Political Technology

The Washington Post reported Saturday that it's going to get ugly. 

Gov. Sarah Palin didn't waste any time that day. According to ABC News:

At a private fundraiser in Englewood, Colo., this morning, and later at a rally in Carson, Calif., this afternoon, Palin for the first time raised Obama’s connection to Ayers, one of the founding members of the Weather Underground, a '60s radical group that took credit for bombing attacks around the country, including explosions set off at the Pentagon and U.S. Capitol.

"Our opponent, though, is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country," Palin told supporters at a $1,000-a-plate fundraiser in Englewood. "Americans need to know this."

Palin cited a front-page article in today’s New York Times that explored the ties between Obama and Ayers. Obama had served on a charity board with Ayers in Chicago during the mid-90s, and Ayers was present at an organizing meeting in 1995 to kick off Obama's first election campaign for the Illinois State Senate.

More incoming fire today. U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's team is pushing back against U.S. Sen. John McCain's "guilt by association" campaign.

According to a 6:30 a.m. ET report by Politico's Mike Allen:

Pushing back against what it calls McCain's “guilt-by-association” tactics, the Obama campaign overnight began e-mailing millions of supporters a link to a website, KeatingEconomics.com, which will have a 13-minute documentary on the scandal beginning at noon Eastern time on Monday. The e-mails urge recipients to pass the link on to friends.

The Obama campaign, including its surrogates appearing on radio and television, will argue that the deregulatory fervor that caused massive, cascading savings-and-loan collapses in the late ‘80s was pursued by McCain throughout his career, and helped cause the current credit crisis.

The 13-minute Web video documentary is now live:

Update at 3:41 p.m. ET: Politico's Ben Smith reports that Obama's Keating campaign may be paying off:  

Obama apparently had today's Charles Keating attack in the can, ready to deploy against an attempt to revive Bill Ayers, and it seems to be working.

A glance at Google Trends finds "keating economics" the second-most-popular search term right now. Numbers 8, 11, 12, and 21 are terms like "keating five" and "charles keating."

Bill Ayers shows up at 36, just after "mccain keating."

The first term is Neal Kashkari, newly tapped to head the bailout. Voter registration terms also rank high.

I've been a long time fan of the Obama campaigns use of mobile media to date, and today they took their mobile strategy a step further.

They lanched a native iPhone/iPod Touch application that connects you directly into the campaign over your device in a number of innovative ways.

You can download it today for free from the official iPhone Application store, but here are the features as described on the campaign page:

My early review of the application very positive. Especially impressive is that when you choose Local Events the App checks your GPS location (for iPhone users) to find the closest campaign office near you at that time. Nice. 

Also for iPhone users: Call friends is a great feature that remembers that this is a PHONE application not simply a small Desktop app. As the author of the app describes this feature:  "It organizes and prioritizes your contacts by key battleground states... Caller stats are then aggregrated anonymously to a leaderboard within the application displaying key stats such as the number of callers and total calls made."

The Obama campaign continues to define and evolve what political mobile media outreach is. All iPhone and iPod Touch users interested in what that can mean should definitely check out this new application.

 

This election cycle, many people have complained that the traditional media has not been doing its job all that well. The general complaint is that instead of giving voters the information they need to make informed and intelligent decisions, the ratings-driven mainstream media increasingly focuses on distractions and sound bites. Some have called for the reform of our traditional media; others have simply bypassed it.

We believe in engaging the non-traditional media. Here are a few of our new-media mentions from the past week:

DailyKos, The Latino Journal, and The South Chicagoan referenced our recent polls of Hispanic voters in key battleground states.

Simon and Rob Shapiro are featured in The American Prospect’s blog, Tapped, as well as Biodun Iginla’s BBC weblog, for their joint statement, “Keep People in Their Homes.” Shapiro also appears in Campaign for America’s Future.

Finally, Michael Moynihan, Director of NDN’s Green Project, has posts in The Huffington Post and Gristmill.

At midnight last night, Twitter launched the first specialized section of their site, election.twitter.com. According to the New York Times, below a box that asks "what do you think?" is

"a constantly scrolling display of the thoughts (called "tweets" in Twitterspeak) of other Twitter users. These include all the tweets entered on the election page as well as those entered in any other part of the service with obvious election-related phrases, such as ‘Palin.'"

Already this morning, there are about 60 posts per minute on the election page. If the debate actually happens tonight (assuming there are no more crazy hail-mary moves from the McCain campaign), expect the page to be flooded with tweets; the company's co-founder says that the service saw "off-the-charts messages per second during the acceptance speeches" of the political conventions. Interestingly, the general public opinion on the election page seems to be pretty pro-Obama, which may reflect the mobile-user political trends I mentioned last week.

Twitter represents a fascinating intersection of different new media; it is like a social networking site, a blog, and a mobile service all rolled into one. To learn more about these tools and how they are fundamentally altering politics in the 21^st century, we encourage you to read our New Policy Institute's New Tools Campaign papers, Go Mobile, Leverage Social Networks and Engage the Blogs.

You can also sign up to follow NDN on Twitter and receive tweets on all of our latest thinking.

In this age of new media and technologies, the music, content, comedy, YouTube clips and news we receive each day is very likely sent to us by friends, family and colleagues. In other words, the content we consume finds it's way to us.

It also is likely that those same people have sent it around to 10 other people and that we will do the same.

I know that's the case with the "Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator," which Gilbert Cruz reported on recently in TIME Magazine.

At least 14 friends and colleagues have sent The Generator to me. It is viral -- and it is hilarious.

Based upon the Alaska Governor's choice of unusual names for her children, The Generator is some kind of program chock full of funny, Hallmark-ish, Paul Bunyan-esque names that invites you to enter your first name and BOOM! You have your own customized Palin moniker.

Mine is Pie Gallon Palin.

Incidentally, I typed U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's name into The Generator: Obama is Chase Rooster Palin.

To generate your own name, click here.

I held out on blogging on this, but The Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator truly illustrates how the new media and technologies of our time can help spread content faster than you can forward an e-mail to your 30 best friends.

Every year the United States takes a time out from September 15-October 15 to recognize the contributions of Hispanics in the United States as part of Hispanic Heritage Month. Hispanics are now recognized as the largest minority in the U.S. - the Census estimates that by 2042 one in four persons will be of Hispanic origin. As this year's Hispanic Heritage Month kicked off this week, it becomes clear that an unprecedented number of Latino voters could decide this year's election, Latinos are increasingly represented in government and industry, Latinos are a growing force in the media - as evidenced by the launch of shows like "Agenda" and "Al Punto" on Spanish language networks, and Hispanics are also becoming web and technology users in rapidly growing numbers.

For these reasons and more, the Pew Hispanic Center reported this week on a survey it conducted on the overall state of Latinos. The report reflects how Hispanics are bearing much of the current economic crisis, combined with suffering increased instances of discrimination.

Half (50%) of all Latinos overall (native and foreign born) say that the situation of Latinos in this country is worse now than it was a year ago, according to this nationwide survey of 2,015 Hispanic adults (higher than the average for non-latinos). Fully 63% of Latino immigrants say that the situation of Latinos has worsened over the past year. In 2007, just 42% of all adult Hispanic immigrants - and just 33% of all Hispanic adults - said the same thing. These increasingly downbeat assessments come at a time when the Hispanic community in this country--numbering approximately 46 million, or 15.4% of the total U.S. population--has been hit the hardest by rising unemployment.

Due mainly to the crisis in the housing and construction industry, the unemployment rate for Hispanics in the U.S. rose to 7.3% in the first quarter of 2008, well above the 4.7% rate for all non-Hispanics, and well above the 6.1% rate for Hispanics during the same period last year. As recently as the end of 2006, the gap between those two rates had shrunk to an historic low of 0.5 percentage points--4.9% for Latinos compared with 4.4% for non-Latinos, on a seasonally adjusted basis. The spike in Hispanic unemployment has hit immigrants especially hard. For the first time since 2003, the unemployment rate for Latinos not born in the United States was higher, at 7.5 percent, than the rate for native-born Latinos, at 6.9 percent, the report found. Latinos make up 14.2% of the U.S. labor force, or roughly 22 million people.

In addition to the economy, issues like immigration, access to health care, and discrimination continue to be of concern to Hispanics and to Hispanic voters. In the Pew survey, one-in-ten Hispanic adults - native-born U.S. citizens (8%) and immigrants (10%) alike - report that in the past year the police or other authorities have stopped them and asked them about their immigration status. Some Latinos are xperiencing other difficulties because of their ethnicity. One-in-seven(15%)say that they have had trouble in the past year finding or keeping a job because they are Latino. One-in-ten (10%) report the same about finding or keeping housing.

On the question of immigration enforcement, the Pew Center's research demonstrates the same data NDN found through our polling on immigration, released last week. Latinos disapprove of current enforcement-only measures - more than four-in-five Hispanics (81%) say that immigration enforcement should be left mainly to the federal authorities rather than the local police and 76% disapprove of workplace raids. Two-thirds (68%) of Latinos who worry a lot that they or someone close to them may be deported say that Latinos' situation in the country today is worse than it was a year ago, as do 63% of Latinos who have experienced job difficulties because of their ethnicity and 71% of Latinos who report housing difficulties because of their ethnicity.

Most Hispanics in the U.S. are native born, i.e., U.S. citizens legally not susceptible to deportation, therefore the fact that most Hispanics worry about raids, immigration, and even facing possible deportation reflects how the existing reckless "enforcement-only" policies are impacting not only foreign Hispanics, but U.S. citizens.

NDN has a history writing and speaking about the Hispanic community as one of the great American demographic stories of the 21st century, recognizing that it will be hard for any political party to build a 21st century political majority without this fast-growing electorate. Hispanics have become one of the most volatile and contested swing voting blocs in American politics, and they are responding to this attention. As reported in Hispanics Rising II, an analysis of the Hispanic electorate and their motivation, Hispanic immigrants are becoming increasingly involved, as reflected by the data released this week by the Immigration Policy Center, demonstrating a spike in citizenship applications. Immigrants want to be U.S. citizens, they want to apply for citizenship, often having to overcome virtually impossible obstacles to be able to pay the obscenely high application filing fees.

Therefore, political candidates will do well to pay attention to the many challenges facing Hispanics today. At the onset of Hispanic Heritage Month this week, both Presidential candidates released statements praising Hispanics' contributions to American society and their military service. The difference between the two statements is that Barack Obama also called for comprehensive immigration reform. On the other hand, John McCain didn't mention it. This is curious because polling for the last 3 or 4 years, including the latest polls conducted by NDN, consistently shows that immigration is of top concern for Hispanic voters.

 

The New York Times this week reported that 17% of American households are now cellphone-only, and that number may reach 20% by the end of the year as tougher economic times and less expensive and easy-to-use mobile devices lead to increased cell phone use.

This trend raises interesting questions about the 2008 presidential election. Higher percentages of cellphone-only users are Millennials and minorities than the national average, and they tend to be more progressive than traditional landline users. For instance, a recent Pew Research Center poll found that cellphone-only voters greatly favored U.S. Sen. Barack Obama over U.S. Sen. John McCain: 61% of voters that were leaning toward a candidate went for Obama, compared to only 32% for McCain. Of those cell-only voters that were certain about their vote, 46% went for Obama while only 18% were voting for McCain.

One common concern is that this trend might throw off national opinion polls by under-representing young people and minorities. Polling companies are certainly aware of this problem, and use statistical weighting and more cell-phone polling to compensate – for example, Gallup now includes cell phones in every national poll they do, and Pew does strategic cell-phone surveys to adjust for differences between groups. While there is no real consensus about whether these measures sufficiently correct for the influence of cell-only voters, we should not assume that Obama has a “hidden” five-point advantage that will materialize in November.

More important than the challenges they pose for pollsters is the fact that cell-only users tend to be more transient and are less likely to be registered to vote. They are harder to reach for voter registration and get-out-the-vote initiatives, but are critical to Obama’s success in November. The Obama campaign understands this, and has revolutionized the use of mobile technology in politics by launching Obama Mobile, which uses SMS messaging to help register voters and remind them to actually vote, as well as to send them regular campaign updates. By inviting people to sign up to receive the text announcement of his VP choice, the Obama campaign added many new mobile numbers into their database, which should translate into increased turnout from cell-only users come November.

The Obama campaign has also launched Obama Movil, the Spanish-language version of Obama Mobil. This is especially important, given that Hispanics are more likely to be cell-only users and use text-messaging more than many other demographics (49% of adult Latinos use text-messaging on their mobile phones, compared to 31% of whites), but use the Internet and landlines less than other groups. Mobile technology is therefore critical in reaching a demographic that could have a profound influence on the outcome of this election. The Obama program seems poised to build on the success of similar text-based programs for Hispanics. 

NDN and the New Politics Institute have been talking about the increasing importance of mobile technology to progressives for some time, and we are finally seeing the new politics coming of age in a big way. To read more from us about how mobile technology is changing politics as we know it, read our NPI papers Go Mobile and The Progressive Politics of the Millennial Generation.

Earlier this week, NDN and its long-time collaborator and pollster, Sergio Bendixen, released a new set of compelling polls that shows overwhelming support for comprehensive immigration reform in the four battleground states of Florida, Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada.

To read the compilation of the four polls, click here. To read the Executive Summary of the polls, click here.

Despite another week of Palin-mania, the polls, released at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute's Public Policy Conference, received a good deal of attention in the press, which is beginning to understand that the Hispanic electorate may very well determine who is sitting in the Oval Office next January.

USA TODAY'S Kathy Kiely led off the coverage, quoting Simon in her article, Polls: Latinos favor Obama in 3 important battleground states.

Marcelo Raimon covered the poll for ANSA, Italian News Agency.

In his post, McCain's support boost does NOT include Latinos, The South Chicagoan's Gregory Tejeda cites NDN's new polls in his explanation of why he thinks McCain is not picking up new Latino support.

UPI summarized the poll in its Top News roundup.

The Thaiindian News reported on the polls in its report, Hispanics support Obama in four crucial states: Poll.

Columnist Ruben Navarette cited NDN and Bendixen's polls in his recent piece, Palin could help McCain with Latino vote.

The Tampa Bay Times blog, The Buzz, carried the USA TODAY article about the polls and the immigration reform issue.

Adrian Perez from the Latino Journal also showcased the poll coverage from USA TODAY.

And yesterday, Markos Moulitas, or kos of dailykos.com, wrote this about the polls:

Great new NDN polling of Florida, Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico shows huge support for comprehensive immigration reform (PDF) in some of the states most affected by immigration. I'll have more on this poll later.

Check back later for more on the immigration reform issue.

And just for fun - I think Matt Damon brings up a good point.

I love the comment a VERY conservative friend of mine made when I sent him this video: "Caring or quoting what celebrities think about anything is usually cause for a punch line, but in this case, he happens to be correct."

His comment reflects how during this election, unlike any other, people are switching parties, switching preferences, and reflecting over a broader array of issues that are less substantive but no less relevant - issues like race and age in a Presidential election, the role of a Vice Presidential nominee - much more than in the past.

 

 

 

 

Here on the blog, we've frequently written about how text messages are playing a more important role in politics. From informing people how to get involved to announcing Vice Presidential picks, these quick and easy messages have evolved from a neat idea into a critical means of communicating to key groups. So it's not really a surprise that their use is being further explored, the latest example coming from the DCCC. Check out their text message below:

During McCain's speech, we'll text u facts to counter Republican lies. It's time 4 change, not more of the same old spin. Tell others to text 'rnc' to 30644. 

To learn more about text messaging in politics, check out Go Mobile Now and Mobile Media in 21st Century Politics, two great papers from our New Politics Institute.