Wednesday 25 March 2009

Did the web or the ground game matter most for Obama?

There is an engaged critique of Change We Need from Anthony Painter over at Liberal Conspiracy, and an interesting nuanced discussion which Nick Anstead, co-editor, has also joined in, to suggest that "Obama didn’t win because of the internet, but he wouldn’t have won without it”. Anthony thinks the old-fashioned organising was more important. (I suspect they are both right). (Anthony is author of 'Barack Obama: The Movement for Change' and has a good blog at anthonypainter.co.uk).

Alastair Campbell's reflections on the event can be read on LabourList and his own blog.

Tom Miller was going to say pretty much what I said about Luke Akehurst. (Tom is a Compassite Fabian of suspiciously freethinking tendencies. He is also helping Mr Derek Draper in his declared intention to end the top down party (work in progress!) which does sound suspicously like a classic case of Entryism to me. On which topic there is a rather splendid post in the comments from David Floyd.


I remember in my young Labour days attending a Westminster gathering where a then member of the Young Labour National Committee, who I'd never met before, came up to me and barked "are you a Trot?"

Apparently it would've been too much to waste valuable denunciation time with a more polite "hello, I'm ?*^%, pleased to meet you, are or are you not a supporter of the replacement of the mixed economy with a socialist system based on the management of industry by a series of democratically elected workers councils?"


Finally, much outraged twittering suggests the event may end up being remembered for our Trot-bashing party hack's 'sweetheart' controversy. This has found its way to Iain Dale's blog, via an audience member who was also, like me, rather reminded of Life on Mars.

If you're posting elsewhere on this, do let us know in the comments. We'll keep flagging up the most interesting responses too.

1 comment:

Tom said...

"which does sound suspicously like a classic case of Entryism to me"

Drat. Fingered.