The San Luis Obispo Tribune

Dean's Internet grassroots flourish here
'Meet ups' online are drawing 125 supporters

Jeff Ballinger
The Tribune

Johnny Gunn had never been a political activist before seeing Howard Dean in March being interviewed by television talk show host Tim Russert.

The 77-year-old Morro Bay man said he had never even heard of Dean, the former Vermont governor and physician who has shaken up the Democratic campaign for president by out-raising his more well-known competitors by using the Internet.

"He woke me up," Gunn said Friday, recalling the television show. "He really made a a lot of sense. I said, 'God, that's the guy. That's the guy who's going to do it.' "

Gunn said he jumped on the Web and began searching for more information about Dean and found links to www.meetup.com, a Web site that organizes informal gatherings of people to talk about almost anything.

More than 69,000 people have signed up to attend "meet ups" all around the country on the first Wednesday of each month, according to the Web site.

Gunn is now among a growing group of local residents attending "meet ups" to chat about Dean with believers and those who are still making up their minds who they'll support.

"It's the first time I've seen grassroots actually be grassroots."

"It's an amazing tool," said Sandy Cook, one of the unofficial hosts of the San Luis Obispo meet up. "The group here started with three people back in March who met on ... MeetUp.com."

At the last meeting one month ago, Gunn said, the number of Dean-backers had swelled to 125 people.

Welcome to a new era in political campaigns.

Candidates still sling mud. Buttons, leaflets and bumper stickers are still used too, but they aren't as effective at defining a candidate's position on an issue.

E-mails, Web logs and meet-ups are the new medium.

"The Internet seems to be moving in on politics as it is on everything," said Gunn. "Ain't it great?"

Dean's Web site - www.dean foramerica.com - links to various other political sites and boasts about an incident last week that illustrates the Internet's potential in what may come to be seen as a turning point in presidential campaign fund-raising.

Vice President Dick Cheney announced he would attend a $2,000-a-plate luncheon last Monday to raise about $300,000 in contributions.

Dean's Web site put out a challenge asking supporters to match the total, and wound up raising more than $500,000 over three days without spending much time or money.

Two weeks ago, Dean's campaign announced it had raised more than $5 million through the Internet this year.

This grassroots effort has helped Dean top his party's competitors in a recent Field Poll of California democrats, and has caught the attention recently of the national media.

The New York Times reported Wednesday that Dean had raised $7.6 million during the second quarter of 2003 -Êtopping all Democratic candidates - mostly in small contributions from 59,000 people.

Using the Internet as a primary fund-raising tool has propelled Dean to what pundits are now calling a serious candidate.

Another national newspaper, The Christian Science Monitor, reported Thursday that the electronic fund-raising techniques "are already playing a significant role in shaping the Democratic primary battle, getting more ordinary citizens involved earlier and shifting influence from big to small donors. If the trend continues, observers say it could transform the entire political process."

Also taking notice are local political activists.

George Galvan, the immediate past president of the county's Republican Central Committee who is now running Sam Blakeslee's campaign for state Assembly, would like to see more candidates in his party use the tool.

"They should, because it's relatively easy to do and I think it's a little cheaper, probably, to get your message out there," he said.

"I think if Dean could sustain himself and last through New Hampshire, people might say 'if it works for him, it might work for me.' "

"The way that we do a campaign from now on is going to be a little bit different," said Bud Zeuschner, Galvan's counterpart with the county's Democratic Central Committee.

While other Democratic candidates like Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and Florida Sen. Bob Graham have a newfound interest in using the Internet in their campaigns, they haven't generated much local interest with them, Zeuschner said.

Local supporters of Dennis Kucinich have a booth at the San Luis Obispo farmers market, as do Dean's.

"The buzz I mostly hear is for Dean," said Zeuschner, who is also a speech professor at Cal Poly. "I think that's where the action and the interest is."

Galvan said the interest in Dean is mostly because he's new to the national political scene.

Zeuschner said Dean may be capitalizing on a general weariness the public has for campaign ads on television, and that they may view the relatively new medium as less insincere.

"There's something a little bit more direct and less staged and programmed about these messages."

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