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John Kerry Online
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John Kerry
SITE OF THE WEEK

For the first time in history, the web is a powerful force in the presidential elections. Howard Dean gets credit for making the Web matter. Now everybody in the race is online. The better the web site, it seems, the better the candidates chances.

 

VISIT: The official John Kerry web site

THE NUTS & BOLTS

Two weeks ago political pundits told us that Howard Dean was practically unstoppable because he alone among Democratic presidential candidates had tapped the youthful power of the Internet. Following John Kerry’s back-to-back victories in Iowa in New Hampshire, the pundits are singing a new tune. "Forget the hype about blogs and backpacks," Newsweek magazine now declares. The new buzz is "electability".

But the pundits should be careful not to throw the baby out with the bath water. No matter who wins the nomination, the 2004 campaign has already proven that the Web is a critical new electioneering tool. Dean was the first to prove that a good site could pull in millions of dollars in small denominations from grassroots contributors. Dean supporters used the Web to organize "meet-up" rallies and coordinate activities and chat about their candidate online.

The credit for all that goes to Joe Trippi, Dean’s maverick campaign manager who quit this week immediately following Dean’s second-place showing in New Hampshire. He was replaced this week by Al Gore’s former campaign manager Ron Neal. Trippi is widely credited with turning a little-known Vermont ex-governor into the hottest media star of the season by using the Web to marshal opponents of the Iraq War into a cohesive, energetic following. This week Howard Dean’s BlogforAmerica.com site was filled with farewell messages to Trippi, and the pundits were telling us that the Web may not be the powerhouse they thought.

That’s ridiculous, of course. When the dot-com bubble burst in the Nineties, the Internet did not come tumbling down. The Internet grew. We learned megabytes from those exploding entrepreneurs. And just as certainly, whether Dean goes the distance or blows up, Joe Trippi has infused the Democratic campaign with energy and set the web site standard. And nobody has learned more from Dean’s excellent Internet adventure than John Kerry.

JohnKerry.com was designed by the V2 Group out of San Francisco that doesn’t even list the project among their clients. I called them and got a call back from Morra Aarons who is Director of Internet Communications for the Kerry campaign.

"I don’t think its fair to say we absorbed the Dean site," she explained. "We redesigned our site around Halloween in 2003. It’s lean and mean…It’s very much a volunteer effort."

While Dean seized on ideas like the "Meet Up" software early, Aarons says, all the candidates have been using pretty much the same approach online. Kerry’s site, she says, reflects the candidate it represents. The Kerry campaign too gets ideas from blogs and grassroots interactivity and has always been serious about the Internet, just as it has about every aspect of the media.

"The web is part of everybody’s daily web life now," she says, "But the Internet isn’t running for President."

THE WEB SITE MAKERS

We learned how political web sites must look back in 2000. That hasn’t changed much. Gen. Wes Clark’s site is typical. There is the obligatory American flag banner along the top with the bold logo on the left. The "contribute" and "volunteer" boxes go on the right. The recent color action photo with the candidate standing among "the people" goes in the middle. John Edwards follows the pattern, although his site is a little too busy with links, a wiggling Liberty Bell, and an animated headline tape

Even Dennis Kucinich, the nice man with the exciting ideas and the hard-to-spell name, manages to look like everyone else on what has to be a shoe-string budget. Unfortunately, someone beat him to his own domain name and put up a parody site. So instead of a dot-com, his Web address isKucinich-dot-us. . Talk about doomed. Joe Lieberman, who took the fifth in the NH Primary, was sporting an unconvincing smile on his site this week with the headline "Thumbs Up in NH".

JohnKerry.com looks like the rest of the pack, but look closer. The masthead of the site is all blue with only a subtle flag motif. The layout has more breathing room. The site changes often and is rich with content. There are plenty of streaming video clips that run large and smoothly. There are lots of photos, lots and lots of political endorsements. Where Kerry has been featured in magazines like Rolling Stone, Atlantic and Vogue – the entire story is online – not just a snippet.

Kerry’s promoters clearly know that his wife, heiress and philanthropist Teresa Heinz Kerry, is going to play a major role in the campaign. She is featured prominently, her "info" button located just below a history of Kerry’s war record and just above his stance on key issues.

The right side of the site, and this is important, looks like something by Joe Trippi. Kerry too has ‘meet-ups" and a prominent blog button. If and when Howard Dean’s youthful army is set adrift, the Kerry camp wants them to feel right at home. The graphic of a bus, popular with volunteer Deaners, is here too. You can by Kerry gear, or hear a forgettable folk tune by Peter Yarrow, formerly of Peter, Paul and Mary. Download a screensaver, a "buddy icon" digital wallpaper or a campaign volunteer kit, photos or an MPs of the song "Funky President." The grassroots endorsements so essential to the Dean energy, are here as well.

Somebody in the Kerry camp has been paying attention. Somebody has been spending a lot of money on this web site, prepping it, hopefully, for use not only as a promotional tool, but as an interactive tool as well. The difference, ultimately, is that JohnKerry.com, like the man it hypes, is more buttoned-down. Where Dean offered open access to his many constituencies, Kerry’s site is forthcoming, but clearly edited. There are special "community" web pages featuring his appeal to veterans, firefighters, gays, blacks, women, Native Americans, sportsmen, young and senior voters, blue collar workers, Asians, environmentalists and the disabled. Kerry’s site exercises more maturity and control, and that may be exactly what Democrats will be looking for as the real presidential showdown looms.

THE UP SHOT

I met John Kerry recently when he was in the dumpster. Heading into the Iowa caucus he couldn’t avoid seeing Howard Dean’s face on the cover of Time magazine. The polls showed Dean with a commanding lead and Kerry, who has had presidential dreams since the age of 18, was bummed out. He spoke to a group of loyalists in the living room of a beautifully-appointed 18th century Portsmouth home. It didn’t help matters when the host referred to him three times in her introduction as "Senator John F. Kennedy".

Up close, Kerry stands tall, like Abe Lincoln in a JFK wig. He speaks deliberately like a man who has been in politics for a long time. It was 9pm and he had been on the campaign trail since dawn, yet there was energy left in him. Kerry was humbled and spoke candidly about his underdog position. After his stump speech, three or four of us explained that we were impressed by his record, but still drawn to the energy of Howard Dean. I was disappointed, I said, that he had not taken a stand against the Iraq War.

"I know," he said dryly. "I get that at home too."

We talked for seven minutes, according to my wife’s record. For much of the time Kerry rested his large hand on my left shoulder. He offered a number of good reasons why he, a man who had both served in and protested the Viet Nam War, had not voted against the Iraq initiative.

"Too complicated," I said after each explanation. "Too confusing. You have to dumb it down for us and spice it up."

"I don’t want to dumb it down," Kerry said, with gentle frustration. But he was not angry, not even when someone compared Howard Dean to Jesus. He seemed determined to understand why he was missing the pulse of the campaign, and willing to hone his message, to get the words right, as long as he didn’t have to change his position.

Suddenly Comeback Kerry is finding the Web is his new best friend. In the first two days after his New Hampshire victory, according to the Associated Press, Kerry raised $500,000 through his web site. That’s five times what he had previously garnered on his best Internet day. The man is looking a lot happier than he did the evening we met. Nothing like a half million bucks in your email browser to brighten the day.