Mousepads, Shoe Leather, and Hope

Authored by Teachout, Zephyr; Streeter, Thomas

“To really use the Internet well, you have to build community, not just enable fundraising.” —from the interview with Howard Dean “Written with the passion, enthusiasm and honesty that characterized Howard Dean’s historic grassroots presidential campaign, Mousepads, Shoe Leather and Hope shows how the Internet can transcend cynicism, build communities, and engage ordinary people in a way that is already rejuvenating our democracy.” —Matthew R. Kerbel, editor, Get This Party Started: How Progressives Can Fight Back and Win “The way we do politics changed in 2004. The Dean Campaign gave new meaning to grassroots organizing, revitalizing democracy – and the Democratic Party along with it. A glorious failure, it may yet prove to herald new triumphs. The Internet was at the core of that moment, and this volume captures the flavor and excitement of those heady – and headstrong – days.” —Toby Miller, author, Cultural Citizenship: Cosmopolitanism, Consumerism, and Television in a Neoliberal Age “Here scholars of communication and politics, as well as activists on that and other campaigns, offer analysis beyond the partisan sound bite.” —Book News Inc.

• Part I Overviews; Chapter 1 Introduction, Thomas Streeter; Chapter 2 How the Internet Taught Me That You Have the Power; Chapter 3 Theories, Thomas Streeter, Zephyr Teachout; Part II Stories of the Campaign; Chapter 4 How a Blogger and the Dean Campaign Discovered Each Other, Jerome Armstrong; Chapter 5 Something Much Bigger Than a Candidate, Zephyr Teachout; Chapter 6 Swept Up in “The Perfect Storm”, Bobby Clark; Chapter 7 A Coder Becomes a Political Activist, Aldon Hynes; Chapter 8 Blogging for America, Mathew Gross; Chapter 9 The Meetup Story, Michael Silberman; Chapter 10 Experiences of a Grassroots Activist, Pam Paul; Chapter 11 The Lessons of Generation Dean, Amanda Michel; Chapter 12 Fund-Raising, Larry Biddle; Chapter 13 A Web Activist Finds Dean, Nicco Mele; Chapter 14 E-Mail, Kelly Nuxoll; Chapter 15 Part Icipatory Political Culture, Josh Koenig; Chapter 16 An Organizer’s View of the Internet Campaign, Zack Exley; Chapter 17 After New Hampshire, Kelly Nuxoll; Part III Reflections; Chapter 18 From Media Politics to Networked Politics, Araba Sey, Manuel Castells; Chapter 19 The Legacies of Dean’s Internet Campaign, Zephyr Teachout, Thomas Streeter;