Virtual vote-getting
JULIE DELCOUR World Editorial Writer
07/28/2002
Tulsa World (Final Home Edition), Page G1 of Opinion

Some ‘sites' for sore eyes
Four years ago, Phil Noble, founder of PoliticsOnline.com, the world's first political Internet company, made several predictions about the upcoming general election.

Noble believed 1998 would be the first year that a candidate a won or lost an election because of Internet campaigning. That candidate, he projected, might turn out to be a thirtysomething newcomer who would unseat "an old white guy who's been sitting there for 20 years and hasn't even heard of the Internet -- and he'll never see it coming. Every newspaper in the country is going to do a story, and every politician is going to say, `I want to get me some of that.' "

Some of Noble's soothsaying came to pass. He was right about the Internet becoming a political force and it's getting bigger with each election.

In 2002, a www can be found in front of the names of almost all serious candidates for major office, and quite a few who just want to look serious. E-campaigning is now a site (actually a multitude of sites) for sore eyes.

Here's a sampling of World Wide Web sites in Oklahoma:

For those who missed Gary Richardson, the Independent candidate for governor, sharing Cajun barbecue with supporters earlier this year, don't despair -- a virtual taste test can be had in the photo gallery of Richardsonforgovernor.org . The candidate who promotes free turnpikes is offering the same on the information super highway. Voters can look -- for free -- at his master plan, his biography and even a campaign version of the Daniel of Babylon parable. They can see a webcast, meet his wife.

Not to be outdone, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Vince Orza also offers his stand on the issues, his background and other information on orzaforgovernor.com . Voters can even peek inside a cyber photo album featuring family vacation pics. There's Vince, the wife and the daughters in front of the Great Pyramid. Where are the camels?

Steve Largent's lifelike face beams off the Web site of largentforgovernor.com . A banner streams across the screen with the snappy slogan: "Raising expectations while removing barriers to growth." There's a lot more there about the Republican candidate for governor who, of course, mentions that along with being a family man, community leader and a former congressman he also is a professional athlete.

Some particularly scintillating bedtime browsing is available at the Web sites of candidates for state auditor. There's Democratic candidate Jeff McMahan's R+R-R=R theory. For those without a computer or Internet access, the formula stands for: "Rules plus regulations minus a relationship equals rebellion." Go figure.

Noble brought PoliticsOnline.com on the scene in 1996 and has made it into a worldwide concern. His company has assisted hundreds of campaigns, including three presidential races in foreign countries, with a variety of advice about online fundraising and campaigning. He claims that the impact of the Internet will eclipse what television has accomplished in the 42 years since the Kennedy-Nixon debates.

With TV ads, "a candidate is buying access to a certain number of eyeballs for a certain amount of time. We will soon come to a point where we're buying access to voters' attention in various ways: Online advertising, video postcards, short message services on telephones. Eventually it's all going to become one big medium. It's changing very fast."

One thing Noble doesn't see going out of style is live campaigning, pressing the flesh. "That's always vital. Technology is about communicating a message. Flesh and blood politics is about who I am as a candidate."

Noble's views about the essentiality of Internet e-campaigning aren't shared by all, including many of his fellow consultants.

"As long as you have candidates whose first question is, `What did you do to win last time?' (the consultants) "are going to do more of the same."

Candidates whose strategy is to simply buy 30-second spots on the three major networks and run them a bunch of times hoping the message will sink in eventually are going to lose, Noble predicts. "That will become passé, ineffective, the market is too splintered."'

More than 50 percent of voters have access to the Internet and that number is increasing rapidly. The world is changing and politics needs to change with it, Noble said. What could be better than the Internet reconnecting people to politics?

"There are worse things in the world than the five- minute activists who log on, visit a candidate Web site, like what they see and make a $50 donation on their credit card.

"People are going to do politics differently with a new set of terms and relationships. The voters will choose when and where they do politics."

Will candidates and consultants get with the program? "This is a revolution. People die in revolutions" Noble says.

If incumbents and newcomers alike choose to ignore what's happening, he predicts that a whole lot of politicians are going to take a cyber bullet.

Julie DelCour is an editorial writer for the Tulsa World.


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