Two weeks ago, with tremendous help from the New Politics Institute, a report Matt and I wrote about the structure of the progressive political blogosphere was distributed to Democratic staffers, activists and officials around the country. Although I have no distribution network for this addendum to that memo except my blog and my personal email list, I would like to alert the entire Democratic establishment to something very important that happened within the netroots over the past twenty-four hours: the meteoric rise of Russ Feingold following his announcement of an exit strategy that included a timeline, firm dates, and total troop withdrawal.

For at least three decades, on a federal and statewide level American politic campaigns have been defined by television ads. As a result, a profession, even a culture, has built up around televised political ads. Now, almost every campaign has what they call a "number mover" ad: the sort of ad that it hopes will shake up static public opinion. Of course, as New Politics Institute keeps reminding us, in three years half of the homes in America will have some form of replay television, and won't be watching nearly as many, if any, commercials. In this developing environment, how does one go about moving numbers? That is a difficult question to answer, and if I had a blanket response that would work everywhere I'd be a multi-millionaire consultant.

However, while I don't have a blanket answer, like many others who spend their days amongst the netroots, I have known for some time exactly how a prospective Democratic nominee could move his or her numbers without running a single ad of any kind. Actually, it is rather simple: offer a real plan to get out of Iraq.

Don't believe me? Look at three candidates from the first two Dailykos community 2008 straw polls, Clinton, Feingold, and Edwards, who have been battling it out for a distant second behind Clark. You can find the June poll here and the July poll here.

	     June     July 
Clinton     36.8%    37.0%
Feingold    35.6%    35.5%
Edwards     27.6%    27.5%

(Note: Percentages reflect the percentages of votes each candidate received from the combined total of Clinton, Feingold and Edwards votes)

Clinton, Feingold and Edwards had nearly identical, and static, support among the netroots in these two polls. Now, look at the numbers in the August straw poll, one day after Feingold declared that he supported a timeline with fixed dates and a real plan for withdrawal:

	    August
Feingold    53.0%
Clinton     25.0%
Edwards     22.0%

(Note: numbers as of this writing)

Now that is what I call moving numbers. One single policy proposal completely altered the way the netroots saw these three candidates in relative terms. And that is in one day, with one policy. There is, quite simply, nothing else a candidate could do to move support in the netroots as quickly as this, period.

* * *

Now, I know that this begs a lot of questions (questionable use of phrase noted). The first such question is whether or not the netroots really are as non-ideological in their support of Democratic candidates as Markos of Dailykos claims they are. My answer is no, though by no means a complete departure from his position. We are ideological, but there are a number of generally non-ideological reforms in the Democratic Party desperately sought by the netroots:

• Improved intellectual infrastructure. The netroots is extremely frustrated by the vast think-tank apparatus on the right, and wishes for few things more than a full-fledged progressive counter to this apparatus. We are getting killed on think tank funding, which results in being devastated in think tank media mentions, which itself results in shifting the national debate to the right. Almost unanimously, we are behind the efforts of Democracy Alliance to make this a reality.

• Improved Progressive Media. Again, the netroots is fully supportive of efforts by Air America and others to build real progressive media, and establish a flourishing progressive media marketplace to rival that currently possessed by conservatives. While we do not believe that such media necessarily has to favor one Democratic ideology over another, we do believe that it has tangible benefits for progressivism and the party as a whole.

• Electoral Strategy. I am not going to revisit the recent clashes between the netroot, the DCCC and other party committees here. Instead, it should suffice to say that netroots supported projects such as Leave No District Behind and Project 90 reflect a division behind widely held strategic visions among the netroots and the Democratic establishment. Again, this is a strategic issue, rather than an ideological one.

• Party Reform. The entire reform Democratic movement online generally focuses not on ideological divisions within the party, but rather on building an effective opposition movement to modern Republicans. A quick five bullet point summary of what it means to be a Reform Democrat can be found here.

These are vast organizational and structural issues that concern wide swaths of the blogosphere and are not, at least primarily, issues that should cause ideological divisions within the Democratic Party.

Now, that being said, that does not mean when it comes to ideology that the progressive netroots are an empty vessel into which any candidate may pour her or his ideas. It also does not mean that the netroots are generally representative of the ideological predilections of the Democratic Party as a whole. Rather, it can be said with little doubt that the progressive netroots are noticeably to the left of the Democratic leadership, and to the left of Democratic rank and file. Even though we are extremely, if not primarily, concerned with the four non-ideological issues facing the Democratic Party that I listed above, no one should ever make a mistake that, when considered as a whole, the progressive netroots would find a very comfortable home within the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

A look at the chart in this post should help in making this clear. It is from a poll of Dean activists conducted by Pew earlier this year, and Howard Dean remains the living, patron saint of the progressive netroots. As you can gather from this chart, netroots Democrats overwhelmingly self-identify as liberal or progressive, vehemently oppose the Iraq war, favor gay marriage, etc. Thus, while Democrats who take the structural and organizational challenges facing the party seriously will receive tremendous support online no matter their ideology, when it comes to choosing something like a Presidential nominee or a committee leader, our first choice will be to go for someone who is both interested in reform and is a progressive. (Of course, since we are also "pragmatic," we do also support candidates who we believe can win. Thus, for example, we witnessed Feingold's precipitous fall from his original position as the 2008 netroots favorite early this year following his divorce. Also, witness the tremendous online support for Rep. Chris Bell in his run for Governor of Texas. We are not naïve enough to believe that a wild, flaming lefty can win where he is running.)

If you want to effectively communicate with the netroots, and if you want to effectively harness its power, then you need to recognize that we are ideological as well as reformist. We are Reform Democrats, but we also tend to be Progressive Democrats. We are also much, much more powerful than we were in mid-2003 when Dean began his meteoric rise. Imagine where we will be in 2007. Just keep that in mind if you are running for President, or crafting a national message on Iraq, or really anything else on a national level. Ideology is by no means the only thing that drives us, but it does drive us.

Oh yeah, and if you think the way Feingold's numbers moved online by announcing a plan for withdrawal was remarkable, note that was the one area where the netroots are more conservative than the rank and file according to Pew.