In today's issue of Roll Call (sorry, subscription required), Nathan Gonzales of the Rothenberg Political Report takes a fairly interesting look at how various party committees are interacting with the grassroots on the internet, both on the left and on the right. Skipping past the rehashing of history that should be familiar to many here (Illinois 6; the broader battle for the 50-state, 435-district strategy; Lieberman-Lamont; etc.), I thought the more interesting sections of the article covered how the way Democratic committees are approaching the internet and how Republican ones are differ.

At this point, Democratic bloggers are more demanding and require more care from the committees than their Republican counterparts. Democratic bloggers have sought recognition as strategists, particularly on resource allocation and candidate recruitment, rather than just fundraisers.

This distinction is apparent in how the committees are structured. Taryn Rosenkranz, the DCCC's director of online services, oversees a staff of three people, including Stakeholder blogger Brandon English, and answers to both Executive Director Brian Wolff and Communications Director Jennifer Crider. Jesse Lee, who handled online outreach for the committee for the past two cycles, now blogs for Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on The Gavel.

Mike Liddell is beginning his third cycle at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and is the director of online communications. He temporarily is a one-man operation, running the committee's official blog and reporting to DSCC Executive Director J.B. Poersch.

On the Republican side, online liaisons are more junior positions and are a part of the communications department. The National Republican Senatorial Committee has hired John Randall as the e-press secretary, working under Communications Director Rebecca Fisher.

Josh Shultz is the new media director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, falling under Communications Director Jessica Boulanger. Shultz is filling the position for the only committee that didn't previously have a dedicated staffer for online activity.

I probably wouldn't have written, "Democratic bloggers are more demanding and require more care from the committees than their Republican counterparts". I think that kind of misses the point. Yes, it's true that currently dealing with the Netroots is "more demanding" than dealing with the Rightroots, but that's because the Netroots are significantly larger than the Rightroots at this point and showed a greater ability to play significant roles in congressional elections in 2006, particularly on the fundraising and messaging side.

But leaving that point aside, I think it's quite telling that internet outreach coordinators in both the NRSC and the NRCC "are more junior positions and are a part of the communications department" rather than stand-alone operations that are at least somewhat independent from the communications department, as the DSCC and the DCCC have things set up. Whether this is a result of the fact that the Netroots are to this point more developed than the Rightroots or because Republicans don't trust their online grassroots supporters or whatever else, it's clear that the GOP committees just aren't giving the type of attention or placing the type of importance on internet activism that the Democratic committees are.

Of course this does not mean that the DSCC and the DCCC are at the beck and call of the Netroots right now. Certainly there remain areas in which the Netroots and the Democratic party committees do not entirely see eye-to-eye, and I would be surprised if there weren't a continued give and take over things like recruitment, allocation of resources, embrace of the grassroots, etc.. That said, the congressional campaign committees on this side do seem to be putting more and more of an emphasis on reaching out to the Netroots, even if superficially, whether it is DSCC chair Chuck Schumer sitting down with me for an interview with MyDD and asking for help recruiting at Daily Kos (where he apparently first learned of Ron Sparks down in Alabama) or new DCCC chair Chris Van Hollen live-blogging at FDL.

Keeping up this dialogue can't be a bad thing. (Yes, we'd love to get Congressman Van Hollen to speak with the MyDD community, too!) Because as long as that line of communication is open, the Democratic party committees and the Netroots can work more closely, rather than separately, towards the shared goal of growing the Democratic majorities in Congress so that more progressive legislation can be enacted into law.