Akkam’s RazorIf you are wearing a 'Born-to-be-Wild' t-shirt, you probably aren't.

This will be interesting to watch because money will no longer be the only way to present ideas. Whether you believe it or not, I assert that campaigns have always been about ideas. In some cases those ideas are watered down, but ultimately people vote based on ideas. In other words, does one candidate appear to think about something in a way that supports the voter’s world view. Given that, the best way to reach voters with a candidate’s ideas has been through direct mail, print, radio, and television. Each of those outlets were typically utilized using advertisements, and increasingly using media manipulation tactics such as press conferences and your grab bag of so-called "publicity stunts."

What we are seeing now is that voters turn to thought leaders in the communities of their choice and that those thought leaders tend to seek out conversations to bring to their communities. These thought leaders are tending to find these ideas and conversations in non commercial are semi-commercial outlets. Many of those outlets are blogs. Regardless of whether or not these outlets are blogs, the more relevant point is that they are difficult to buy your way into on a large manageable scale. Instead, what we saw from the rapid success of the Howard Dean campaign, was that it was more effective to stimulate conversations and empower micro campaign worlds complete with their own fundraising and media buying structures.

This just goes back to my new Rule of 72, and what elements of our broken system are going to lead to the big change and the dawn of the new republic.