What do you do if you’re a lonely liberal in, say, La Junta who wants to affect politics across the state?
You go online, say the activists at ProgressNow.org, formerly the Rocky Mountain Progressive Coalition, who Thursday unveiled a new website that gives far-flung activists – including conservatives, to a point – the tools with which to build a movement.
Found online at www.progressnowaction.org, the website has its roots in the Web-savvy presidential campaign of Vermont Gov. Howard Dean.
Now, activists working on smaller issues can access technology that former Dean staffers say is the next step in the online evolution of politics.
They can research registered voters in their communities, contact legislators and newspapers, create blogs and build social networks to take their ideas into the political realm.
“We started asking the question: ‘Knowing what we know now, if we could start over, what would we do?”‘ said Bobby Clark, a former Dean staffer who now works at ProgressNow.org.
Michael Huttner, who heads the Web activist group funded by some of the state’s wealthiest liberal political donors, says he believes the new website eventually will be copied in other states.
And despite his group’s political stance, the Web tools might even further some causes it doesn’t agree with, he said. Content will be vetted, with close calls settled by the group’s board of directors, he said.
Jon Caldara, president of the conservative Independence Institute in Golden, said he thought the website sounded like a logical next step for online organizing.
“Time will only tell” whether the site can affect state politics, he said.
Staff writer Jim Hughes can be reached at 303-820-1244 or jhughes@denverpost.com.
