MoveOn.Org: Democracy in Action
•Introduction
MoveOn.Org is “an online assemblage of 3 million souls who co-exist in cyberspace and who are exerting a leftward pull on the Democratic Party in particular and the nation’s politics in general,” wrote veteran political reporter Carl M. Cannon in the Dec. 2, 2006 National Journal. MoveOn.Org has grown from a grassroots Web site into a political force in less than a decade. Today, it has more than 3.3 million members, people with progressive views who gather on the site to find information on policy issues. Then, instead of simply mulling the issues over at home, they take action. MoveOn employs a staff of 15, and along with more than 200,000 volunteers, the site organizes Get Out The Vote drives, online petitions, congressional visits and protests. MoveOn’s reach has spread to every state and congressional district. And, perhaps most importantly, it learned how to use the Internet to raise a substantial amount of money. In 2004, MoveOn raised more money for political candidates than the National Rifle Association or American Medical Association.
•History
MoveOn.Org began as a conversation between a husband and wife. Joan Blades and Wes Boyd founded Berkeley Systems, a gaming software company, in Berkeley, Calif. In September 1998, the couple decided they were tired of watching the Republican majority in the House of Representatives focus solely on President Bill Clinton’s relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. “We were increasingly frustrated by the paralysis of the government, particularly the failure of elected leaders to get back to the business of governing,” Blades and Boyd wrote in their 2004 book, MoveOn’s 50 Ways to Love Your Country. “Nobody needed to be educated about the situation anymore. People had well-formed opinions, and the vast majority leaned toward ‘Get over it! Censure the guy, and get back to the serious business of running this country.’ But the folks in [the district] seemed to be living in a parallel universe ⎯ one that didn’t put the needs of citizens above the advantage to be gained by partisan politics.” Blades and Boyd felt as many Americans did at the moment. For most couples, the conversation fizzled out over dinner. But the software owners did something different. They e-mailed a one-sentence petition to around 100 family members and friends. “Congress must immediately censure President Clinton and move on to pressing issues facing the nation,” the petition read.
Focusing on their sentiment ⎯ move on ⎯ they set up MoveOn.Org’s first Web site. Their petition gathered a following as the original recipients forwarded the e-mail to their friends, and it had more than 100,000 signatures in a week. This is a phenomenal response for a petition. Obtaining the same number of signatures by hand would have required an enormous amount of human labor. By the following winter, the petition would have more than a half million signatures, and had generated more than 250,000 phone calls about the impeachment debate. Their efforts did not stop the House from passing articles of impeachment, but political scientists think MoveOn’s petition, and the organized opposition it created, was a significant factor in the Senate’s decision not to force Clinton out of office.
MoveOn maintained the Web site after the impeachment crisis, and moved on itself to other political issues. It created a Political Action Committee to raise money for political candidates through its MoveOn PAC, today called MoveOn Political Action. The social activism and media reform arm of the organization remains as MoveOn Civic Action.
•2008 Election
MoveOn plans to spend $35 million in the 2008 presidential election. Most of that money will be raised online, through small donations of $100 or less. The average donation is $45. MoveOn’s PAC cannot accept donations exceeding $5,000.
During 2007, MoveOn held virtual town halls leading up to the Democratic presidential primary. MoveOn wanted candidates to address its membership using YouTube and podcasts. The three topics were Iraq, global warming and health care. The largest debate, on global warming, drew 100,000 people to the Web site. MoveOn tied the debates to external cultural events. For instance, the global warming debate occurred the same week as Al Gore’s Live Earth concerts.
It has refrained from endorsing political candidates. However, now that Sen. Barack Obama is the presumed Democratic nominee, he has the group’s full support. MoveOn is currently trying to raise enough money to air a pro-Obama ad on MTV.
•Move On.Org and Strategic Communication
MoveOn proved the political power of the Internet in two important ways. First, it demonstrated that it could be used to raise millions of dollars through $5, $10 and $25 donations, and that it could organize individuals around an issue in a way that led to action. After the impeachment trial of President Clinton ended, Move On noted which members of Congress voted for impeachment against the wishes of their constituents. If the incumbent had not voted in sync with their district, MoveOn began raising money through its PAC to support opposition candidates.
Using its growing collection of e-mail addresses, MoveOn developed a targeted e-mail network. Through trial and error, it developed an e-mail pattern that is copied today by many political campaigns. It walks the fine line between pestering and informing members through e-mail blasts every few days. The e-mails update people on the progress of a campaign, keep them motivated, and ask for donations only periodically. They can also be targeted by congressional district, which has been a useful Get Out The Vote tool.
After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, recent college graduate Eli Pariser, 20, started a Web site opposing war as a response to the attacks. He addressed a petition to President Bush with a similar message and e-mailed it to 30 friends. Within two weeks, more than a half million people from 192 counties had signed his petition, and his Web site was among the 500 most-viewed sites on the Internet. People began e-mailing Pariser, asking him whom they should call or write with their anti-war message. Pariser turned to MoveOn for assistance, and helped the organization start MoveOnPeace, an anti-war group, which has become part of MoveOn Civil Action. Pariser’s collaboration with MoveOn made it one of the most visible opponents of the Iraq War, before the war began and after operations commenced in March 2003. MoveOn circulated online petitions opposing the war, and helped organize member visits to their representatives in Congress. It coordinated political rallies. Its members attended one of the largest anti-war rallies on Feb. 15, 2003, in Washington, with satellite protests held around the world.
MoveOn regularly facilitates constituent meetings in local congressional districts on a range of subjects. Members meet as a group and speak to their member of Congress. MoveOn understands that while national online petitions are important, it is also vital that representatives hear directly from MoveOn members who live in their district, and vote.
Their methods have attracted critics. MoveOn often has a specific fundraising goal when it e-mails members, another successful tactic, such as raising money to run an anti-war advertisement in the New York Times or Washington Post. It may ask members to contribute a low sum, $5 or $10, toward the goal. With more than 3 million members, the money can be collected quickly.
This fundraising effort led to the controversial full-page ad that ran Sept. 10, 2007, in the New York Times A section. It ran the morning Army Gen. David Petraeus, commanding general in Iraq, was testifying before Congress about troop levels. The MoveOn ad had a headline that read, “General Petraeus or General Betray Us?” It said Petraues was not being honest about the security situation in Iraq, and that he would not admit Iraq is “mired in an unwinnable religious war.”
The ad got an angry reaction from Republicans and Democrats, and the New York Times received 4,000 critical e-mails. Also causing controversy, Move On paid a “standby” rate of $64,575 for the full-page ad, when it should have paid $142,083. An advertising employee made an error, according to the Times, but it left the public with the impression that the newspaper made an exception because it agreed with MoveOn’s message.
In an influential column about the incident, New York Times public editor Clark Hoyt said the ad and payment error “backfired” on MoveOn and the Times. “It gave the Bush Administration and its allies an opportunity to change the subject from questions about an unpopular war to defense of a respected general with nine rows of ribbons on his chest, including a Bronze star with a V for valor,” Hoyt wrote. Personally, Hoyt thought the ad was a “low blow” at a soldier.
MoveOn has also stumbled on member-submitted content. In 2003, it asked members to send them homemade commercials opposing the re-election of President Bush, called “Bush in 30 Seconds.” It received more than 1,500 submissions. Two MoveOn members submitted ads that compared Bush to Hitler. The ads were posted on MoveOn’s site long enough to gain attention before they were taken down. The ads were denounced by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith and the Republican National Committee. MoveOn apologized, but noted it had not created the ads, and that the RNC had chosen to post the ads to their Web site. The satirical news site The Onion ran a spoof piece about the incident with the headline “MoveOn Curls Up in Corner.”
Yet MoveOn has rebounded from both incidents, and continues to be a political fundraising and organizing force for the Democratic Party. It is also targeting concerns that may matter to younger voters. Early in 2008, MoveOn targeted an online petition at the social networking site Facebook. It asked Facebook to stop using Beacon, advertising software that tells Facebook users what their friends have been doing on the Web outside of Facebook. For instance, when a Facebook member makes a purchase on Overstock.com, their purchases is trumpeted on the member’s profile page. The online petition has more than 50,000 signatures. Facebook has compromised, allowing members to opt out of Beacon messages. MoveOn would like a direct notification of this option.
On MoveOn, people can join a conversation about politics, a subject that is often deemed inappropriate to raise at work, school and even among friends. MoveOn is a civic sanctuary for people who enjoy politics, at least politics from a liberal to moderately Democratic point of view. It will be interesting to watch how MoveOn adapts if there is a Democratic majority in Congress and a Democratic Obama Administration in the White House. The group has spent most of its existence fighting for causes when it was outside of power as the scrappy underdog. The true test of its power may be watching to see who remains when the group becomes disenchanted with the leaders they expected to lift the nation out of war and an economic crisis.
•For Further Information
Hamm, Theodore. The New Blue Media: How Michael Moore, MoveOn.Org, Jon
Stewart and Company are Transforming Progressive Politics. May 2008.
Move.Org’s 50 Ways to Love Your Country: How to Find Your Political Voice and Become a Catalyst for Change. 2004.
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