Description

Howard Dean’s campaign for president changed the way in which campaigns are run today. With an unlikely collection of highly talented and motivated staffers drawn from a variety of backgrounds, the Dean campaign transformed the way in which money was raised and supporters galvanized by using the Internet. Surprisingly, many of the campaign staff members were neither computer whizzes nor practiced political operatives, even though that is how some of them are identified today. This book allows key individuals in the campaign the chance to tell their stories with an eye to documenting the Internet campaign revolution and providing lessons to future campaigns. Howard Dean’s inspirational statement of what it took for his campaign to get as far as it did—“mousepads, shoe leather, and hope”—holds great wisdom for anyone campaigning today, especially the 2008 presidential candidates. Includes an interview with Howard Dean.

Visit the companion website for Mousepads.

Watch an interview with Larry Biddle on YouTube at: http://www.youtube.com

Zephyr Teachout was interviewed on NOW discussing the similarities between Howard Dean's use of the internet and Ron Paul's internet campaign. Read the full transcript here: http://www.pbs.org

Author Info

Zephyr Teachout is Visiting Assistant Professor of Law at Duke Law School, where she is researching law and political corruption. She was the Director of Online Organizing for Howard Dean’s campaign, the National Director of the Sunlight Foundation, the Executive Director of the Fair Trial Initiative, and a consultant for several new media companies. In 2005–2006 she was a Fellow at the Harvard Law School Berkman Center for Internet and Society. She received her law degree summa cum laude from Duke Law School and holds a master’s degree in political science from Duke University and a bachelor’s degree in English from Yale University.

Thomas Streeter studies the Internet and media at the University of Vermont. His Selling the Air (University of Chicago Press 1996) won the McGannon Award for Social and Ethical Relevance in Communication Policy Research. Other publications include “The Moment of Wired” (Critical Inquiry) and “The Romantic Self and the Politics of Internet Commercialization” (Cultural Studies). He has taught at the University of Wisconsin and the University of Southern California, and in 2000–2001 was a member of the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.

Reviews

“To really use the Internet well, you have to build community, not just enable fundraising.”
—from the interview with Howard Dean

“Written with the passion, enthusiasm and honesty that characterized Howard Dean’s historic grassroots presidential campaign, Mousepads, Shoe Leather and Hope shows how the Internet can transcend cynicism, build communities, and engage ordinary people in a way that is already rejuvenating our democracy.”
—Matthew R. Kerbel, editor, Get This Party Started: How Progressives Can Fight Back and Win

“The way we do politics changed in 2004. The Dean Campaign gave new meaning to grassroots organizing, revitalizing democracy – and the Democratic Party along with it. A glorious failure, it may yet prove to herald new triumphs. The Internet was at the core of that moment, and this volume captures the flavor and excitement of those heady – and headstrong – days.”
—Toby Miller, author, Cultural Citizenship: Cosmopolitanism, Consumerism, and Television in a Neoliberal Age

“Here scholars of communication and politics, as well as activists on that and other campaigns, offer analysis beyond the partisan sound bite.”
—Book News Inc.