Daily Kos Launches “Operation Hilarity”—Urges Michigan Dems to Support Santorum in 2012 Primary
by P.D. Lesko
The (mostly) boys over at Daily Kos are sticking their wooden spoons into the political pot that is Michigan once again and trying to stir up trouble for a Republican. First, it was Governor Rick Snyder.
Although many people have never heard of Daily Kos or think of it as simply “that liberal blog,” it has become the model for online community political blogging. Founded in 2002 by Markos “Kos” Moulitsas, according to the site’s About page, it now gets around 2 million unique visitors per month and has over 300,000 registered users. In addition to paid staff who write for the main page, anyone can sign up for a free account and write pieces, called “diaries,” for the website.
Diaries receiving the most “Recommends” by readers end up on the Recommended List where they can receive as many 2,000 comments and be seen by thousands of visitors. (tip o’ the keyboard to Chris Savage, the Daily Kos 2010 Diarist.) [A2P notes: This is a media model that incorporates aggregation of content generated by unpaid contributors. In April 2011, Jonathan Tasini, a journalist and union organizer, filed a complaint in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Tasini is seeking class-action status for his $105 million dollar lawsuit against the Huffington Post on behalf of some 9,000 unpaid bloggers whose work was used to generate millions in advertising revenues for HuffPost owners.]
In late May 2011 Daily Kos decided to get involved with the initial effort to Recall Governor Rick Snyder. As A2Politico pointed out, this was breaking news that went unreported by the major news outlets in Michigan for well over a month after the announcement was made. The entrance of Daily Kos into this effort was significant because, until that time, there were no other organizations, including unions, that had stepped up to offer assistance in terms of money, resources and organizational help.
Daily Kos helped send volunteers, a $10,000 in-kind donation (advertising) and other direct donations to the effort to topple millionaire Republican governerd Rick Snyder. In an interview with A2Politico, Chris Bowers, who works for Daily Kos as the company’s Campaign Director (Kos is not a non-profit organization, but rather a privately held for profit) explained why the company got behind the effort to recall Michigan’s governor from afar:
A2Politico: Why did Daily Kos decide to get involved with the recall effort targeting Michigan Governor Rick Snyder?
Chris Bowers: When we saw the energy on the blog getting behind the energy on the ground, we could see something important was happening. There were a couple of days in a row where Michigan issues were our most recommended diary on Daily Kos. People were clearly getting behind the recall movement in response to the emergency financial manager law and the assault on democracy that it entails. Once we heard that over 1,000 local activists had already signed up on their own, and that there was a real effort behind it, that was enough for us.
Now, Daily Kos is trying to launch a campaign to help Rick Santorum take Michigan in the 2012 Republican presidential primary. It’s not that the Daily Kossacks are Santorumites. The idea is to be a fly in Mitt Romney’s political ointment. Romney, who was born in Michigan, is expected to take the state in the primary.
The Washington Post is reporting, however, that Michigan Democrats may just have other plans, or at least the folks at Daily Kos are trying to give Michigan Democrats other ideas. In a blog entry titled “Michigan primary: Democratic mischief?” writer Al Kamen suggests that there may be a fledgling movement afoot to urge the state’s Democrats to go to the polls during the Republican primary so they can vote for Romney’s most significant rival, Santorum.
Kamen writes:
There don’t seem to be clear signs yet of any effort in state — orchestrated or not — by Democrats to embarrass Romney in his home state by voting for Rick Santorum or another opponent. (Even if they wanted to, the Democrats probably couldn’t figure out which other candidate to vote for.)
On the other hand, in the age of social media, these things can gel quickly, very quickly. The popular liberal blog Daily Kos posted a call on Facebook for Democrats to crossover for Santorum in Michigan and other states with open primaries or caucuses.
The move is called “Operation Hilarity.”
Just a quick FYI for all Dems who are planning to participate. This year a new rule goes into effect. Everyone who goes to the polls and votes will have their party affiliation choice recorded, and those records will be made public. So, while it might be hilarious to hand Michigan to Santorium, fending off robo-calls from the Michigan GOP asking for donations based on your 2012 cross-over vote in the primary may not be so amusing.
@A2Politico, thanks for asking. The answer is Yes!
@Brandon do you think the same thing about Daily Kos helping with the recall effort?
Daily Kos is a for-profit company. Daily Kos is trying to influence an election in Michigan in a direct way. If you replace the words Daily Kos and insert something else, say Halliburton or Exxon, how would so-called liberals feel about that?
I want to get corporate influence out of politics. Daily Kos should get the heck out of Michigan.
Stupid, unethical, blah, blah, blah, say what you want about Daily Kos but there is just no way that it’s right to compare a blog to ALEC. ALEC is out to do major damage to the political process state by state. Daily Kos is a blog owned by some guy with a good idea where people spout off about whatever they feel like talking about. It’s progressive Oprah where mostly the audience runs the show.
Have to agree with Chris on ‘Op Hilarity’ and his description of the DailyKos community as ‘self-correcting’ that will be resolved, no doubt after literally thousands of opinions are voiced.
@Dave D:
Glad you mentioned ALEC and CU. “Communities” like DailyKos and the instruments of the mega-wealthy few and their corporate interests (ALEC supported & CU funded orgs) are fundamentally on opposite ends of the spectrum. It’s simple: Are we a nation of citizens, a collection of free thought and voices (democratic principals), or are we just ‘consumers’ and ‘viewers’ told what to buy and how to vote in a plutocracy or ‘corporatocracy’ (to use OWS jargon)? The scale of ‘manipulation’ has tipping right off the table.
ALEC: Before March 2011, besides only a few progressive minded orgs, there were only a few outlets of any sort covering ALEC, one blogger on DailyKos had been tracking ALEC for years. Another ‘blogger’, Prof Bill Cronon UofWI in his FIRST post ever asked “Who’s Really Behind Recent Republican Legislation in Wisconsin and Elsewhere? (Hint: It Didn’t Start Here)” exploded the ALEC issue from blogs to eventually the front pages (not in MI of course).
It was largely bloggers (and if you have a view, start your own, please do) across several communities (DailyKos was late actually) that rooted out the trail and demonstrated the unbelievable pervasiveness and recently accelerated ALEC influence across nearly EVERY state in the US.
The tools of ALEC and CU funded orgs (largely out-of-state BTW) are alive in well in Michigan. Snyder ran for office with his own money and put up by his business buddies, and the GOP / Tea Party (AFP) legislature have already begun the process of the complete transformation of our State Government in their own image, not ours (anyone making much less than $334K). The Big Biz tax cut while at the same time slamming the poor should make it clear what they want.
As Chris, and others within the MI-related blogger ‘communities’ continuously point out, 2012 will be a dramatic year of change and enlightenment for many, as the full reality of the impacts of Snyder and GOP policy hits nearly city, school and everyday citizen.
Hang on to your hat MI, last year was nothing.
PS A2P membership check in the mail. Support MI alt media!
@Hector thanks for the Kos, Alec, CU comment. It’s important to draw these distinctions. I do think @Dave D. has an interesting point. Hector you write, “Are we a nation of citizens, a collection of free thought and voices (democratic principals), or are we just ‘consumers’ and ‘viewers’ told what to buy and how to vote in a plutocracy or ‘corporatocracy’ (to use OWS jargon)?” So isn’t Kos telling people in Michigan how to vote and why? Isn’t that what Dave D. is saying? EXCELLENT point about the Wisconsin prof who blew the lid on ALEC. He then found his college emails FOIAed.
Hector if Kos (a company) is a ‘community’ then you agree with Mitt Romney that corporations are people. I don’t think that’s true. Unless the Kos owner takes down his blog post and back-tracks on his call to manipulate the primary vote in Michigan, 7 million comments, posts, etc…will have dobne little but help him rake in more bucks from banner ads, right? No doubt sites like A2Politico serve an important role in our community. I can read stuff here about local and state news I can’t read anywhere else. You have that 100 percent right! I’m a proud supporter. I am just so leery of people telling other people how to vote whether its liberals or conservatives.
@Chris, Sorry about that. Funny though, I was just talking about you and ethics last night.
Daily Kos is not a “community.” It’s a business, evidently, in the business of tryinh to manipulate elections. How does that make Daily Kos different from ALEC or Citizens United? Different methods, same outcomes. I guess there is a difference, the guy who owns Kos makes millions for himself. The post is still up at Daily Kos by the way. (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/02/15/1065052/-Announcing-Operation-Hilarity-Let-s-keep-the-GOP-clown-show-going-)
Fat lot of good your community feedback did. Kos is getting lambasted in the media, as it should. As for Mr. 2010 Diarist, I’m not sure I’d be bragging about that just now, or ever.
Operation is a really stupid idea and, in my opinion, unethical. Last night there were no less than seven Rec List diaries decrying it, in fact.
That, however, is the beauty of Daily Kos. It’s in many ways a “self-correcting” community.
By the way, it was actually me that was voted Daily Kos Diarist of the Year for 2010. I can provide proof, if necessary.
Spreading Santorum!