Early in the semester, Mary pointed out the tendency writers/scholars have for being overly enthusiastic in their predictions of our digital future. No theme has shown up more consistently in our readings. Jenkins is no exception, though he knows better, "We may not overturn entrenched power (whether that of the political parties or their big money contributors) overnight." (219) Who is "we," and who is he kidding? Much of what Jenkins presents as new phenomena is simply the assimilation of new communication technologies, techniques and political realities by, arguably, our society's most successful communicators, the ruling political class. Two examples, one from the left and one from the right, should make my case. Interestingly, lawyers(the chosen profession of the political class) were at the "grass roots" of both of these.
MoveOn.org was founded by a married couple, Joan Blades (a lawyer) and Wes Boyd, from San Francisco. They had recently sold their software company and wanted to respond to the impeachment of President Clinton. MoveOn started as an email based petition drive to get Congress to "move on" from the distraction of impeachment. Since then MoveOn.org has grown into a large scale fund raising, voter mobilizing, communication organ of the DNC and supporter/endorser of progressive candidates. Though the technology was innovative at the time, the pathway from grassroots to big-time, moneyed, activist political player seems well trodden by groups like: NRA, AARP, NOW, SCLC, etc.
Jenkins also cited the CBS document-gate as an example of new media, grass roots mobilization checking the power of old media. He is only partly correct. I am friends with the man who exposed the differences in the fonts. His name is Harry MacDougald, our sons played little-league baseball together for years and we have both worked in Republican politics. Years earlier, Harry had extensively researched fonts for a court case and that enabled him to spot the fakes. I remember talking to him at the ballpark the day the media revealed him as the source of information. He was visibly shaken-up because his bosses, he was a attorney with Womble Carlyle, were extremely unhappy with the media attention and threatening his job. Harry's conservative Republican politics were widely discussed at the time, his work on the Clinton's disbarment, and his membership in the Federalist Society. Another fact, relevant in the dissemination of Harry's discovery, never received media attention. Harry's brother-in-law is Byron York, longtime contributor to the National Review, Wall Street Journal, The Hill, Meet the Press, etc. Byron is a good old-fashioned old/new media Washington pundit, with lots avenues for moving a story from a blog by an anonymous Atlanta lawyer to the lead story in the national media.
What seems so new is also the same old story of politics, money and connections. Good thing Mary told us to be on guard against exuberance.
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