What happens next?

I am girding my loins for the disappointment I expect to overtake me on Wednesday. I am not talking so much about one candidate or another that I am committed to not getting elected. I expect this to happen. It comes with the turf. Some of the candidates I’ve been supporting have always been long shots at best.

I am not talking about the need to find a new purpose that will come. I’ve spent the past two years preparing for tomorrow night. I know that when this is over, I will spend some time figuring out what the next cause to demand my attention will be. I know that it will come.

No, my biggest concern is what happens to the wonderful communities of supporters that have sprung up during this election cycle. What will happen to them? How can we hold them together as we go from one cause to the next?

Over the past few years, I’ve been on several panels which have talked about the future of political parties in the United States. What is the role of political parties in the twenty first century? The best answer I’ve heard about why we need political parties is ‘institutional memory’. When I visit friends on the local Democratic committee, they have incredible institutional memory. They remember who is who. They know how to find the people that will get the job done. They are the social networks that existed before it became in vogue to talk about social networks.

On the national level, many of my best friends are people that I met online during the Dean campaign. We have stayed in touch. We’ve used mailing lists, online social networks, and any other tools we can to stay in touch.

The tools have gotten much better over the past few years, and I hope that everyone finds ways to stay involved. Please, sign up for the DNC’s PartyBuilder. Please, sign up for DFA’s DFALink. Please, sign up for OneCorp.

Beyond that, stay involved with national blogging communities like DailyKos or MyDD. Get involved with, or stay involved with local blogging communities like the Soapblox based sites, or those that leftyblogs point to.

Yet if you are reading this entry, the odds are that you are already plugged in, most likely to many of the tools I’ve mentioned. However, you are also probably someone that can influence other supporters, especially those new to politics. Be sure to encourage them to sign up and stay involved in the communities that last beyond campaigns.

So, let’s get out the vote. If we work hard, today and tomorrow, we might be able to lessen the our disappointments about election returns. But let’s also keep an eye on how we hold together the wonderful communities we’ve been part of.

Posted by Aldon Hynes at November 6, 2006 9:10 AM | TrackBack