On the Campaign Trail

It’s been a pretty intense and wild September.

On Thursday, September 11 – exactly two years from that day – I got a phone call from an old friend and employer, Josh Lerner, who I knew was involved in the Draft Clark movement. He told me that Clark was on the verge of announcing his candidacy and wanted to know if I was interested in being involved.

I told Josh the same thing I told him a few weeks earlier when he tried to convince me that Clark was worth paying attention to: “He’s not even running yet. How can I commit to anything knowing that he’s not even a declared candidate yet?”

Six days later, Clark announced in Little Rock and the following weekend I was in a car with two other people on a road trip to Little Rock. I’ve been here ever since, living out of a suitcase and wearing the same four shirts and pair of jeans for what feels like months.

Today, I was offered a formal position as the “blog strategy guy” (official title pending) for the Clark campaign. I haven’t accepted it yet but I’m pretty sure that I will. Working on the Clark campaign is a chance of a lifetime and I’d be pretty crazy to turn the offer down. How many times in your life to have a chance to change the way political campaigns work? How often do you have a chance to change the world?

On Monday, we launched the official Clark blog, which has already gained a large readership of Clark supporters. Some of the comments people leave are the most moving and powerful things I have ever read. Nothing makes you believe in something more than watching thousands of people rally behind a single cause or campaign.

Two days ago, Joshua Marshall interviewed General Clark and posted on his blog one of the best interviews I have ever read. The feedback so far has been overwhelmingly positive. Clark is the man who will be our next president. He has what it takes to win the primaries and to go on and win the election. Of this I am convinced.

On Saturday I will be at BloggerCon to participate in a panel about blogs in politics, and to talk about how the Clark campaign is using blogs and web technology. We’ve got some exciting things lined up, some of which I will outline during the session and some of which I cannot yet talk about.

What I do know is that we’ve got a very strong web team in place. And we will do some amazing stuff. It’s an exciting time, an exciting place, and only the future knows how we will fare.

Posted by Cameron Barrett at October 2, 2003 06:28 PM

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