This is so funny: For some months now, the weblog community has been abuzz with revelations that the Republicans have been organizing some very hokey "astroturf" movements. These are campaigns designed to make it look like some point-of-view is originating with The People and spreading across the land when it is, in fact, being planted by the party leaders. (It's called "astroturf" because it's a simulation of a genuine "grass roots" movement.)
One of the big weapons in this cause is www.gopteamleader.com, where you can not only sign up to try and plant news stories and such, you can actually earn points that can be redeemed for caps, t-shirts, etc. For instance, you get points if you take one of their pre-written letters of support for George W. and e-mail it, via their site, to some local newspaper that will print it. Dozens of papers have printed letters-to-the-editor which looked like they were studiously composed by average Americans who took the time to research stats and write about their support for the Republican agenda. In fact, those folks just did a couple of on-line clicks to send a form letter, and collected those valuable G.O.P. points in the process.
This article over in Slate summarizes the whole process. It also suggests that Democrats log in and use the site's e-mailing capabilities to send Bush-bashing letters. Let's see how long the Republican site stays up and allows folks to do this.