OLLIE OX UPDATE: Video and text are now available at KAAL-6 on the Walz Facebook organizing project.
On the phone just now, a kind friend just told me that Rochester's ABC station, KAAL 6, just reported on today's developments in the DM & E story.
A second story was broadcast, this one about Nick Burkhart's Facebook organizing for Tim Walz's campaign. Apparently, the young 2006 National Merit Finalist from Mankato (who was one of the high school students in Walz's company who was tossed from a 2004 Bush rally in Mankato) took it upon himself to rally young people to work for Walz through this social networking tool. Over 500 responded.
Every culture tells cautionary tales about inhospitality. Be kind to the stranger, the outsider, the naif, the feeble old, the powerless, this folk wisdom instructs us, for they may be the instrument of the divine, or at the very least, of fate.
Young Mr. Burkhart's expulsion from the quarry two years ago was one of the instances for Tim Walz's decision to run for Congress. And the talented Mr. Burkhardt has generous talents of his own to use against incumbent Bush lapdog Gil Gutknecht.
Fantastic - social networks have a big part to play in politics. I'm waiting for the day when a social network will be as easy as a wiki to set up. Ergo, instead of Facebook or Myspace you could instantly set up a Walzbook or a TimSpace that would incorporate directly into the candidate's website. Having an internal social network would allow for a virtual "base of operations" volunteers could use to mount recruiting and visibility actions into the larger public social network.
Posted by: blankout7 | July 26, 2006 at 05:27 PM