I went to the local monthly get-together for supporters of Howard Dean last night. These real-world meetings are arranged virtually through MeetUp.com. The meetings all take place on the same day in cities across the country, so you feel some sense of solidarity with the other 31,000 Deanies who have signed up with MeetUp.

The event packed the downtown bar where it was held. Of course, any event is packed so long as the room is small enough. In this case, however, it looked like there were 100-200 people there, continuing the event’s growth. Plus, there are now Dean MeetUps taking place in 5-6 cities in Massachusetts.

The brief presentations by the local organizers stressed (boiled down and rephrased): 1. Bush sucks. 2. Diversity rocks. 3. The Internet makes a difference. At least, that’s what I heard.

If Dean gets some traction – things are looking up in New Hampshire and Iowa – then being packed into a room of supporters in June ’03 will be an “I was there when it started” sort of memory (although, of course, it started way before then in much smaller rooms). If his campaign founders, well, it still felt good to be in a real world room with people willing to work for change.

The strength of a group is determined by the entanglement of its links. There’s nothing like the real world for tangling them links quickly and ambiguously.

It also reminded me why I don’t hang out in bars.

Categories: Uncategorized dw