From Marc Ambinder (found via TechRepublican:

Obama clearly intends to use the Web, if he is elected president, to transform governance just as he has transformed campaigning. Notably, he has spoken of conducting “online fireside chats” as president. And when one imagines how Obama’s political army, presumably intact, might be mobilized to lobby for major legislation with just a few keystrokes, it becomes possible, for a moment at least, to imagine that he might change the political culture of Washington simply by overwhelming it.

What Obama seems to promise is, at its outer limits, a participatory democracy in which the opportunities for participation have been radically expanded. He proposes creating a public, Google-like database of every federal dollar spent. He aims to post every piece of non-emergency legislation online for five days before he signs it so that Americans can comment. A White House blog—also with comments—would be a near certainty. Overseeing this new apparatus would be a chief technology officer.

Not to sound like a skeptic, journalists might want to give it a try, but I hardly think twittering and posting YouTube videos from the Oval Office is going to transform Washington. It is not like most of what Washington does isn’t already online. Hell you can look up where the money comes from, who is in your representatives bed, what people want and where we are moving. It is all just so, I don’t know, boring for most Americans.

So enter this online Army which already exists. Will Obama truly bring together teenagers and bloggers in a way that MoveOn, DailyKos and the rest of the netroots who act as party shills do not already? I am suspect. We’ve already seen what the fund raising machine can produce and though it has helped an obscure candidate become the nominee, the awesome power hasn’t resulted in wins in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, California etc. etc. etc. Outspending and out campaigning and some flashy Web video hasn’t moved the heartland of America in the campaign, will it really matter if it suddenly has the seal of the presidency on it? I don’t think so.

The Web, like all media, is an extension of the human senses and the traditional campaign. While it has helped transform the movement and spread the message, it isn’t going to suddenly turn us into a Utopian society anymore than radio or television did. How do I know? Because as McLuhan predicted it has instead moved us back to tribalism and further segregated our politics.