Cheese pizza powers Ron Paul's revolution

by Jason George

MANCHESTER, N.H. — Cheese pizza powers the Ron Paul revolution.

So do Doritos, Cheerios and beer. Junk food in general dominates the menu at this rented house, full of young people who’ve moved in from Seattle, South Florida and points in between to push for the Texas Republican’s long-shot presidential bid in the Jan. 8 New Hampshire primary.

At first glance, the abundance of T-shirted youths with laptops gives this outpost the air of a fraternity or an Internet startup. Instead it represents a new type of political fundraising and may be a sneak peek at campaigns to come.

Consider Trevor Lyman: Two months ago he lived in Miami Beach and ran a small online company that helped bands promote their music. Then he stumbled onto Paul’s campaign via a MySpace page—not from a newspaper article, television report or presidential debate. He liked what he saw, particularly Paul’s “out of Iraq now” stance.

See the rest of the story in today's Tribune:

Lyman knew he wanted to help. But instead of just giving money to the campaign, something he’d never done in his life, he created a Web site directing people to Paul’s campaign coffers on Nov. 5, a date other supporters had declared a day to “money bomb,” or send frequent and fast donations. They ambitiously aimed for $10 million.

Nov. 5 arrived and organizers fell well short of their goal, but they still made history by raising $4.2 million for Paul, a 10-term congressman. It was the largest 24-hour total for any Republican candidate this year.

The feat was even more impressive given that the Paul campaign had no direct involvement in the effort and that 95 percent of the donations were made through the Web, the largest online funding day ever.

“It was an amazing day,” said Lyman, who was immediately heralded as an online campaigning wizard—not a bad achievement for a 37-year-old who’s never voted.

“Sure, I had my part,” he added, sipping Corona out of a coffee mug. “But I didn’t do it. It’s the energy out there.”

That energy also streams through Lyman’s roommate Vijay Boyapati, a 29-year-old engineer who quit his job at Google to become a full-time volunteer for Paul, who polls nationally in the single digits.

“I think a lot of people think I’m a bit crazy,” Boyapati said, laughing. “But it’s very important to me.”

Boyapati rented the house that he, Lyman and up to five others will inhabit for the next month. He spends his days online, organizing a drive to get 1,000 out-of-state Paul supporters to New Hampshire for the primary (405 have signed up so far). He’s also raised $55,000, from roughly 3,000 donors, to provide housing for those volunteers.

When filled, each of these houses — soon to number 20 across the state—will have different people and missions. But all will share certain tools of success: new technology, little hierarchy, microdonations and a democratic delegation of work. You could call it wiki-paigning.

The fact that it’s coming from political neophytes and not seasoned Beltway bundlers makes sense, said professor Bruce Cain, director of the University of California, Berkeley’s UC Washington Center.

“Innovation often comes from outsiders. It’s the people who have to throw the long bomb,” Cain said. “If you’re a front-runner and try different things, it can backfire.”

The men in the house speak often of personal freedom, the Constitution and the idea of limited government—central Libertarian positions espoused by Paul, who ran for president as the Libertarian candidate in 1988. It’s a position that traditionally has attracted passionate adherents, but never in great numbers.

Costas Panagopoulos, director of the Center for Electoral Politics and Democracy at Fordham University, said the Paul phenomenon is the technological descendant of Howard Dean’s blogger base in 2004. That “revolution” also created excitement, but Dean quickly faded once the voting started.

Paul insists his fate will be different than Dean’s, and not just because online campaigning is more important today––YouTube, Facebook and MySpace are all sponsoring debates—but because he’s tapped into a deep public sentiment. How else could he raise so much money, he asks?

“The disgust with government and the spread of our message, plus the willingness of these individuals on the Internet to organize, is going to make a difference,” he said in interview.

The Internet fundraising crusade has given Paul a far bigger role than he would otherwise have. Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said the campaign is budgeting advertising buys through the Feb. 5 primaries, no matter what happens in earlier states.

At the Manchester house, Lyman is working on “Tea Party ’07,” a fundraising push scheduled for Sunday, the anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, which organizers hope can raise $10 million in 24 hours. Their goal is for 100,000 donors to each give $100.

Lyman is also working on the Ron Paul blimp, scheduled to fly along the Eastern Seaboard until the New Hampshire primary. The blimp will invite observers to “Google Ron Paul.”

Such original thinking came from hundreds of people, from attorneys to graphic designers to blimp pilots.

They all came together — where else?—online.