Part Two of Two:

When I wrote the first part of this post, I wondered how, if at all, Ron Paul’s army would react. I hoped that his supporters would read the post, and comment rationally– to tell me why I was wrong about their chaotic message board responses to anything Ron Paul-related. But what I honestly expected was more of the same. I did get a few reasoned replies, but the overwhelming response was what I feared. Some samples of the more outlandish comments:

“What if we don’t want to be the slaves of usurers and thugs? The End is nigh! Can’t stop the freedom train! Vote RON PAUL!” - Max

“NAU, UN and NAFTA are NOT ‘conspiracies’ for those who read. They are things that are happening with which we disagree. For example, UN treaties now control what is taught and done in our public schools. Ask any teacher about that! They even dictate what books we can read or how we can line up the children for the bathroom…” - Fed up with bloggers like you

“Your obvious attempt at misinformation about the Ron Paul supporters will result in the same type of blowback that accompanies every attack on his freedom message: more people supporting Ron Paul…” - Scott Mitchell

“if you shut out the truth for too long it rises up and explodes in many surprising ways……” - Paul Weber

“Keep it up msm your showing the world your biased ass!!” - American

A handful of readers did put up reasoned counter-arguments, like Brian:

“I post comments and donate money and vote in polls because I love what RP stands for. And I do sometimes give back a bit of attitude whenever a blog or news story is patently ridiculous and insulting to RP. However I haven’t seen much of the cringe-worthy bad behavior that you referred to, though I’ve seen a lot of references to it…No matter what RP supporters do, they and he will be marginalized. If they do nothing, he’s a fringe candidate, and if they are passionate, well that can be spun in a million bad ways.”

Other commenters simply re-gurgitated their usual online talking points about biased polls, and repetitive talk about “libertarian principles”, foreign policy, and the bias of the mainstream media — which I suspect they simply copy and paste to each Ron Paul post they read.

This is not an effective technique. I was a bit surprised that none of these commenters corrected me when I said that I don’t know if they have a leader. Ron Paul does in fact have an e-campaign manager named Justine Lam. She is at least partially responsible for the initial flood of online Ron Paul support, which of course is an overall boon to the campaign. But it’s since gotten out of control — chaotic, sporadic, and quite frankly, annoying. Granted, a lot of money has been raised online. But the e-campaign has become a parody of what online campaigns should be — organized grassroots efforts with a real shot at locating and convincing new supporters utilizing technology to the greatest effect. I hope Ms. Lam has recognized this, and has an E-Campaign 2.0 in the works that will surprise us all.

Tags: Social Media Best Practice, Social Media Insights //