Issue Date: January 9, 2005
The election's over. Political sites aren't.
During the 2004 presidential race, MoveOnPAC.org and MoveOnPlease.org presented themselves as beacons of light, oracles for misled voters. But that was before Nov. 2. With Dubya about to be re-inaugurated, does anyone care what these sites have to say?
Guess so. As much as you might think those sites would have expired by now like a gallon of milk in the back of the fridge, both MoveOnPlease and MoveOnPAC are still hanging around.
The goal of MoveOnPAC when it launched in 1998 was to influence voters with its anti-Bush message. Pre-election, it offered videos of former Republicans urging citizens to vote for John Kerry, plus an ad where the president joked about WMD. In recent weeks it has posted a report by the People for the American Way Foundation and the NAACP on alleged GOP voter intimidation and misinformation. The site also devoted funds to supporting recounts.
MoveOnPlease originated last year as an online "National Lampoon" parody of MoveOnPAC. Typically, that kind of feature would be a one-shot deal, but the positive response was so overwhelming, those "Lampoon" pranksters kept building on it.
MoveOnPlease looks just like MoveOnPAC, but every article and section is designed to satirize it with headlines like "Losing Does Not Mean We've Lost" and "Because of You There Is No Hope." There's even a trailer for a mock Michael Moore documentary that purports to tell the true story behind "Fahrenheit 9/11." (Like most "Lampoon" creations, it's not for kids.) The site now serves as a refuge of sorts for conservative-leaning Web surfers and liberals with a sense of humor.
Now, if these sites can only keep the nation divided ...
-- Katherine Brodsky
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