News-Record.com

So Greensboro journalist Ed Cone interviewed Elizabeth Edwards for a CIO Insight article on campaign trends:

The Web can be liberating. "It's about bypassing the sieve of the mainstream media," says Elizabeth Edwards, wife and confidant of Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards. "The idea that you have people standing between you and the voter is diminished, and the capacity to speak directly empowers candidates to trust their own voices." With Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama hogging media coverage, campaigns can push their messages without paying for ads.

"In some ways, it's the way we have to go," Edwards says. "We can't make John black, we can't make him a woman. Those things get you a lot of press, worth a certain amount of fundraising dollars. Now it's nice to get on the news, but not the be all and end all." (Bloggers note: bold mine.)

The larger companion piece is here.

Now that's a dandy way to illustrate how the web might help your campaign overcome certain liabilities, like when two candidates are crowding out the free media time.

But if you're thinking that the quote got some play and maybe blown out of proportion a bit in the wider blogsphere, you'd be right. Here's Ed's take on the quote, plus more from:

• National Review.
• Advertising Age.
• Bob Parks, who I just found today looking about for people who picked up this quote.
• Tech President.

Now, I'll grant you that?s a sexy quote, but there is a larger point to all of this.

Pretty much all good presidential, and more so now statewide, campaigns have a strong online element. Blogs, social networking sites and even static websites (how very 2000!) all play a part. But what part?

Can the online elements help candidates overcome weaker fundamentals elsewhere in the campaign - say in fund raising for traditional media buys or an unfortunate campaign outburst? They haven't quite yet, or Howard Dean would have been the Democratic nominee in 2004 and Larry Kisselwould be a sitting U.S. Congressman.

Especially as I watch state and local campaigns, the online element is becoming something they need to keep up with the Joneses. It is part of the strategy, but even the fanciest of web tools haven't shown themselves capable of overcoming large voter registration margins or big disparities in ad time. Pig pickings, baby kissing and cheesy photo-ops with the local constabulary aren't going away any yet.

Will that change? My own take is that eventually, by sheer dumb luck if nothing else, the guy or gal who runs the best online effort is going to win. But I bet the rest of their campaign will be pretty good too.