The one who defies gravity of course; in Virtual Reality. Want to tune into the next James Webb or Jon Tester before they get picked up by beltway pundits? Visit Virtual Reality; where under recognized Democrats often play starring roles. For the politically minded, ground zero in virtual reality might well be Daily Kos, which occupies prime online turf well seeded by the netroots. Each month brings a new Kos poll of current or probable Democratic Presidential candidates, and the results there seldom resemble Gallup.
Though us Netroots activists might be a different kind of animal than more typical Democratic voters, it's not like we're minerals instead. The netroots are affected by the same passing storms of buzz and conventional wisdom that buffet all Democrats as primary season approaches, just to a lesser extent. The major difference is, we tune in early and intently to races in preliminary stages, becoming quite familiar with some candidates most voters have barely heard of.
Conversely early scrutiny sometimes helps us locate chinks in a leading candidate's armor that the main stream media seems unwilling or incapable of finding or acknowledging. The netroots always has its favorites. Those bestowed that status win extra support when push comes to shove in the primaries, enough sometimes to rise a tier or two to become a serious contender, seemingly from out of nowhere to more conventional eyes.
Gravity is my personal metaphor to describe how a Presidential candidate's conventional poll numbers compare with his or her netroots numbers, with conventional polls forming the baseline. If John Edwards comes in at 15% in a conventional poll, but at 30% in a netroots poll, in my system Edwards defies conventional gravity by a factor of two. If Hillary Clinton scores at 40% in a mainstream poll, but only at 10% in a netroots poll, she's weighed down in netroots gravity by a factor of four.
In the last Kos presidential poll, Edwards, Obama, and Clark took the first three slots in that order. Edwards and Obama each "defied gravity", using conventional polls as ground zero, by a factor of roughly 2 to 3 times in the Kos poll. Wes Clark however "defied gravity" at Kos by a factor 5 to 10 times higher than his current standing in conventional polls. Wes Clark is unique among all of the non first tier likely presidential candidates, both by scoring in double digits in online polls to start with, and by performing so dramatically better in them than he does now in conventional polling. With Hillary Clinton though it is just the opposite. She lags at Kos in single digits, dramatically underperforming her conventional poll tallies.
If one believes the netroots can pick up on some things that most Democrats haven't figured out yet about the 2008 Democratic Presidential field, Wes Clark and Hilary Clinton stand at opposite ends of the spectrum. If Kos voters are on to something about Hillary Clinton, most likely they are about Wes Clark also. If that is the case, than Hillary Clinton is the candidate with the most unrealized downside with the Democratic electorate, while Wes Clark has the most unrealized up side.
So if you are looking for a dark horse candidate to rise to contention for the Democratic nomination, pay some attention to netroots gravity. It may be your best early indicator.
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