Blogs and the US Presidential election

One view of the US presidential election was that "One blogger is worth ten votes - a voter with a weblog is ten times more powerful than a voter without a weblog, because there's more voting than just going in and flipping a lever." Dave Winer, Harvard University

However, it turns out that higher voter participation in the election was inversely related to the degree of Internet usage, or as the Register puts it, "How organized religion, not net religion, won it for Bush":

"Technophobes and luddites won the election for George W Bush in 2004, not technology-toting bloggers, by turning out the vote. The giant, self-congratulatory humpfest that is the blogger nation really didn't do much at all for the Democrats, despite Joe Trippi telling anyone who'll listen that the internet transformed politics. For voter turn-out was markedly higher in the states with the lowest broadband penetration.

Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Connecticut, New York and California have the highest broadband penetration and all went to Kerry. Meanwhile, Mississippi, South Dakota, Montana, Wyoming and New Mexico have the lowest penetration and all went to Bush. But the rise in votes was proportionately higher in states where the internet doesn't reach so many people."