The Web on the Candidates

• The Hotline's Shira Toeplitz parsed FEC records compiled by PoliticalMoneyLine.com and posted a breakdown of how much the campaigns have spent online this year. The big spenders: Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney, who have each spent over $1 million online this year. The list also includes consulting firms working with the candidates, and the names of web staffers (though their salaries aren't listed).
• The inimitable Colin Delany rounds up the various discussions, critiques, and analyses of Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney's decision not to, or maybe not to, participate in a YouTube debate in September. Delany approaches the issue with more nuance and depth than most mainstream journalists. As he winds his way through Jose Antontio Vargas' reports, Sarah Lai Stirland's blogging on Wired's Threat Level blog (it's all about the war, she says), a video submitted for the Democratic YouTube debate, and responses from Hugh Hewitt, Patrick Ruffini, Jeff Jarvis, and Danny Glover, a dense, bi-partisan critique emerges. All of these bloggers and writers are respectful of the candidates' wariness -- this is a very new medium, after all, and one with a superficial resemblance to "America's Funniest Home Videos" -- but also firm in their belief that we're experiencing a fundamental if incremental change in the way politics is practiced in America. As Patrick Ruffini says, it's not about snowmen. "If you think this is about snowmen, you are sadly mistaken. These aren’t frivolities. These are the fundamentals. Without fundamentals, we die."
• Meanwhile, conservative columnist Kathleen Parker writes a critique so off the mark it reminds us of why people want professional journalists to have less control of the process. "What anybody can do, anybody can do. Anyone can make a goofy video and ask a goofy question, but the man or woman intending to lead the free world should resist dignifying the charade," she writes. True enough. Except that the debates were full of substantive, thoughtful questions, many of which could have been asked by the pros themselves. As my colleague Micah Sifry puts it, the YouTube videos simply made it better television. And that snowman question? It was about global warming, not protecting the rights of snowpeople worldwide. She also seems to think that there was a time when debates were more serious, and didn't involve, for example, asking Michael Dukakis how'd he'd feel about the death penalty for the rapist and murderer of his wife. Those were the days.
• Speaking of snowmen, Amy Schatz of the Wall Street Journal talked to the the men behind the man, Nathan and Greg Hamel. Amateur video producers of YouTube classics like "Sandwich of Rage," a video about a killer sandwich, "I Learned to Fight From Videogames," and "Lawn Chair Jousting," the brothers decided to turn another character they created, Billiam the Snowman, to address a serious topic for the debate. "The pair retreated to their third-floor lair, which is strewn with videogames, and hunched over their Mac PowerBook. They put the 18-second video together in about two hours," writes Schatz.

The Candidates on the Web

• Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney might be on the fence about participating in a Republican YouTube debate, but Mike Huckabee has made it clear he'll be there. To drive the point home, Huckabee's campaign blog links to a post on SaveTheDebate.com's Twitter account confirming the decision. Huckabee, with the guidance of blogger Vince Harris, has vigorously embraced the web. "Governor Huckabee is a strong supporter of alternative media, as is seen from his weekly blogger conference calls, and numerous YouTube videos," the web team writes on Huckabee's blog.

In Case You Missed It...

Patrick Ruffini combs through Shira Toeplitz's post on candidates' web spending and finds that the Dems are outspending the GOP 3-1 on new media staff. "That works out to an average of 5.6 staffers per candidate on the Democrat side, and just 2 on the Republican side," Ruffini notes.

Fellow Republicans are urging Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani to participate in a YouTube debate, including NRCC Chairman Tom Cole, writes David All.