I didn’t get your e-mail but found your response through the link back to Beltway Blogroll. I’m happy to respond to your points.

I did read your posts entirely. My entry was a response to the spirit of those posts, as evidenced in the headlines and general tone, and of the ones by Erick Erickson and Lance Dutson. In my view, you were not defending RedState’s decision about Ron Paul so much as you were using that as a launching pad to personally attack David All, and that approach buried and undermined your arguments about Ron Paul and his backers. That’s my analysis, mind you, but my analysis is what you’re going to get at Beltway Blogroll.

As for dubbing RightRoots a failure, the barometer I used is pretty obvious from the post I linked back to — the win-loss record of the candidates you backed. It’s the same barometer GOP bloggers had used for two years to ridicule liberal bloggers who raised money through ActBlue and other outlets. I don’t know whether you were one of those bloggers. But before netroots candidates actually won races in 2006, that generally was the standard embraced by GOP bloggers to judge the success of their rivals.

I figure what’s good for the netroots goose is good for the RightRoots gander.

Furthermore, your comparison of your RightRoots fundraising in 2006 to what ActBlue accomplished when it started is an apples-and-oranges comparison. As you well know, the online political world is much more established now than it was then, so a startup today theoretically is on more solid footing out of the gate. Raising $300,000 in 90 days in 2006, when accounting for both economic inflation and e-politics growth, is not the same as ActBlue raising money as the true innovator in the field.

RightRoots also had the endorsement of then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist — something ActBlue did not have when it was working to crash the gates of the Democratic establishment.

And one more point along those lines: Ironically, you did not mention that Rep. Jack Kingston, one of those “Congressmen with name ID in the teens” for whom David All worked, cut RightRoots a check for $14,000 when it met an early fundraising goal. So David All, who undoubtedly helped persuade Kingston to back RightRoots, was indirectly responsible for helping RightRoots raise more than 4.5 percent of its money in 2006. Can we expect that you’ll now be giving him some credit for helping elect the two RightRoots candidates who did win in 2006?

And one more point along those lines: Ironically, you did not mention that Rep. Jack Kingston, one of those “Congressmen with name ID in the teens” for whom David All worked, cut RightRoots a check for $14,000 when it met an early fundraising goal. So David All, who undoubtedly helped persuade Kingston to back RightRoots, was indirectly responsible for helping RightRoots raise more than 4.5 percent of its money in 2006. Can we expect that you’ll now be giving him some credit for helping elect the two RightRoots candidates who did win in 2006?

Actually, even a cursory amount of research would have disproved your claim. Go back and look at our FEC reports. Kingston didn’t give us a dime. If you don’t want to actually research before writing, you can Google Rightroots and Kingston and read any of the posts that explained the challenge.

Kingston, based on us raising funds, agreed to cut checks to each of the House candidates in the amount of $1,000 each. That was free and clear of what we raised, and never passed through our account.

To your point about the netroots/RightRoots barometer, it’s good to see that you, again, decided not to do any research about me before including me in a broader attack against their faulty yardstick. In my post linked above, I have clearly stated that simply because Republicans don’t attribute their losses to the Democrats’ use of the Net doesn’t mean nobody has won because of it.

Our candidates have a significant problem raising funds online, but the fact is our candidates this year have a significant problem raising funds at all. If you strip away what Hillary and Obama have raised online, their traditional fundraising is still blowing our guys away. We have a bigger problem with a party out of touch with its supporters, but that’s another post entirely.

Finally, my original post on David was exactly that, a post about David. His defense of Paul’s anti-Semitic minions was what triggered it, but it encompasses a variety of issues on which David is way off the mark.

You can take your pick on those. Whether it’s Net Neutrality and advocating a big government solution the issue (despite his professed Republican beliefs); his support of Google in its assault on political speech; his defense of the indefensible under the guise of beating Hillary; or his general tendency to put himself above his clients or his party; I find all of it distasteful.

However, his assertion that RedState should allow Paul’s fringe supporters to spew bile simply because one or two of his supporters may eventually cast a vote for Hillary was the final straw.

In all the years I have spent in politics, I have never compromised principles to get a candidate elected. I would never argue that allowing the worst behavior simply to get a vote is a good idea.

If campaign victories are the best indicator of a campaign hack’s abilities, then David All and Bob Shrum are both brilliant.

How about we stop shooting arrows at each other and find a way to elect some traditional, fiscally conservative, socially moderate, republicans to both both houses and the presidency. It seems that historically the party occupying the majority of the middle gets elected and it is much easier for a fiscal conservative and social moderate to occupy the middle.

PS – I’m not fond of anti-semitism and I would prefer that was left to the Democrats (no pun intended). Rs should not be forwarding anti-semitic candidates or candidates who believe that the only reason for Jews to be in Israel is to initiate Armageddon.