political movement manipulation

Initially I intended to post this as a reply, or addendum, to the thread posted by docholladay "Techniques for dilution, misdirection, and control of an internet forum"
http://www.dailypaul.com/...

From both the perspective of participant and volunteer moderator I have witnessed first hand the kinds of unscrupulous methods internet's underworld of PR hit men. Tactics intended to deflect scrutiny, silence critics, bury facts, and otherwise do whatever is necessary to defend the interest of powerful players within arenas of politics, commerce, and mass media communications. Often (and this should come as no surprise) these categories become collectively intertwined within a client's list of subservent or contractually connected business partners.

Here is one example of grassroots movement infiltration as a political blogger described to the Boston Globe.:

"WASHINGTON -- Erick Erickson has been running the popular blog Redstate.com long enough to know what his readers' postings sound like: red-meat conservative rhetoric served up with a little dash of populist anger.

So when postings from an unknown writer on the site showed up praising Senator John McCain -- one of the site's least-popular Republicans for his deviations from hard-core conservative orthodoxy -- Erickson thought he smelled a rat.

Or maybe a sock puppet, shill, or a troll -- Web slang for bloggers who pretend to be grass-roots political commentators but instead are paid public relations agents.

The author of the pro-McCain articles on Redstate.com, Erickson determined after a Google search, was a Michigan political operative whose firm worked for McCain's political action committee.

With big corporations now hiring public relations firms to pay fake bloggers to plant favorable opinions of the businesses online, many political bloggers are concerned that candidates, too, will hire people to pretend to be grass-roots citizens expressing views."

"This is going to happen more and more, and blogs are going to have to be vigilant," Erickson said in an interview. "I expect there will be commenters jumping in and trying to build negative campaigns to cause scandal for the other side. That's my fear."

The Internet has already become a prime target for such manipulation. Tom Rosenstiel , the director of Project for Excellence in Journalism , said the growing influence of political blogs, combined with the relative ease of posting negative information anonymously, make them "irresistible for dirty tricks and attack politics."

http://www.boston.com/new...