Well what we learned in this election is that community activism through organization and coordinated actions work.
Now not all communities are based on geography. Communities like what we find here are issue based. And what we have here can be built upon.
I think Obama and the Democrats learned from the grass-roots activism that occurred ariound the time the AWB expired when the second amendment community was very successful in getting its message out to the legislature to let the AWB die.
Of course that did not suit their agenda, but they learned and adapted. We now see the results. The Obama campaign is creating an activist database through collecting of e-mail addresses, cell phone numbers, selling tickets to political events, etc. for the purpose of creating noise from the grass-roots level. This is called astro-turfing, basically the creation of a phony "grass-roots" outcry when opposition or support is needed.
The test case was the bombarding of the local Chicago radio station that intended to interview an author critical to Obama, and basically shout him off the air.
Now think of that on a national scale, centrally orgainized and directed.
While the 2nd amendment movement in 2003 was truly organic, the current democratic machine is building the ability to astro-turf or manufacture support or opposition for their causes - 2nd amendment issues included.
To respond to this will require this second amendment community to organize in a similar manner; or risk the second amendment being steam-rolled.
