Fred Thompson savvy Internet campaigner


Is Tennessee’s Fred Thompson the savviest presidential candidate at appealing to the net community? That’s the question posed by Mark ‘Rizzn’ Hopkins at Mashable.

The video above aimed at liberal movie maker Michael Moore is but one example. Hopkins said:

Sean Hackbarth, of the Fred Thompson campaign, sent me an email yesterday essentially stating that not only is Fred Thompson a lawyer, but he played one on TV, citing his appearances in In the Line of Fire, The hunt for the Red October, Die Hard 2, and Law and Order. As such, he recognizes the value of “star power” in spreading the word about why “Fred will make a great, conservative President.”

Essentially, Fred wants to create the next Chris Crocker or Star Wars Kid by surveying the roster of YouTube-worthy talent in his support base, have his fans vote for the favorites, and then promote the heck out of them, and by proxy Fred (ostensibly on YouTube, although I wouldn’t rule out traditional TV ads).

All you need to do is upload your video, and stay tuned to Fred08.com to vote yourself up. He’s looking for positive videos about himself, trying to stay away from attack ads against his competitors.

Wonder which Tennessean is the biggest star: Fred Thompson or Chris Crocker?

Conservate GOP candidate Ron Paul gets my vote. I can tell from KnoxNews‘ referring domains and pageview reports anytime the Texan is mentioned on the Web site.

Other contenders are Democrats John Edwards (he’s still twittering among other things) and Barak Obama.