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Not only is the site address easy, it tells the reader exactly what to expect. These qualities were exactly what Michael and Jeri Archuleta had in mind when they named notbush.com, a self-proclaimed anti-propaganda portal dedicated to voting President Bush out of office in 2004.
The Archuletas are not the only ones trying, from their own partisan perspective, to de-spin the news. Recently, political activist site MoveOn.org stirred the press with its anti-Bush ads, and the National Rifle Association launched NRAnews.com as a source for political discussion. What these sites have in common is their desire to sway voters through material independent of political campaigns themselves, which is exactly what Archuleta is attempting to do.
Officially launched on April 15, notbush.com began when Archuleta and four Austinites formed the ABB 2004 Political Action Committee earlier this year. The committee set up shop first on Notbush.net because Notbush.com was taken, and later secured the domain name.
Archuleta and his wife say they have been involved in politics in the past by donating money to different campaigns.
"We thought we'd do something different this time," he said.
Notbush.com presents what the site refers to as "informed talking points from the mainstream media." Visitors are asked to submit articles from third-party media sources, such as the New York Times or Washington Post, that are posted on the site to guide online discussion. Because the site is dedicated to replacing Bush, any article in favor of his campaign will not be posted, said Archuleta. He hopes using third-party articles instead of documents written by members of Notbush.com will lend credibility to the material and influence voters. However, because a majority of the articles are editorials, readers are more often than not subjected to opinion pieces, instead of facts.
The site draws 3,000 new visitors a day according to Archuleta, who adds that he foresees up to 100,000 hits a day if the current growth rates continue. He cautions new visitors that, despite the site's dedication to replacing Bush, Notbush.com is not a slander outlet.
"We need the people who are undecided and thinking people to make rational decisions," Archuleta said. "There are enough sites with Bush with devil horns doing a little dance in a monkey suit."
But campus Republican groups don't see much of a difference. Members of Students for Bush, a conservative student organization, say Notbush.com epitomizes political slander sites.
"Negative propaganda has been used for years to try to discourage voters," said Students for Bush co-director Matt Stolhanski.
Another center of support for the president is his official campaign Web site, GeorgeWBush.com. Launched in August of last year, the site is maintained chiefly through campaign donations.
Like most campaign sites, it features its own version of the news. By clicking on the "news room" link, viewers can access a list of headlines and talking points. The articles read like press releases, because they are. Unlike third-party sites, all articles are supplied by the Bush-Cheney campaign, not major news media. Presidential candidate John Kerry's site features the same kinds of "news briefs," supplied not by major media outlets, but by Kerry's campaign.
Chuck DeFeo, the e-campaign manager for the Bush-Cheney campaign, said the documents are provided "so that the people can have more access to their [president and the first lady's] thoughts."
Bush's site also prominently features six links to various sites about Kerry. Included are videos, commentaries from Vice President Cheney about Kerry and a link called the John Kerry Travel Tracker, which includes a statement encouraging viewers to use the link to "see why John Kerry is wrong for your state."
When asked why the site features so much material on Kerry, DeFeo said the site's content is constantly changing.
"If you were on the Web site on any day last week, you would see different stuff," DeFeo said.
Items DeFeo mentioned included a large spread about the president's support for Earth Day.
As far as the Bush campaign site is concerned, Katherine Ford, public relations director for the University Democrats, said the chief problem is that the Web site is essentially an attack against Kerry, a campaign strategy the Bush-Cheney campaign claimed it was not going to use.
"I think [the Bush-Cheney campaign] knows that their asses are on the line in this election and that they're going to have to insult the other candidates," Ford said.
Ford added that she isn't impressed with Kerry's site either because it essentially contains rebuttals to the Bush-Cheney attacks. As a result, Ford believes, the Kerry site is not focusing enough on the issues of the election.
According to Ford, University Democrats would like to work with Notbush.com and other similar sites by spreading awareness and providing material. University Democrats are already participating with the Burnt Orange Report, an online discussion run by University Democrat Byron Lamasters, by assisting in those discussions.
Despite the quantity of third-party political activist sites available, Ford remains reluctant to believe any Web site is going to convince people to vote one way or the other.
"I think people already have it in their mind who they're going to vote for," Ford said. "I can't just look at a Web site and decide 'Oh, I'll vote for that guy.'"
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