Taegan links to New York Times profile of American Bridge 21st Century, “a new Democratic organization that aims to record every handshake, every utterance by Republican candidates in 2011 and 2012, looking for gotcha moments that could derail political ambitions or provide fodder for television advertisements by liberal groups next year.”

Since the Times now limits us to a finite number of free views per month, I can only give you what Taegan (thankfully) posted.

“The organization has hired a dozen professional trackers… outfitted them with the latest high-tech cameras and computers and positioned them in key states where Republican candidates are busy chattering away to voters… Combined with a team of 20 researchers in a Washington “war room” that has a large rack of computer servers, the effort is part of a push by Democratic groups to bolster their opposition research. Republicans also have trackers, but so far have not assembled the kind of centralized video archive of political caught-on-tape moments that their rivals envision.”

Wait. The Dems are… organized? Actually, I posted about this back in April. Here’s some of that post:

Washington (CNN) – [...] “You have to do something about it,” Ryan Rudominer, a spokesman for the new committee, told CNN. He acknowledged with the Republicans’ House majority and its financial advantages when you include these outside groups “it’s not going to be easy…(that is) why we are starting so early.”

In order to compete with the donations that pour in via the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s many tentacles, Karl Rove’s American Crossroads /Crossroads GPS, et al, Dems are forced into raising obscene amounts of money.

What we really need to raise is hell about campaign finance reform. Think about what all this cash could pay for, the mouths it could feed, the medical costs it could cover, the education it could provide.  Instead, it funds inane campaign ads. This is one vicious cycle that needs to end.

I have nothing more to add to what I wrote previously, except to say that I’m glad our side is being pro-active… and that it’s a shame that we have to spend so much time and money on this kind of thing rather than on programs and projects that this country really needs.