The Republicans are, I believe, making a gigantic mistake in running away, scared, from the internet. They're running away from voters -- and their money. The latest indication of their fear of the internet is their attempt to fink out on the YouTube/CNN Republican debate. The party line -- as we see from Rush and others -- is that YouTube is somehow biased. That's absurd. That would be like the Democrats saying that mail is biased because the Republicans made the first, best use of it. If internet video is biased it is a damned bad sign for the right and mighty strange considering the leading work done in the medium by the conservatives in the UK, France, and Germany. Hugh Hewitt frets that listening to YouTube will open up Republicans to cheap shots. That's merely convenient paranoia. They're looking for excuses to stay away from this dance. The Republicans are scared of the internet. They are scared of us. Giuliani has, as this blog as pointed out frequently, run away from the internet and interacting with voters there at every opportunity: It shows in his pathetic internet fundraising. Patrick Ruffini, former Giuliani internet guy (we can see why that's former) frets that the Republicans will be outraised by $100 million because of this attitude. Meanwhile, Mitt Romney is sniffing snottily at the quality of the questions on YouTube... from citizens. John McCain has been stiff and scared in his videos. Sam Brownback has hardly made any videos and the ones he has made are as stiff as a Kansas silo. The entire party has left the internet to Ron Paul. And he has taken it and run. In the end, this is not only short-sighted tactically but also essentially insulting to the American people. We are on the internt. Come talk with us. What, you're too scared to? Big, tough terrorists don't scare you but we do? Come on, boys, we don't bite. But we do vote. * * * MORE: The Republicans can't escape us. Remember that ABC News is going to use video questions from the people. Earlier posts about Rudy's digiphobia here, here, here. Andrew Sullivan echoes the sentiment here. This is Josh Marshall's take. Here's Ana Marie Cox' reporting. * YET MORE: TechPresidents looks at the data and finds that YouTube is more Republican than Democrat:

According to comScore, YouTube actually attracts more Republicans than Democrats. Specifically, there are 3.3 million self-identified Republicans on the user-generated video site versus 3.1 million Democrats. (An addition 5 million consider themselves independent.) Digging a bit deeper, it seems like Democrats have a bit more free time on their hands. Whereas Republicans spend an average of 13 minutes on the site each time they visit, Democrats rack up an average of 20 minutes. No matter which way you splice it, YouTube is clearly an important medium among Republican and Democratic voters and the perception that YouTube is a liberal haven simply isn’t true. Coupled with new data showing that more than half of all Facebook users are not currently enrolled in college, I hereby officially declare the death of conventional wisdom.

Yes, and according to my calculations, 87.8 percent of Republican YouTubers are making Ron Paul videos.