In the Right

And though the organization continues to exist, it carries little of the weight or influence it once did.

In fact, none of the major social conservative organizations that provided the bulk of the ground troops of the conservative movement -- for instance, Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum, or Beverly LaHaye's Concerned Women for America -- have anywhere near the organizational strength and political influence they once did.

That leaves Republican and conservative campaign strategists up the proverbial creek without the proverbial paddle. As one of history's most successful political activists asked in an earlier era, what is to be done?

Answer: Go back to the drawing board, and update the software for a new generation.

Enter Reed's new organization -- Faith and Freedom Coalition -- what might as well be called "Christian Coalition 2.0."

Reed says, "This is not your Daddy's Christian Coalition," and he's right.

For one thing, as much as Reed wants to organize at the state and local level -- as he did with the original Christian Coalition -- he also acknowledges that using online communications and social networks to create "virtual chapters" will be a key focus of the new organization.

"The Internet's first wave was E-mail, and the next wave was social networking, which Obama perfected," Reed told Dan Gilgoff of U.S. News. "There's going to be a third wave, which we're still developing."

When I saw who Reed had recruited to run the operation on a day to day basis, I was even more enthused -- he's brought in Jack St. Martin, who's been a senior staff member at the Republican National Committee, working with social conservative organizations through the tenures of four different RNC chairmen.

St. Martin's first race was the 1990 Boschwitz-Wellstone contest for the U.S. Senate in Minnesota. (For real political trivia buffs, you can see an early shot of St. Martin in this Wellstone campaign ad -- he's one of the Boschwitz campaign staffers captured on video.)

Unlike many of the leaders of such organizations, St. Martin has actually been in the field, campaigning on the ground to elect conservative candidates.

It would be hard to find a better choice for operational control of an organization that's going to work at the intersection of politics and policy.

And let's face it -- it's hard to find a guy who's got a better track record than does Reed when it comes to building a new organization from scratch.

St. Martin says the organization will concentrate its efforts on mobilizing conservative voters in targeted races at the national, state, and even local level in the 2010 cycle.

Asked if the group would concentrate its efforts in any particular geographic region, St. Martin told me, "I don't think there's any area of the country that's a lost cause" -- and then cited the success of the anti-same-sex-marriage Proposition 8 campaign in California as evidence.

"Groups like this take years to build, not days," says St. Martin, who notes he's only been on the job for sixteen days himself.

One veteran conservative leader who's got a pretty good track record himself thinks this is just what the conservative movement needed.

"This is going to be big," said Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist.

Reed and St. Martin have their work cut out for them -- but it's work that needs to be done, if the conservative movement is to position itself properly in anticipation of a target-rich environment in the 2010 and 2012 cycles.

Disclaimer: When I write about the politicians in my past, CQ Politics says I have to turn the cards face-up. About 19 years ago, Grover Norquist and I were partners in a public affairs/political consulting firm.

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