Leave it to Mike McCurry, the famously earnest former spokesman for the President of the United States, to offer himself up as part of the problem: "I had never signed on to the White House Web site until after I left the White House," he admits.

Chuckling gently at his confession, Mike pauses thoughtfully, then carries on: "The Internet is affecting commerce, it's affecting health care delivery, it's affecting education, it's affecting entertainment," he enumerates.

"But the impact on politics has been sort of a delayed reaction. The reality that the Internet is here to stay has dawned later in the political world than elsewhere. There are very few people who are at higher levels in the political world who really understand the Internet."

And so Mike paints himself as the poster child of online ambivalence, at least while his boss was Bill Clinton. But that's changed radically in the year or so since he left his place at the presidential podium. You talk to Mike McCurry these days and it's all dot-com this, bandwidth that -- and most of all, how the Internet is going to become one of the best things that ever happened to "small d" democracy.

The Internet should make voting cool again, says Mike, now a CNN commentator as well as president of the Beltway-based Public Strategies Group, a communications consulting firm.

To that end, he's launched a coalition with former Congresswoman Susan Molinari called iAdvance. It's an alliance of computer companies and telecommunication providers like SBC and Bell Atlantic. Gateway is in it. Juno is in it. Netnoir, too. The goal is to deploy high-speed broadband technologies to rural America and close the gap between the information haves and have-nots.

On the content side, Mike's advising a group called the Markle Foundation, which had a program in 1998 called Web, White and Blue. It was a political site for those interested in following politics on the Web. They're looking at how to involve the presidential candidates in an online dialogue with the Internet community -- in a structured way that would have some real impact on the campaign debate in the fall.

And he's on the board of advisors of a political destination site called Grassroots.com. "There are several political destination sites now that are competing to provide a menu of political content, political campaign services and organization tools on the Internet," Mike explains.

I'd much rather make a second career in the Internet world than to think about going backwards and becoming a press secretary again.

He says the thing he likes about Grassroots.com is they have a partnership with the League of Women Voters and they're concentrating on local races. "They're saying that the power of the Internet in politics is really at the local level because people will have multiple media sources for the presidential campaign and for gubernatorial and senatorial campaigns.

"But where they really are hungry for information is when they try to figure out who is going to be on the school board, and who's going to be on the city council."

Mike actually got his own start in politics canvassing, door-to-door, for city council candidates. In 1968, while just an eighth-grader, he campaigned for Bobby Kennedy in the California primary. During his senior year at Princeton, he volunteered, believe it or not, for Jerry Brown's presidential campaign. Mike went on to work for Senator Harrison Williams of New Jersey and Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York -- spending about eight years total on Capitol Hill as a U.S. Senate press secretary.

Then in 1984, he worked for John Glenn's presidential campaign. In 1988, his presidential pick was Bruce Babbitt. Later that year he was vice presidential nominee Lloyd Bentsen's press secretary in the general election. Then it was back into the private sector at a D.C. public relations firm. In 1992, he first joined Bob Kerrey's presidential campaign and then signed on with Clinton-Gore in the general election. After the election, Warren Christopher, the Secretary of State, asked him to become spokesman for the State Department. He did that until January 1995, when he went to the White House, a post he held until October of 1998.

That was then. The 'Net is now.



Do you think it's inevitable, Mike, that someday we'll have a president who was "born" on the Internet the way JFK was "born" on television?

Well, yes. But only because convergence is going to happen, and the information tool in your home is going to be the device that's going to bring that candidate into your living room. And it's going to be a combination of computer, television, radio, fax and email machine. It's going to combine a lot of the techniques of communication that any modern campaign will use.

It's a very exciting technology. It's so much more preferable than thirty second TV commercials. I mean, just imagine if you and your family want to find out what a candidate is thinking on a certain issue and you can actually prompt a conversation with that candidate in which that candidate will say, "Well, I'm glad you're interested in the environment. Here are several points I'd make about that." And you can then email a campaign directly if you're interested in learning more, or go to other offerings that candidate has. I think it's just a very exciting set of possibilities.

When that really takes hold, how do you think the presidency, or the type of person elected president, will change?

I think we will still put a high premium on effective communication. I mean, just like Ronald Reagan, just like Bill Clinton, our presidents will be effective at that most basic human transaction -- conveying information and delivering a message. But it will be much more interactive. Because the Internet is so consumer sensitive, the candidate will have to have a program that engages the citizen and really gets the citizen involved in a participatory way. So there will be a much higher premium on the ability to organize and the ability to really inspire.

Al Gore has already proposed dropping political ads in favor of debates twice a week. From a marketing standpoint, do you think he's a visionary, or is that just tactics?

I think that is largely tactics. But it is based on the reality that advertising will play a smaller and smaller role in electing a president.

There's a lot more ambulance-chasing in the media and by politicians than there is constructive thinking about how to solve problems over the long haul.

To think about it a different way, the candidates collectively get money from the Federal government for running the fall campaign. And it ends up providing an advertising budget that's probably only a fraction of what Anhueser Busch spends to sell beer or what some of the new dot-com companies spend just for branding.

So, you have to rely, to begin with, on filters like the media. But I also think that Gore is trying to establish a willingness to engage Bush on substance. One of the impacts the Internet will have on politics in the future is that it will be more substantive because there will be greater quantities of information that are instantly accessible.

It still seems though, that mass media advertising is the epicenter of political campaigns.

Oh yes, oh yeah, yeah. Remember, we're talking about long-range change here. This is definitely not happening in the year 2000. It's going to be a change that occurs over time. But just like in the 1960 television debate, we tend to overestimate the short-term impact of technology, but we always tend to underestimate the impact over the long-haul.

Television advertising in campaigns began to appear in the late 1950s. I think Eisenhower was one of the first to explore it. In fact, I was reading an article not too long ago that said that most of the political professionals in the 1950s really didn't believe that television had much of a future when it came to politics. But then the 1960 campaign, and the televised debate between Nixon and Kennedy, really did sort of crystallize changes that had been underway and in a way accelerated them. Because then we went into the television age and the change over the following decade was really profound.

I think the Internet is probably at the same place, that it's just starting to have an impact. We're beginning to understand it better, but the impact and the change will accelerate as we go through the term of the next President.

You recently published an op-ed piece in The New York Times, where you said that no serious candidate for president could offer the press the kind of access that it wants.

Yes. Particularly now, because the access that the press needs is sort of 24/7! They've got to keep something going all of the time.

Are there other reasons a candidate can't offer the press that kind of access?

Well, in part because, you know, there wouldn't be any time to think, there wouldn't be any time to sit back and use your best judgement on what to say. You'd be constantly shooting from the hip. That is not only contrary to the political interests of the campaign, it also can be dangerous.

Many politicians think they don't get rewarded for doing the hard work of figuring out tough issues. But I think we've got the power to change that kind of thing.

If you begin to set policy and you begin to make decisions on the fly, you're not giving the American people the benefit of your best judgement, your wisdom. That goes to the heart of whether we're having a representative democracy. A candidate could be on all the time. But, frankly, the voter could be on all the time, too, giving thumbs up, thumbs down. Then we would have sort of a direct democracy instead of having the representative form of government that we have.

To be a good representative you have to have some space to think, to accumulate information, to hear contrary ideas before you articulate your own position. I think McCain got a little caught up in that. He was sitting in an environment in which he basically was having people fire questions at him non-stop. He didn't always get every opportunity to think through clearly what it was he wanted to say.

It seemed like the very thing that made McCain successful also brought him down ultimately.

Right, right. It was just like that with Bruce Babbitt, when he ran for president in '88. The thing that brings you success and establishes your capacity and something that's fresh and good and new can also be your undoing if you're not careful.

Do you see parallels between your role as presidential press secretary -- or press secretary -- and the role of a chief marketing officer?

In many ways, yes. I think the press secretary is in sort of retail sales. The folks who work in the communications shop are more in product development (laughs). I always felt like it was not my job to go figure out what sausage we were cooking that day, but I was supposed to provide some sizzle in the frying pan.

Kind of extending the metaphor here, there was a political cartoon recently that depicted Gore versus Bush as kind of like a choice between Banana Republic and J. Crew.

(Laughs) I heard someone else say that it was as exciting as choosing between Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi!

Same idea, right. Well, the question is, if politicians are like brands, what do you see as the difference between the Gore brand essence and the Bush brand essence?

Well, it's funny, because I don't think it's about brand. I think the presidential selection process is a very deeply personal one. The American people are struggling with a fundamental personal question about both candidates. They respect Gore in terms of his capacity to do the job, but they're not sure they like him. They like Governor Bush, but they're not sure about his capacity to actually do the job.

Through some of the projects that I work on that involve the ministry, I really see how people of values and ethical commitments can really make a difference. We need more of that in politics.

It's interesting. I think people are searching for some answer to the question of "Will I really trust Al Gore to be the kind of person I want to have in the presidency, knowing that he is fully competent?" And then, turning to this attractive, engaging, more compassionate conservative Governor from Texas, the question is "Does he really know what he's doing?"

That's what people are searching for. There's not much about brand or image or public relations that answer those kinds of questions. They are fundamentally about the best take the American people get on the capacity of these people for leadership. That's why it's always much more important -- those things that really come out about character and substance and intellect of the candidate during the campaign -- than how the campaign actually presents the public image.

I have to confess, this is uniquely presidential, because most other levels of government are prone to image making and spin and some of the techniques that are used in politics. But choosing a president is almost a religious experience for Americans.

And then there was the McCain experience, which was striking because there were so many people who disagreed with him on a philosophical basis and yet were ready to vote for him because of his personality.

It's not just personality, though. It's also vocabulary, the approach that sort of demonstrates a willingness to throw off conventional thinking and dogma. I think that the McCain campaign, the phenomenon of the McCain campaign, was probably related in a sense to what Jesse Ventura did. He sort of suddenly sounded new and refreshing and unconventional. That's what people like about politics. But then you have to measure that fresh, unorthodox approach against what we really need to have and making sure the job gets done.

Does the concept of brand essence apply to the political parties, if it doesn't apply to the candidates themselves?

It could. But the political parties have become so dormant in the age of television that it's not so much a question of branding. It's a question of presence in the market in the first place. The parties, in many senses, are non-entities for most Americans because they don't have a crisp set of ideological distinctions. But I think that again, the Internet has some power to change that. I mean, political parties could use communications technologies to really rejuvenate themselves and reorganize people across many different areas of interest that are currently defined by what we call the special interests. The party could be something that really unites and collects people around a set of common goals.

You mentioned Jesse Ventura. How significant is the convergence of entertainment and politics, from a marketing standpoint?

-Well, I think our politics is a lot more fun when it's also entertaining. But that doesn't mean that it can't also be substantive and intellectual. I think Jesse Ventura has governed a lot more smartly than many people understand. He's been sort of a dynamic figure in the center of the political spectrum. He's navigated a pretty clever course between the right of the Republican party and the left of the Democratic party and he's ended up in a place that many people in Minnesota are comfortable with.

But he's a combination of both entertainment and pretty sophisticated political thinking. I happened to see him speak one time when I was out in Minnesota and I was very, very impressed with the guy. He's a lot more shrewd in his analysis than many people give him credit for.

"It's the economy, stupid" will probably go down as one of the all-time most memorable campaign strategies. Is there an equivalent bumper-sticker sized strategy this year?

When we get to November and look back there probably will have been one. But we don't know what it is yet. It may very well still be about "the economy, stupid," depending on what happens to the macro economy, what happens to the stock market fortunes.

Maybe one day I'll think about running for office, but not anytime soon.

In reality, though, I'd say this: It's always about the future. And I think one of the real distinctions you saw Clinton make in 1996 was talking about that bridge to the 21st Century. That was a way of really saying that it's not so much where we've been, it's where we're going that counts the most.

And, by the way, that's one reason why I'm amazed we haven't seen the candidates talk more about the Internet. Information technology is going to be the single most important thing affecting the quality of life of the American people during the term of the next President.

Do you think the Internet could make voting "cool" again?

Yes. I think the experience with online voting in Arizona was encouraging. It really did seem to increase turnout, although that was probably not a completely crystalline experiment. But I think people are beginning to use the Internet for voting for a lot of different things. I just happened, a couple of nights ago, to have sent in my proxy votes for some of my mutual fund shares, voting online. I think people are going to become increasingly comfortable with the idea that they can express themselves using Internet technologies. And I think voting will come quite naturally over time.

This is a two-part question that's joined at the hip. The first part is, what was it like to be the spokesperson for the President of the United States? And the second part: What was it like to be the spokesperson for Bill Clinton?

(Laughs). Well, they were both equally daunting and thrilling. It's important always to remember, when you stand there, that you are the representative of an institution that is a fundamental part of our form of democracy.

I was always conscious of the fact that I had an obligation both to the presidency, as well as to Bill Clinton, the person. But there were times, as we know only too well, in which the loyalty to the individual person was in conflict with what was important for the institution. For example, I felt I could not go out and robustly defend his personal behavior each day because that was contrary to what most people expected from the institution of the president.

So you had some conflict in the role there. Now, at the same time, Bill Clinton is one of the most engaging, deft and adroit political leaders I've ever encountered. And it was an absolute joy to watch him work his magic with an audience or in a meeting or with a group of people who had different interests. In retrospect, it's just too bad that a great opportunity may have been frittered away.

Did you ever set a goal of becoming the White House press secretary?

No. But, you know, I worked in so many presidential campaigns as a press spokesman. Beginning in 1976 until just about every campaign forward and through 1996, I was serving in a presidential campaign as some type of press spokesman or volunteer. So it was almost inevitable, I guess, that I would get a chance to do that. But it was a chance that I was grateful for nonetheless.

So why did you leave?

I left because I had been doing a daily briefing for almost six years! It was getting a little tiring after a while. I'd had two years at State and four years at the White House and that was too many briefings for any one person. It felt like I had accomplished what I had wanted to accomplish at the job.

I learned early on that politics has the capacity to break your heart, but also to thrill you.

I left at a moment at which the Monica Lewinsky matter looked like it was going to be resolved. I remember saying to my successor that I didn't think there was any chance that Clinton would get impeached. I left in October of '98. And it looked like, because the President would do reasonably well in the mid-term election, that the whole impeachment issue would sort of move on.

What is it about politics that attracts you?

I like the people in it. The people I've met in politics are engaging and interested in their country and they're interested in trying to do the right thing, irrespective of their party. They really like to come together and solve problems.

Do you have any advice that you would give to a young person interested in the marketing side of politics?

I think too many people who are getting into politics think it's about image and the ability to argue. It really also is about substance and the ability to persuade. You need to learn to write effectively and quickly and to use all the techniques that we sometimes neglect when it comes to persuasion. That's the most important thing -- to really be very effective at making a coherent and logical case using facts. We need more of that in politics.

One last question -- and it's a little bit cheeky. Have you bought one of those Monica Lewinsky handbags for your wife yet?

(Laughs). No, I haven't. But it's interesting, I ran into the Duchess of York on Capitol Hill. You know, she's a spokesperson for Weight Watchers. And she says (affecting a high-pitched English accent): "Well, I'm very familiar with someone you may know. It's my counterpart working now for the Jenny Craig diet plan!" And we both got a good chuckle out of that! Our paths crossing and having Monica in common!It's critically important to spend some time doing the consumer and retailer feedback up front.