From Liz Sidoti, as she toasts the Tea Party movement and tries to put the grassroots initiative in perspective [emphasis added]:
It was just a few years ago that liberals rose up against President George W. Bush and Republican rule on Capitol Hill. The groundbreaking Web site MoveOn.org lead the charge of left-leaning Web sites giving the opposition party a voice and an organization tool.
But the impact of the collective ''netroots'' was limited: It was credited with helping independent Ned Lamont beat Sen. Joe Lieberman in the Democratic primary in Connecticut, but Lieberman won the general election as an independent.
Now, with a Democrat in office, the ''netroots'' is muted.
Did you follow that? According to the AP, the only thing the liberal, online netroots movement accomplished was to help Ned Lamont win a Connecticut primary. But Joe Lieberman won the general election anyway, and after Obama became president the netroots were muted.
Right, except that there's a slight gap in Sidoti's rewirting of history -- the 2006 and 2008 election cycles in which the netroots helped Democrats recapture the House and the White House with sweeping wins.
But yeah, other than that, the netroots didn't really accomplish much.