Micah reports that Barack Obama is beating other Democratic presidential hopefuls in bottom-up web enthusiasm on sites like MySpace and FaceBook. Obama may also have the most "draft" websites to his name, although many Democratic frontrunners for 2008 now have at least one "draft" website. In this new Nation column, I argue the proliferation of unnecessary "draft" websites this cycle may undercut one of the most innovative tools in Internet politics. Why?

Most of the campaigns to "draft" frontrunners feel like a charity drive for Paris Hilton. It rankles because they are not only unnecessary but a little perverse.

We don't need to "draft" top-tier politicians who are already actively pursuing the presidency. A draft compels you to do something you would not otherwise do. Civilians are drafted to fight wars. Reluctant public servants are drafted into electoral politics. But ambitious politicians, by definition, do not need a draft to run for higher office.

The recent string of 2008 "drafts" also risks diluting the impact of one of the most innovative successes in Internet politics. Several web-based drafts have recruited accomplished, apolitical leaders and turned them into compelling rookies for the Democratic Party.

In 2003 netroots activists pushed General Wesley Clark, who had taken almost no steps toward running for President, into a crowded field by generating a large supporter list, hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign pledges, amateur radio ads and plenty of speculation about his potential candidacy.

In Virginia last year, local bloggers not only drafted James Webb into the first campaign of his life but helped the former Reagan official reintroduce himself as a proud new member of the Democratic Party. He beat a well-funded lobbyist in the primary and then unseated Senator George Allen. As a forceful and longtime opponent of the Iraq War, Webb is quickly becoming a foreign policy leader for Democrats, who tapped him to give the official response to the Presidents's State of the Union address.

It is hard to draw new leaders like Clark and Webb into electoral politics, especially in expensive races where establishment frontrunners have the edge. Both men have said that the draft campaigns had a major effect on their decision to run. Webb met with several of his online supporters before taking the plunge, and both hired draft activists to work on their campaigns.

But if draft websites become another pro forma step in America's choreographed and overhyped presidential campaigns, co-opted by frontrunners and thus written off by activists, donors and reporters, they will have far less ability to bring new blood into politics. Then the only people recruited by drafts will be those who have already enlisted.