Patrick Ruffini, conservative Internet mastermind, has - together with a group of people - set up a new website called “The Next Right.” The Next Right is ‘the place for wired activists to build a new Republican Party and conservative movement. As a community-driven grassroots action website for the right, we’ll feature in-depth political analysis, on-the-ground reports, and strategic discussion and debate.’

The other founding fathers of the action site are Soren Dayton and John Henke.

At his own website Ruffini explained:

It’s no secret that the right operates at a severe disadvantage to the left when it comes to building online political infrastructure. People point to ActBlue and Obama’s massive fundraising advantage, but the problem cuts deeper: netroots activists on the left have built critical mass around an idea that regular people on the Internet can get their hands dirty and remix Democratic politics. They not only raise money. They recruit candidates. They fund full-time investigative journalism to ambush Republicans. They act as a party whip, creating consequences for Democrats who, in their view, don’t act like Democrats. They volunteer and flock to states with key races. The right can build all the tools it wants, but without a narrative and a rallying point for action, it will be for naught.

Part of the problem is structural. When the conservative blogosphere first emerged, we were in the midst of a political upswing, with back-to-back-to-back victories in 2000, 2002, and 2004. Political activism wasn’t going to be a comparative advantage for the right online. Most were content just being pundits or media critics. This trend was reinforced by the blogosphere’s success in scalping Dan Rather, part of a series of new media-driven events that arguably changed the trajectory of the 2004 election.

Ever since then, a radically different set of circumstances has dominated our politics. It’s one that requires a substantially different response — one that requires us to stop being pundits and start being change agents.

Put simply, the party, and in many cases, the movement, has lost its moorings. Earmarks exploded ten-fold, and it wasn’t under a Democratic Congress. In this winter’s primary, we saw the once mighty fiscal-social-national conservative coalition turned in on itself, with economic conservatives pitted against social conservatives. And too many of the “experts” in the Presidential campaigns this cycle failed to modernize the way the party does business, clinging to the old top-down rostrums of direct mail and fundraising-by-cocktail-party in an increasingly networked and crowdsourced world…

We’re calling the site The Next Right because much of this story will be written in the future tense. Our analysis will be as much about looking ten and fifteen years down the road as it will be about dissecting the mechanics of the 2008 contest. What are the coalitions, strategies, and tactics the right needs to win again? How does the party need to change to attract a generation of voters who could very well be lost to us if we don’t move fast? Where do we find the candidates who will lead a resurgent right in the 2010 and 2012 elections and beyond? The vibrant discussion Soren, Jon, and many others had about the future of the movement last spring and summer would be perfect fodder for this new venture.

An interesting initiative that could play an important role in the coming years.

Then again, haven’t we heard this before? James Joyner quite correctly points out that progressives were able to unite because of their hatred for George W. Bush, ‘the neocons, and the war.’ But conservatives don’t have much to unite around yet. Perhaps it will take a Democratic president to unite conservatives.

Having said that, I am not sure whether that will be suffice in the US either. The Republican Party is quite strongly divided. If you can’t agree on ‘what kind of change’ the party needs, well, you will probably only waste your time trying to unite people.

Having said that, someone has to be the one willing to do the dirty work (uniting, activism, etc.), so this new website could very well function as the foundation of the greater unite and change movement. Other than that, this website is quite well timed, me thinks; it will probably not be long before a Democrat will be president. That will certainly help a website like this.

The Next Right also has a Facebook group.