Interesting piece in Saturday’s New York Times about the raging healthcare debate and Barack Obama’s notroots.

As the health care debate intensifies, the president is turning to his grass-roots network — the 13 million members of Organizing for America — for support.

Mr. Obama engendered such passion last year that his allies believed they were on the verge of creating a movement that could be mobilized again. But if a week’s worth of events are any measure here in Iowa, it may not be so easy to reignite the machine that overwhelmed Republicans a year ago.

Isn’t this the same thing that happened after Deval Patrick’s Massachusetts gubernatorial win in 2006? Back then, Patrick supporters – and many media mavens – anticipated a bully digital pulpit that would ignite the BayStateroots (like Blue Mass Group) to pressure Beacon Hill 1.0 into executing the policy reforms Patrick had promised.

State lawmakers executed them alright.

And now, it looks like Obama might meet the same fate on a national level.