Today’s post involves the most dangerous type of reporting a researcher can do. I am going to posit a theory based on assumptions and loosely connected, though factual, information. Besides, who doesn’t like a good, counter-intuitive conspiracy theory?

I’m risking any credibility I may have engendered in the short history of Lumification, as you’re going to think I’m crackpot (or maybe a genius.) But there are reasons to put it out there.

First, if I’m correct, we are witness to one of the greatest political maneuvers in American history. Secondly, in the spirit of Lumification, I’d like to show how research, even when the result of which doesn’t come to a succinct conclusion, can be published to the world for consideration and examination. Research doesn’t always have to be definitive; it can serve to spark debate and inspire further investigation. The important thing for the authors of research is to be open and transparent with the audience as to whether the work is authoritative and definitive or more supposition and exploratory. (Insert dispute to accuracy of facts in Wikipedia here - but only if you have many hours to waste.)

The following is supposition and exploratory:

The giant flare-up and media circus surrounding Senator Barack Obama and Reverend Jeremiah Wright - the public falling out of two friends that pundits breathlessly discussed as having the potential to bring down the most important (culturally at least) presidential candidacy of the century - is a brilliant creation of the Obama campaign itself.

Consider these facts:

Obama and Wright have been friends for over twenty years with many ties to Chicago’s South Side community. Wright is intelligent; so much so that I have a hard time believing that any aspirations of wealth and fame he may have couldn’t wait until his buddy Barack became an personal ally in the Oval Office. If a person you mentored was about to become President, would you throw them under the bus for fame and profit before they became President, or hold a “chip in the game” for when you really needed it?

Obama’s strategist, David Axelrod, is an experienced, media savvy political consultant with a history of helping black politicians get elected. Axelrod knows how to manipulate the media and, by extension, public opinion. It’s interesting to note that Axelrod’s first black client was the man he helped elect as Chicago’s first black mayor. He’s been intimate with the conflicted ideologies of community activism and Black Liberation Theology.

Axelrod knew Obama would face intense criticism for his membership in Wright’s Trinity United Church - even though the inflammatory remarks and sometimes ridiculous claims of Wright were his own and not Obama’s. Obama is guilty by association. The association either gets used against Obama by the Clinton machine in the primaries or by the Republicans in the general. Not if, but when.

It’s my theory Axelrod orchestrated Wright’s outburst and personal media whirlwind just as it became clear Obama won the nomination. It gives Obama the chance to put the issue to rest once and for all (How are the Republicans going to use it now? Obama’s already addressed it; if it comes up in the general the Republicans will look like they are practicing politics of hate and divisiveness. Hmm, the same thing of which Wright is accused.)

Not that there isn’t some Clinton stink on the Wright media outreach. A Clinton supporter organized the Monday morning speech at the National Press Club, after all. Consider, though, that Obama hasn’t been hurt in the polls, and hasn’t lost any state primary he was predicted to win before Hurricane Wright hit the airwaves. Hillary hasn’t won anything by the controversy (in fact, she was decidedly out of the news during the frenzy.) And now McCain can’t use it for his gain either.

Obama seems more presidential and more of a “unifier” than ever. The whole fiasco has enabled him to address issues of race and cultural divides with his usual eloquence, but also with an air of leadership that seems to convey that although he understands the issues that separate the races, he is somehow above the fray.

The packaging of political candidates is serious business, and with the White House at stake, little is left to chance by men like David Axelrod. Politics is a cold and calculating game, and the loosely connected facts I’ve gathered leads me to think the Obama/Wright debacle is a product of cold calculation - just not by Obama’s opponent.

You may disagree. You may think I’m crazy. Send me some of your own research. Maybe we can collaborate on a Lumifi Notebook and publish our new take on the subject using Lumifi’s publish-to-the-web feature.

Not the usual long and winding post this time. Just some shout outs to some really interesting folks I’ve met in my recent travels.

Last weekend, I gave an Un-Demo of Lumifi at the Un-Conference, PodCampDC. The plan was to get everyone attending the session to log in to Lumifi. We would then use the platform to create a research project about global warming on the fly and then publish it to the web - all in 45 minutes. I thought this would be much more interactive and fun for the attendees than having me do a traditional demo or drone on over some PowerPoint slides. Unfortunately, we were a bit wi-fi challenged at the otherwise very hospitable Art Institute of Washington, and only a couple folks could log on, so the Un-Demo became a demo because not everyone could interact with the application and they were stuck with me and a projection screen.

Andrew Turner, founder of very interesting start-up Mapufacture, saved the day by diving into Lumifi and adding documents, links, and images to our research notebook while I answered questions and fielded comments from what turned out to be a very lively group that included Mr. Ron’s Basement podcaster Mr. Ron (who has some excellent links for Research Sources for Public Domain Writing), Judy Bradt of Summit Insight, and Beth Shankle of the National Press Club, among others.

I’m indebted to Andrew for keeping the session running. Check out his company, whose technology let’s you create custom maps using all kinds of data to which they supply access.

Andrew also Twittered during the session. I found this out by using Tweetscan. Thanks to my Mashable buddy Adam Ostrow for posting about Tweetscan. If you are a marketer who wants to take an active role in the conversations going on about your company, you would do well to check it out. I also talked with Adam at the PodCamp happy hour about his exciting new venture, ReadBurner. ReadBurner is kind of like a Digg for Google Reader.

The session fell into what George Brett of Internet 2 described as, “the rat hole of copyright.” Copyright is such a flammable issue that sparks passionate debate, but I think George said it best. As researchers, bloggers, technologists, and citizens of the web, we aren’t necessarily trying to solve the problems of the publishing, movie, or music industries - we are the consumers and users of information; eventually content publishers will figure out how they need to adapt to our needs or they will die as more nimble and progressive companies and models take their place.

I don’t think I’m alone in that thought. One attendee was so disinterested in the copyright discussion, he got up and left. That’s always disconcerting to a speaker at a conference, but I love the fact that he blogged about why he split in the middle of the session - apparently it wasn’t just because I turned the Un-Demo into a Demo.

As always, let us know how you are using Lumifi and the kind of research in which you are interested. We’re looking for innovative uses, interesting collaboration stories, and the like.