If you are anything like me, you are getting pretty fed up with all the political messages that are clogging your email inbox. A lot of people would like to blame Obama for this, but then a lot of people would like to blame Obama for everything.

The truth is, the Republicans were the first to take a commanding lead in data analysis technology, a lead they exploited in the 2004 election cycle. The Democrats eventually closed the gap, and data mining technology is almost universally credited with Obama’s defeat of Mitt Romney in 2012. Both parties have long known that the most effective way to influence someone is through direct, personal interaction and in today’s world, email is about as direct (and cheap) as there is.

If creating a political culture of technology and innovation were truly the path to getting elected, then the Democrats would appear to have the edge. Young technologists tend to see the conservative right as anti-gay, anti-immigrant, anti-women and pro-gun, all positions that turn them off. The demographics of the Republican Party are generally older and these are the folks that are usually suspicious of technology and slow to adapt to change. The left has the advantage in recruiting technical innovators and exploiting Big Data to generate targeted emails that can be converted to votes.

Come to think of it, maybe it is Obama’s fault after all.