Everything that people say is wrong with the Democratic Party is also what's wrong with its Web page.

Democrats.org obscures the reasons for its existence. It gives too much space to things that aren't important. It has few really dynamic elements. It's old. It doesn't print well. And before it does anything else, it asks for your name and your money.

If, like me, you're a lifelong left-of-center, you'll find this depressing. But here's what I saw when comparing the site for the Democratic National Committee with the site for the Republicans:

The layout: The Republican Web page, rnc.org, vaguely resembles Yahoo's news page, with evenly spaced headlines and story blurbs, plus a slim features bar along the side.

But democrats.org ? “It's laid out terrible,” said Andrea Levin, art director at Yesmail, an Internet marketing firm. “Can't they afford to get a little college person to come in and do their Web page for them?” The page has several different fonts, and the headlines are in small, unimpressive typeface, buried in the features section. “It doesn't make any sense why it's that size,” she said. “There's no rhyme or reason to the way it's laid out.”

Worse yet, the side section asking for names and donations take up about a third of the page, and pushes down the page index. The page is asking you to get involved before you quite know what you're getting involved in, Levin said – talking purely as a marketing professional but nonetheless speaking volumes as a political analyst.

Pop-ups: When you enter the Democrats' page, you get two pop-up ads – one asking you to sign up for news updates, the other soliciting contributions. I spend a discernible fraction of my work day getting rid of pop-up ads. So although it pains me to say this, if you put pop-up ads on your page, you have seriously lost touch with the American people.

The Republican page has no pop-ups. You open only what you ask for. Nothing else gets shoved in your face.

Photos: Every story on the Republican page “has a real photo of actual stuff going on,” Levin said. Sure, each one is a posed photo of the president. But it helps to personalize the page. The Democratic home page has exactly two photo elements. One is of a book they're selling, called It's Still the Economy, Stupid. The other is a composite at the top of the page that goes with the party's logo. The photos in that composite change, but none of the people in them are necessarily even Democrats. They're models, from a generic image archive called Getty Images.

On the day I looked at the page, the black man in the composite came from Getty Image photo No. AA015775. (Or dig him up using the search terms “one man only,” “50s” “toothy smile,” and “African ethnicity.”) The Asian girl was photo AA037763. (Use search keywords “Asian ethnicity,” “smiling” and “8-9 Years.”) The middle-aged woman was AA015788. (“One mature woman only,” “Caucasian” and “confidence.”)

Content: For a summary of the Democrats' platform, I found a slim address by Colorado Senate candidate Tom Strickland talking generally about the economy. Eventually, I also dug up the official Democratic Party Platform from the last presidential election. It's 54 friggin' pages long. It's two years old. You'd have to print it to read it comfortably. And they won't write another one until 2004.

But for the Republican planks, the button for “Key issues” is at the top of the side bar, right under the date. (Which the Democratic page doesn't have, by the way: the date.) It brings up five featured issues, each with its own catchy headline, bright blurb summary and cheerful photo, plus four other, less prominent issues. Click on any headline for details.

Overall, Levin compared the Democrat's Web page to what you'd see at a rickety nonprofit agency. But with the Republican page, while I disagree with much of its content, at least I know where the content is.

And not coincidentally, sometimes when I vote Democratic, I know what I'm voting against, but not quite what I'm voting for.