Catalist grew out of the embers of two groups that Mr. Ickes headed in the 2004 election, Americans Coming Together and the Media Fund, which, in part, conducted strong get-out-the-vote efforts. But when the Democrats failed to take the White House in 2004, wealthy donors believed that one reason they had failed was that Democrats lacked the sophisticated voter databanks of the Republican Party, its celebrated “voter vault” that can pinpoint likely supporters. . . .  

 Catalist is actually just one piece in a larger, and interlocking, network of independent liberal organizations that are acting almost as a shadow Democratic National Committee, now that the party itself can no longer accept unlimited large soft money donations. While these independent groups cannot communicate with the Democratic Party on strategy, they provide yet another way of getting the party’s message out, even if not in the words of the party.  

Its clients include groups like MoveOn.Org, the N.A.A.C.P., the Sierra Club, Emily’s List, Naral Pro-Choice America and the National Education Association, along with the service employees union and the A.F.L.-C.I.O. All those groups were involved with Americans Coming Together in 2004 and are planning even bigger get-out-the-vote campaigns this year. Catalist does not do business with Republican-aligned groups. 

Helping these groups coordinate their efforts — and to prevent them from bumping into one another — is a group called America Votes, which maintains close ties with Catalist. Until recently, America Votes, which has raised $18 million, shared office space with Catalist. Not only is it a Catalist client, but its mission is to help Catalist clients use the data they have bought to develop on-the-ground strategies in 19 crucial states.  

And, standing in the background, but still linked to this effort, is a new group called Fund for America, which is solely a money-raising vehicle, somewhat like a foundation. Fund for America got off the ground late last year with donations of $2.5 million each from Mr. Soros and the service employees union. Since then, Fund for America has given America Votes $1 million for its work in helping Catalist clients. Both groups are tax-exempt organizations that can take nearly unlimited contributions and have limited oversight.

 The conservative group Freedom’s Watch, headlined by two former senior White House officials, had been expected to be a deep-pocketed juggernaut in this year’s presidential election, heralded by supporters on the right as an aggressive counterweight to MoveOn.org, George Soros and the like. 

Bradley A. Blakeman resigned last month as president of Freedom’s Watch, which came onto the political scene last summer saying it would promote Republican issues but has lost steam since.  

But after a splashy debut last summer, in which it spent $15 million in a nationwide advertising blitz supporting President Bush’s troop escalation in Iraq, the group has been mostly quiet, beset by internal problems that have paralyzed it and raised questions about what kind of role, if any, it will actually play this fall.  

The group was conspicuously absent this week as Gen. David H. Petraeus, the United States commander in Iraq, returned to Congress to testify. Moreover, the troubles at Freedom’s Watch come as some Democratic-aligned groups are seeking to take the offensive, with one group, Progressive Media USA, planning to raise $40 million to spend on advertisements and other efforts to undermine Senator John McCain of Arizona, the presumptive Republican nominee. . . .  

Backers of Freedom’s Watch once talked about spending some $200 million, a figure that officials now say was exaggerated. Lending to the aura of ambition, the organization moved into a state-of-the-art 10,000-square-foot office in Washington and hired a staff of about 20, with talk of bringing in scores more for a vigorous campaign to promote conservative issues.  

Behind the scenes, however, Freedom’s Watch has been plagued by gridlock and infighting, leaving it struggling for direction, according to several Republican operatives familiar with the organization who were granted anonymity so they could be candid about the group’s problems.  

Although the organization was founded by a coterie of prominent conservative donors last year, the roughly $30 million the group has spent so far has come almost entirely from the casino mogul Sheldon G. Adelson, the chairman and chief executive of the Sands Corporation, who was recently listed as the third-richest person in the country by Forbes magazine.