SUGGESTION: Facebook type tool for DKOs: "Factions"

ATTN: This is an idea I came up with looking for a tool which might already exist.  I was unable to find it, and if it does exist here, I'll take this diary down and stand in the corner :)

UPDATED: 2:14PM Made some changes based on the feedback.  Thanks everyone.

Just browsing around checking out people who commented on my comments, I really wish DKos had an OPTIONAL  tool for users that would let them keep a list of friends.  If people wanted, then they could create their own policy papers, and platforms.  "Factions" would result (maybe this is a bad name for what I'm trying to express here) but I mean "Factions" in a good way, not in an infighting type way.  Sort of in a way that makes people more productive on the site - able to create and belong to sub-communities as well as to the larger comunity.  This is the kind of situation that evolves naturally when a group reaches a critical mass.

I mean why not?  DKos seems so huge a place with so many varieties of "progressives" that to be a DKo's reader doesn't mean much anymore.  I can't identify myself anymore, in shorthand, which makes it hard for people to get together without wasting a lot of time futzing around trying to figure out where they're coming from.

I started wondering about this possibility while browsing my comments, and noticing a few people that agreed with me, or uprated me.  Okay, there was only a handful :) but I thiought.  Wouldn't it be cool to tag them as "friends" like facebook does, and then message them as a group?  

Since this is a political blog, and people are making political comments, then I starting wondering if this would lead to people making organic political connections through our site--and the de jure "factionalization" of Dkos might ensue. (the de facto factionalization already exists)

Now this might be a "bad" thing but I think it would be overall, quite cool, because names might be given to these emerging "clans" loosely organized around shared beliefs.  Of course the usual "left-right-center" "hillary-obama" clans would exist, like they do now, but just in a more organized way, all within the DKos "brand" (for lack of a better word--I hate that word)

The cool thing is that I could be called a "Blue Team Dkos reader" or a "Legion of Progression DKos reader" or something which identifies me more specifically .

The other thing that might be cool is that Users could be tagged then by their orientations on a quiver of issues.  Sort of like "political compass" but it would be a tool that would identify people by their broad beliefs -- and as people's positions change, they can update their compass.  Actually you'd probably want to have multiple "compii" for a suite of issues.

I kinda think this would emerge organically if the engine allowed for "Friends" like Facebook does.