"In a national election, money isn't everything. Paid media matters too."

I think you mean "free media."

Yeah, and as a matter of fact, I'm one of those who didn't particularly care who won the nomination, I just wanted it to be over. So I was not going to feed the beast by financing any Democratic primary campaigning. Now that our long national nightmare is over, I surfed on over to Obama's web site this morning and Visad him some simoleons. I will bet you there are plenty more like me out here.

Ezra --

Just wanted to point out the fallacy (and not just here, but on politico too) in predicting that 2/3 of Obama's contributors will give him the max amount. A vast majority of people who gave him money did so in $25 or $50 or $100. These aren't people who would even consider giving thousands of dollars.

Yah, why assume 2/3 will max out? I gave him $25 about 5 or 6 separate times over the course of the primaries, but I'm not sure I can give much more for the general--maybe $100 max. Who can afford to give $2,300 to a politician? There's no way that 2/3 of his donor list has the income for that.

not only money....
but an incredibly energized ARMY of volunteers and grass roots organizers.
in our small headquarters alone, on nomination evening, there were local students introduced who are working in the obama fellows summer internship program and heading out to work at schools in other cities....
some other folks have started "obama weeklies" where everyone gets together once a week to work for the obama campaign and grow the grass roots network locally in all parts of the country...
and another group of obama supporters will be doing "green" activities and community charitable works as way to participate.
others are doing training workshops to work for candidates that will support obama on the local level.
the amount of creative activism and volunteerism is going to be awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

want to get involved?
go to "events in your area":
www.barackobama.com

What I like about the Obama fundraising situation is that his ability to amass real big dough from millions of small contributions. This is similar to public campaign financing, with all its advantages in freeing up the candidate for real voter contact, avoidance of kowtowing to special interests and the big guys, and giving everyone confidence that the process is open and democratic.

Now if we can just shut off the spigots from the remaining entities that have no spending limits (per person/family), we just might have a real democracy that prevails instead of the
'best government that money can buy' approach that we've been heading toward for several decades.

I've given several times in small amounts, and each time I feel like I'm investing in good government - a nice feeling to periodically instill in oneself.

I'll buy Ezra's expectation that Obama can raise $500 million if he thinks he needs it - and that advantage just might force the GOP into rethinking major portions of their modus operandi over time.

Yah, why assume 2/3 will max out?

He's not assuming they will. He's providing an "upper bound" on his fundraising potential and comparing it to McCain's.

To put it more in perspective, raising $100 million in a campaign season was considered a huge breakthrough just four years ago. Being able to talk about $300 million on the low end is simply stunning.

Hopefully he will use it to press his advantage during the summer months rather than waiting until the convention.

Obama has already spent about a quarter billion to date to McCain's 85 million or so and yet, they poll within a few points of each other.
I believe Obama will need all the money he can get to beat McCain and the reason is his association with Marxists, his dealings with convicted crooks and his lack of any track record at all.

Kilgore also mentions that Obama is the first Democrat since LBJ to have more money than the Republican. The playing field has been skewed against us for 40 years, and suddenly it's shifted in the opposite direction.

I believe Obama will need all the money he can get to beat McCain and the reason is his association with Marxists, his dealings with convicted crooks and his lack of any track record at all.

I believe that El Viajero is a vicious pederast and child molestor. My evidence for this is as strong, if not stronger, than El Viajero's evidence that Obama has ties to Marxists and convicted crooks.

We must, therefore, act quickly to detain and torture the vicious pederast El Viajero.

What's more, we know for a fact that McCain has close ties to former Trotskyites, and a fair number of unindicted war criminals are prominent in his campaign.

A few things.

First, nobody expects two-thirds of his current base to max out their donations. The point is, Obama has such a higher ceiling McCain right now that it's not even funny. If his base of fund raising didn't grow by one supporter from now until election day, assuming about two-thirds of them have him $500, well below the maximum, he'd have $500 million. (I'm pretty sure that once the general election campaign starts, everyone is allowed to donate up to $2,300, just like in the primary, effectively starting over from $0. If this is wrong, please tell me how.) Of course, it's ridiculous to assume that he won't get any more supporters, either from the general population or from former Clinton fund raisers. In other words, his ceiling, already far higher than McCain's is likely to be, isn't even done growing. I haven't given anything yet, for instance.

Second, I'm curious to see how this money will be invested. A few weeks ago, I read an article about the list of states where the Democrats expect to compete. The usual suspects, from Ohio and Florida to Colorado and Virginia, were there. But I want to know, is the Obama campaign going to invest any money into North Carolina, North Dakota, Montana, or Texas? If so, when, and how much, and in what ways? If not, why? I know that it's not nearly as likely that Texas will flip compared to Virginia, but imagine a race that put us within five points of McCain in September in Texas, aided by the news of some sort of huge ad buy. It'd scare the pants of the McCain camp, could get us even more voters, and could help bring in more money. Plus, we could be grabbing a lot of potential voters for future races. Are there any articles that discuss, with authority, these possibilities?

That last post was from me. I have to get a new computer soon.

ElV, take my advice: unless you're being paid to shill for McCain, sit this one out. Seriously. Spend some more time at the gym, read some more books, and maybe take a continuing-education class. This isn't a Republican year, and it's not worth screaming about how horrible Obama is for the next 5 months when all that effort will be wasted. Plus, if McCain wins, you come across looking like a genius in the fall without having to have spent all that effort over the summer shilling for the guy. Repeating all this anti-Obama propaganda that everyone knows is BS is just making you look like an idiot and is only cared about by the small pool of Bushist dead-enders who are forwarded right-wing e-mails to each other. The rest of us know you're full of crap, and desperate.

"I believe Obama will need all the money he can get to beat McCain and the reason is his association with Marxists"

Tom Delay, is this what you've been reduced to? Anonymously trolling liberal blogs under the ridiculous moniker "El Viajero?"

But I want to know, is the Obama campaign going to invest any money into North Carolina, North Dakota, Montana, or Texas? If so, when, and how much, and in what ways? If not, why?

For another thing, Obama already has a corps of volunteers in all 50 states; he doesn't have to start from scratch anywhere. That makes it a lot more feasible to put at least some money into states like those you list or, say, Arizona (not as Republican as it used to be--imagine McCain having to play defense in his home state).

The campaign is focusing the first wave of organizing fellows in 17 states, and there are some non-usual suspects among them (Georgie, e.g.)

So yes, expect a vastly expanded map of contested states.

I know that it's not nearly as likely that Texas will flip compared to Virginia, but imagine a race that put us within five points of McCain in September in Texas, aided by the news of some sort of huge ad buy. It'd scare the pants of the McCain camp, could get us even more voters, and could help bring in more money.

Exactly. It would force McSame to spend money in a state that he could normally take without any real trouble. And IIRC, Texas is an expensive media market.

Do not mistake me for a kool-aid drinker. I never voted for Bush either time. AND I would vote for anyone from any party that I believed would further my preferred agenda. I have had many problems with the Republicans and the Bush administration in particular. Now we have a contest between what I consider two liberal nominees. At one time, McCain was about to bolt parties, become independent and caucus with the Democrats.
So which one will give me more of what I want? Obama will not. McCain might.

So, does that mean I should not donate to Obama, but give my money to the DSCC, or other party? What happens to the money that Obama does not spend? If he wins and has a ton of money left over, what happens to it? I don't have a lot of money to give, so I want to give wisely. Personally, I want advice!

Perhaps, an analogy will help you obtain needed about why you aren't, and nor will you ever be, significant: Your problem with the GOP is the same as Mel Gibson's father's problem with the Catholic Church. If this doesn't help you- here's it in a shorter version- you are an extremist to the extremists. It's like asking us to contemplate the opinion of the 1 percent of the population that is to the right of reactionaries. In some sense you are on the right site for such "who gives a shit that crazy segment of the population thinks" (ie, Ezra's need to talk about what Libertarians are saying on this or that issue), but you really can't expect people to consider your analysis of the political spectrum useful. That's a little like expecting black to describe white, and in this case, gray.

I just hope Obama doesn't overbuy on the TV ads though. We don't want Obama's ads to become the next "Head-On, Apply Directly to the Forehead!" Just out of curiosity, is it even somehow legal or possible to do what they did on "Mad Men" with political ad buys and regular ad buys?

It's probably best to give the money to Obama directly because his team is going to be running the national campaign more vis-a-vis the DNC than most Democratic candidates have.

if you are looking for underserved candidates to give money to- check out Actblue and sites like Swing State Project

McCain is bringing a knife to a gunfight.

I hate to rain on everyone's parade, but while I am glad Obama is the one with the insane money and not the other guy, this is a strong case for public financing. If the shoe was on the foot, Obama supporters would be livid and crying foul. Taking a look at the big picture, I don't think money should have so much weight in elections.

Hay @ Mitch Schindler | June 6, 2008 2:35 PM

For all practical purposes, BOs campaign is being publicly financed.
And by having the DNC adopt a no-PAC$ position, the influence of BIG$ is further reduced.
McBush's slimy wriggling around his namesake campaign reform act, speaks for itself.

I don't have a lot of money to give, so I want to give wisely. Personally, I want advice!

Hymie Shorenstein on the problem, speaking to a Staten Island Assemblyman candidate in 1940 who wasn't seeing any local spending:

Ah, you're worried? Listen. Did you ever go down to the wharf to see the Staten Island Ferry come in? You ever watch it, and look down in the water at all those chewing-gum wrappers, and the banana peels and the garbage? When the ferryboat comes into the wharf, automatically it pulls all the garbage in too. The name of your ferryboat is Franklin D. Roosevelt - stop worrying!"

It's gonna be one of those elections...

"For all practical purposes, BOs campaign is being publicly financed."

Careful with this logic. A major difference between the Republicans and the Democrats has been that in addition to the Reps having more money, they received more of it from small donors, the way Obama is doing now.

If we argue that Obama is "publicly financed", then so were Reagan and the Bushes. I'm not sure I agree with that, but at least both parties have the apparatus to do it in place now.

One thing that doesn't get mentioned often enough is that a lot of voters are more concerned with where a candidate's money came from than they are with how much they have. In a state like Utah, for example, the Republicans' advantage was that they could claim their advertising was paid for by local Republican donors. Voters there would like that. If the Democrats chose to contest the state, they would have to do it with large ad buys funded by big donors in other states, and typical small-state voters would probably be turned off by that.

I think the shoe is on the other foot now. Obama may be more competitive in states like Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming because all of a sudden he is the one with the base of local donors, and McCain will need out-of-state revenue to counter it.

No guarantees that they'll all go to the Democrats, but I'm expecting Obama to make quiet gains in many areas of the country. Watch for a lot of Republicans to say things like "I still don't agree with their guy's platform, but I have to admit they finally picked a guy who campaigns properly."