Obama Raises $150M+ In September
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Money
Looks like Sarah Palin was really good for fundraising.
But more than that…these are insane numbers. As I’ve said before, Obama has completely and forever changed the political game.
More from the WSJ:
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama announced early Sunday that his campaign had raised more than $150 million in September, shattering the previous record he had set in August when he drew $66 million in contributions. [...]Sen. Obama has now raised more than $600 million total since launching his campaign in early 2007 — also a record for any presidential candidate. [...]
In a press release, the Obama campaign said that the campaign in September “added 632,000 new donors for a total 3.1 million donors to date.” The statement added: “The average donation for the month was less than $100. The average contribution for the campaign is $86.”
Now, I do expect the attacks from the right wing to start stepping up immediately. It’ll be all about donation fraud and how not taking public financing is anti-American.
But smart Republicans will see the opportunities.
We shall see…
UPDATE:
Well, no sooner did I post, did I find Patrick Ruffini confirming my prediction about smart Republicans…
Public finance in the general election is dead, dead, dead. Any nominee from now on can safely opt out because the Internet makes it for the public to massively participate. If we had not had a nominee with such misguided instincts on campaign finance reform, Republicans probably would have figured this out this time.McCain raised $47 million in August, or 71% of Obama’s total, and he raised $10 million in 2 days because of Sarah Palin. Had this trend continued into September, McCain would have raised over $100 million for the month. By the time the McCain campaign figured out it was possible to excite the base, it was too late.
The game has changed. It started in 2004 with Howard Dean and Obama has effectively finished it.
UPDATE:
On the other hand…
McCain, reacting to Obama’s announcement, raised the potential of fundraising abuses given the amount taken in by the Democrat.“History shows us where unlimited amounts of money are in political campaigns, it leads to scandal,” McCain said on “Fox News Sunday.”
How disappointing to have this come from McCain himself.
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October 19th, 2008 at 9:10 am
Wow. Very impressive. I have no problem with Obama raising these kinds of funds. Supporting a candidate by freely contributing your hard earned money is an expression of free speech. It is why I oppose public financing of campaigns and even “reforms” like McCain-Feingold which are a direct attack on free speech.
However, I do have a problem with hypocrites who decried the Republican ability to raise enormous funds in past years, demanded limits, insisted that public funding was the way to go, but now suddenly revel in Obama’s unlimited fund raising prowess. Did I spell that right? H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-T-E-S?
I also have a big problem with a candidate who lied to supporters about supporting public financing when it was politically convenient in the primaries, then broke an explicit commitment to take public financing when it was no longer politically convenient. Speaks directly to character or lack therof and is a great indicator of what we can expect in the Obama
monarchypresidency.October 19th, 2008 at 9:23 am
mw once again lying to make a point. Obama never “explicitly” agreed to public financing. Once again, he agreed to meet with McCain on the issue, but when McCain was unwilling to rein in the 527s, Obama knew he couldn’t compete unless he forego public financing. I give the Republicans credit for one thing, though. They sure know how to get maximum mileage out of their lies.
October 19th, 2008 at 10:02 am
Sorry Ed. He didn’t do what he explicitly said he would do. That is a commitment which he broke. That is a lie. In addition, despite his massive advantage in fundrasing, the Obama campaign encouraged 527′s after claiming they would reign them in. More lies.
As I said, I have no problem with either candidate raising and spending as much as they want on the campaign. I just have a problem with hypocrites and liars.
October 19th, 2008 at 10:08 am
Ed, to call mw a liar in this case is intellectually dishonest.
Obama signaled VERY clearly that he was going to accept public financing if McCain agreed to it, and then backed away from that claim after he started raising a ton of money.
By the same token, calling Obama a liar isn’t accurate either. Whether you like it or not, he did leave himself room to change his mind and he never unequivocally stated he would go with public financing.
The one bright spot in all of this is that true public financing seems absolutely possible with the Obama model.
October 19th, 2008 at 10:37 am
Who cares whether Obama went back on his word or not, Obama proved himself smarter than McCain, so far Obama has run an amazing campaign, people say he has not executive experience, I say look at the campaign, look how skilled it has been, he is the executive of that, if his presidency is half as good as his campaign, he’ll be one of the top presidents in our history.
October 19th, 2008 at 10:54 am
I can see how having a few donors giving huge amounts of money could open the door to corruption. (As it has in the past.) But I can’t see how having millions of people giving a day’s pay or less (for them) is going to do so. Is a candidate going to decide to start doing political favors for each of them, or what???
October 19th, 2008 at 11:00 am
Shockingly, I mostly agree with Avinash. Very concerning. Well, except for the part where it does not matter if Obama went back on his word. Like I said – goes to character.
Without question Obama/Axelrod ran a brilliant campaign. They kicked Clinton’s butt and now have done the same to the Republicans and McCain. They beat the best of the Dems and the best of the Reps. And they did it going away. Axelrod’s jiu-jitsu campaigning is brilliant, with the ability to turn weakness into smears of their opponents (Obama’s funny hat becomes “Clinton campaign is underhanded and racist”, Obama’s perfect partisan toe-the-party-line voting record becomes “McCain is George Bush”). These guys are good.
One wonders what role David Axelrod aka “Barack’s Brain” will play in the administration. As a political operative, he makes Karl Rove look like an amateur.
October 19th, 2008 at 11:06 am
wj,
Check out the stories on Biden’s fundraising in the SF bay area yesterday. Net net – a few fat cat donors contributed millions to the coffers. Pretty typical of how the Obama campaign has raised these stunning figures. But the illusion that Obama’s campaign is funded by $50 contributors persists. More Axelrod brilliance.
October 19th, 2008 at 11:23 am
The trouble with the Republican Party, is they became so dependent on their big-money donors pouring money into their 527 slime machines, that they could never imagine a time when their fat cat friends would never be in the position where they couldn’t donate enough money to overcome the Dems. They failed to see the perfect storm that was brewing. The billionaires who bought and owned George Bush and the Republican legislators are suddenly out of cash (file that under “chickens coming home to roost”). On the Dem side 3,100,000 individuals have contributed to the Obama campaign so far, and the average contribution is $86. You can check my numbers, but $86 * 3,100,000 = $266,600,000 — which came from that very crafty and subversive special interest group called the American people. Ironically, the people who don’t mind paying their fair share of taxes, are now generously funding a candidate who will stick it to the wealthy special interests. Only in America! God I love this country.
PS: Obama said he would “aggressively pursue” a campaign funding agreement with McCain. But when McCain refused to reign in his 527s, well, Obama is no fool…
October 19th, 2008 at 11:37 am
Yup. Lots of contributors bring down the average. He has a lot of support. And he and Biden will be beholding to the fat cat contributors that fatten their coffers and have funded the Democratic 527 slime machine. It was another Obama/Axelrod lie of course – first pretending that they would reign them in, but in fact encouraging their attacks.
October 19th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
mw: sorry to be the one to clue you on St. John of the Robocalls, but the Obama campaign’s criticism of McCain has been fairly tame compared to what the GOP and their 527s are slinging at Obama. The Obama campaign has deliberately refrained from bringing up a whole slew of issues about McCain’s background. But since I’m not part of the Obama campaign, I’ll make a quick list of *some* of the things that McCain might not want aired on prime-time television:
1. That ’67 incident when McCain accidentally launched a missile on the deck of the USS Forrestal, killing 134 people, injuring another 161, destroying 20 jets, and taking the Forrestal out of action. But his daddy the Admiral got him off — it was all blamed on an accidental “power surge”. Accidental power surge? That’s what happens when you accidentally press the launch button, isn’t it?
2. Then there’s the fact that he dumped his first wife while she was recovering from some serious injuries. Not only that, but he obtained a marriage license to marry Cindy before he had divorced his first wife. I would suggest that shows McCain had some impulse control issues, especially because obtaining a marriage license while still married is bigamy (at least where I live).
3. Keating Five, anyone? No, take scratch that one of this list. Obama DID bring that one up. Good for him.
4. McCain has serious gambling problem. He regularly bets thousands of dollars on the roll of the dice, which probably means he’s lost a few million dollars over the years. Luckily he has Cindy to bankroll his gambling addiction.
5. McCain is superstitious to the extreme — to the point of bizarre behavior. Do we really want a CinC who believes he can wiggle his pinkie to defeat his enemies (BTW he calls his pinkie wiggle his “lizard spell”). He’s probably worn a hole in the bottom of his “lucky shoes” by now. And I guess his lucky penny, lucky feather, lucky compass and his lucky rock are suffering from the Obama Mojo ;-)
As you can see there’s feet o’ clay walking in those lucky shoes. But Obama thinks he can win without bringing these issues up. People who live in seven glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
October 19th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Beowulf, man, you can’t accuse a guy of accidentally launching a missle and having a severe gambling problem without providing a link to some credible sources. I mean, what proof do you have that McCain his the launch button, especially when launching a missle takes more than bumping into a switch?
As for superstitions, a lot of people have those. Unless you’re relying on a card reader to make policy choices, a couple of good luck totems is nothing worth even bringing up.
Although, I do agree with your general thesis that Obama hasn’t thrown as much mud as he could have. But he’s been ahead down the stretch, which tends to permit for a more graceful campaign.
October 19th, 2008 at 5:22 pm
Since Obama refuses to show where tens of millions of dollars in donations came from, we can only wonder if Obama could be financing a possible win of the Presidency with donations from foreign nationals … and if so, which foreign nationals ?
Palestinians phone bank for Obama
http://townhall.com/columnists/AmandaCarpenter/2008/05/13/palestinians_phonebank_for_obama
\Are foreign donations powering the Obama campaign?
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/10/are_foreign_donations_powering.html
Obama’s appeal in the Muslim world
http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0613/p09s02-coop.html
Pro-Obama, Muslim-led voter registration in mosques
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Election2008/Default.aspx?id=2738844
October 19th, 2008 at 10:36 pm
Here you go, Alan:
1. McCain’s involvement in the Forrestal Fire:
–> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forrestal_fire
–> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIWeq2DL_N4
–> http://nnnforum.org/forums/showthread.php?p=264342
2. McCain’s bigamy:
–> http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jul/11/nation/na-divorce11 (read down to paragraph 9, where it says: “McCain obtained an Arizona marriage license on March 6, 1980, while still legally married to his first wife.”)
3. Keating 5 – well, that story is well documented.
4. McCain’s superstitions:
–> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/2000-02/19/067r-021900-idx.html
–> http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/2/20/02150/0194
5. McCain’s gambling addiction:
–> http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1819898,00.html
–> http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_stump/archive/2008/07/06/john-mccain-s-gambling-problem.aspx
FULL DISCLOSURE: Obama is an avid poker player, but the stakes aren’t anywhere near what McCain plays for. And Obama wins! — while McCain has been known to lose a lot of $$$$.
Like I said, people who live in seven glass houses really really shouldn’t throw stones ;-)
October 20th, 2008 at 10:50 am
Here you go, Alan:
1. McCain’s involvement in the Forrestal Fire:
–> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forrestal_fire
–> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIWeq2DL_N4
–> http://nnnforum.org/forums/showthread.php?p=264342
2. McCain’s bigamy:
–> http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jul/11/nation/na-divorce11 (read down to paragraph 9, where it says: “McCain obtained an Arizona marriage license on March 6, 1980, while still legally married to his first wife.”)
3. Keating 5 – well, that story is well documented.
4. McCain’s superstitions:
–> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/2000-02/19/067r-021900-idx.html
–> http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/2/20/02150/0194
5. McCain’s gambling addiction:
–> http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1819898,00.html
–> http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_stump/archive/2008/07/06/john-mccain-s-gambling-problem.aspx
FULL DISCLOSURE: Obama is an avid poker player, but he plays for stakes aren’t anywhere near what McCain plays for. And Obama wins! — while McCain has been known to lose a lot of $$$$.
Like I said, people who live in seven glass houses really really shouldn’t throw stones ;-)
October 28th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
[...] I don’t have a problem with how much money the Obama campaign raises. I consider the money that individuals, special interests and fat cats [...]
October 28th, 2008 at 8:21 pm
I’ve probably earned some money that has been in the hands of questionable individuals at one point. And that is just what candidates do, earn money by making a great campaign, and being a great candidate. We can’t always control whose hands the dollars have at once been in contact with.
Indeed, these “small donors” have contributed, but both candidates have had more than a handful of big donors. We can tell that atleast the Obama camp’s funds check out, as the McCain camp has resorted to calling Obama a terrorist sympathizer, rather than blow the whistle. Either that, or both camps have dirt to hide, and have made a voiceless agreement not to sound horn.