Money is this campaign's real hallmark
Doug Robinson
It's money.
"The amount of money being spent is obscene," says Dan Jones, the renowned Utah-based pollster who has monitored every presidential campaign since 1962.
For instance, Obama has raised a total of $237 million since he began his campaign, smashing the previous record of $185.6 million raised by President Bush in 2004. And we've still got eight months to go.
How much money is that? Let's put it this way: You could buy a pretty good outfielder with that moola.
According to Kirk Jowers, director of the Hinckley Institute of Politics, if a candidate wants to raise $100 million in a year, he or she must raise $250,000 every day — or, in other words, collect five of the legal maximum $2,300 individual contributions every single hour of every single day, including weekends, for one year.
Keeping that in mind, in 2007 Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama raised a combined total of $208 million from individual contributors.
In a way, the man they seek to replace in the White House has only himself to blame. President Bush started it all. From 1976 to 2000, every major party nominee accepted public funding, which meant candidates were legally limited as to how much money they could raise and spend on their own.
In 2000, Bush decided not to accept public financing for the primary election, figuring he could raise much more than the almost $50 million the federal government was offering. He was right and then some. He raised more than $110 million — more than double the public funding that Democratic rival Al Gore had at his disposal.
Thus the floodgates were opened.
In 2004, none of the major presidential candidates accepted public financing for the primary election. John Kerry and Bush each raised some $260 million.
The stakes have been raised again for the 2008 campaign. Obama raised $55 million in February alone. That same month, Clinton and McCain raised $35 million and $11 million, respectively.
These seem like ridiculous amounts of money to spend just to put a man in the White House, but Jowers doesn't look at it that way. Because federal law limits donations to individuals (as opposed to special interest groups and corporations), the money now comes from ordinary citizens and in relatively small amounts.
Recent comments
When you cry about the election money think twice about the billions...
Anonymous | April 8, 2008 at 2:29 p.m.
Doesn't look good for McCaine as we always seem to elect the...
Dave | April 8, 2008 at 7:30 a.m.
