Matthew Yglesias » Big Bucks

Sep 14th, 2008 at 11:06 am

Big Bucks

Looks like a big money haul for Barack Obama in August with the campaign reporting $66 million and 500,000 new donors. That brings their total number of donors to around 2.5 million which is a staggering total. All told, he has $77 million cash on hand. That’s a lot of money and, I think, assures us that the Obama campaign will be able to meet its goal of outclassing McCain’s ground operation.

That said, when pondering Obama’s fundraising feats, it is worth recalling that there’s nothing stopping Sheldon Adelson from giving “Freedom’s Watch” $60 million or, for that matter, $600 million if he decides that swamping the airwaves with conservative messaging is really important to him.

Comments
26

Filed under: Fundraising, obama,

26 Responses to “Big Bucks”

Petey Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 11:09 am
I’d say Sheldon Adelson is more prioritized on destroying Israel than he is on destroying America.
ed Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 11:14 am
That’s great. And yes, Obama will always outclass McCain/Rove, but that’s irrespective of money.

And yes, Freedom’s Watch will spend gazillions. Republicans are the party of nasty, classless, rich-ass douchebags. That’s not new either.

Now, where’s the ad showing how confused McCain is:
–doesn’t know Sunni from Shia
–needs Droopy to correct him
–doesn’t know about his own opinions on women’s health “I guess I support the President…”
–admittedly doesn’t know about economics
–is admittedly out of touch

All of this and more can easily be done in McCain’s own words, with video to boot. He’s pathetic. Give him enough rope. Hop to it, people.
J Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 11:20 am
And of course just a few days ago we were being told that Obama’s fundraising might be “down” and that this (speculative) fact was proof that his amazing fundraising prowess was gone.

How many times has this happened? The Obama campaign holds back their numbers; a bunch of concern trolls and right-wing media folks start speculating that his numbers must be down; and then it turns out that he’s broken the previous record yet again.
kafka Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 11:46 am
Now that we’ve counted the cash, let’s count the promises Obama had to make to the moneybags to get the cash. No doubt caving in on offshore drilling added significant $$$$ to the total.
Adam Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 12:11 pm
“No doubt caving in on offshore drilling added significant $$$$ to the total.”

Not sure if you’re aware of this but, uh, the ban automatically expires October 1st unless it’s renewed. Which with only two weeks left in session and a filibustering Senate and certain veto of any bill containing such a provision the chances of happening are close to zero.

So you’d *really* like Obama to tilt at windmills and not actually be able to get anything done about it instead of just taking the issue off the table and winning the election? Good thing you’re not on his strategy team.
otto Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
I’d say Sheldon Adelson is more prioritized on destroying Israel than he is on destroying America.

Maybe he’s the sort of man who likes cheese as well as dessert.
DTM Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 1:22 pm
Given the number of donors responsible for Obama’s fundraising, I doubt much of that is attributable to Big Oil fat cats.
dm Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
…and allegedly $10 million of that was raised in the hours after Sarah Palin’s speech to the Republican Convention. I wonder what September’s numbers will look like, given that McCain’s negative ads and further revelations about Palin may be motivating Obama supporters even more than her speech did.
dm Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
@kafka: Now that we’ve counted the cash, let’s count the promises Obama had to make to the moneybags to get the cash.

$77 million over just the 500,000 new donors is only $154. Assume only half of Obama’s 2.5 million donors ponied up in August, that’s an average donation of $62 per donor.

That doesn’t leave a lot of room for quid for the fat-cats to demand their pro quo.
Grumpy Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
That brings their total number of donors to around 2.5 million which is a staggering total.

Look to the person to your left. And to your right. And in 99 other directions. Wherever you are in America, odds are one of you contributed to the Obama campaign.
mad6798j Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
“and allegedly $10 million of that was raised in the hours after Sarah Palin’s speech to the Republican Convention”

No that’s not true. That happened this month. It wouldn’t count toward August numbers.
pseudonymous in nc Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Yep. And the September number will matter more than the August one. I think we can assume that money raised in October will be aimed at the ground campaign; but ground ops are really going to be cheaper than the massive wealth transfer from individuals to network affiliates and cable companies that will take place in the next month or so.
tomboy Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Sheldon Adelson may be a rich guy, but his company Las Vegas Sands (NYSE: LVS) has been getting killed by high gas prices, the real estate and banking crisis, as well as the declining Chinese stock market.

Adelson, though he is a majority shareholder, may have some other things on his mind right now, like the overall health of the Las Vegas economy, the availability of construction loans, refinancing his debt, etc.

His company, like MGM and WYNN, is in a pretty precarious situation right now. I’m unsure who does their investment banking, but I’ll bet they did business with Bear Stearns and Lehman. They probably have extensive business with Washington Mutual, as well. The recent and imminent collapse of several regional Las Vegas banks cannot help.

As much as guys like Adelson love Israel, he would be wise to focus on the health of his company, LVS, for a while.
tomboy Says:
September 14th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
I think that the declining fortunes of America’s plutocrats may be a factor in determining just who comes out ahead in this election.

Bush’s biggest backers included several Houston and Dallas area homebuilders, Adelson, the credit card industry, investment bankers, etc. Oil and gas are still relatively strong, but coal prices are off highs, oil is 33% off its June high, natural gas is down more, and many energy stocks are down much more.

These people have angry shareholders right now.
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Matt Yglesias

Big Bucks

26 Responses to “Big Bucks”

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