Once again, Barack Obama's fundraising prowess and his intense focus on rallying donors has put him in the advantage in the fundraising race.
As Newsday reports:
Slow down in Fundraising Hits Clinton, Obama
BY GLENN THRUSH
glenn.thrush@newsday.com
9:09 PM EDT, September 25, 2007
-WASHINGTON
The torrid fundraising pace set by Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton is cooling faster than the housing market, with both camps claiming to raise millions less over the last three months than in previous quarters.
Obama is expected to pull in between $18 million and $19 million during the July-September reporting period, according to spokeswoman Jen Psaki -- $14 million to $15 million less than his $33 million second-quarter haul. Another Obama supporter, speaking on condition of anonymity, predicted that number could be somewhat higher, "in the low 20s."
Clinton will take in between $17 million and $19 million over the last three months, according to a person familiar with her fundraising.
"People are getting tapped out," said one Clinton donor.
So far, Obama has not been able to translate his fundraising prowess into popularity in key primary states, trailing Clinton by double digits in all early battlegrounds except Iowa.
Clinton got another boost in advance of tonight's debate at Dartmouth College, with CNN reporting that 54 percent of New Hampshire State Democrats think she's best positioned to beat a GOP candidate, compared with 13 percent who thought the same about Obama.
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What's interesting is that the Obama campaign is focused almost exclusively on fundraising, as Obama has been shirking his duties in the Senate to focus on rallying donors. Obama has missed 3 times as many Senate votes as Senator Clinton has, since January, so of course he'll be able to raise more money:
WASHINGTON - Barack Obama won't win any Senate attendance awards during the 2008 presidential campaign - he has racked up three times as many missed votes as challenger Hillary Clinton since January, according to roll call records.
Obama's most recent no-show happened Thursday on Capitol Hill when he skipped a vote on the controversial Republican-sponsored amendment to reprimand MoveOn.org for attacking Gen. David Petraeus, saying it was a "stunt" to embarrass Democrats.
But that was hardly the first vote the Illinois freshman sat out: He's missed 23.7 percent of his votes, according to vote-tracking databases. The issues he did not cast ballots on ranged from the symbolic to the significant, and included measures on abortion, homeland security, bridge safety, foreign aid, the alternative minimum tax and a failed no-confidence vote on Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in June.
Obama has been absent for 82 of his chamber's 346 votes during the current two-year session, a measure of how much time he's been spending in the crucial campaign states of New Hampshire, Iowa and South Carolina.
In contrast, Clinton has missed 8.3 percent of her votes - 28 since January, according to the Senate's voting tracker and the Washington Post's roll call database. She missed several key votes on abortion this month, in addition to earlier measures on bridge safety, immigration and offshore gas exploration.
Obama has not been able to convert his record-breaking piles of cash into record-breaking levels of voter support, though. Hillary continues to lead by double digits in virtually every poll.
Politics junkies like us have all heard candidates who are running losing campaigns say a variation of the message, "We are going to win, I can tell by the crowds we are getting and the enthusiasm in our crowds - we’re going to come from behind at the last minute." Savvy donors and supporters know that such language is a clear signal that the candidate is either lying or delusional. In his book "The Audacity of Hope," Obama wrote:
"Less than halfway into the campaign, I knew in my bones that I was going to lose. Each morning from that point forward I awoke with a vague sense of dread, realizing that I would have to spend the day smiling and shaking hands and pretending that everything was going according to plan."
SOURCES:
http://www.newsday.com/...
http://www.newsday.com/...