Obama: The $150 million man
Posted: Monday, October 20, 2008 9:06 AM by Domenico Montanaro
The New York Times writes that Obama’s “announcement on Sunday of his record-shattering $150 million fund-raising total for September underscored just how much his campaign has upended standards for raising money in presidential campaigns. His campaign has now raised more than $600 million, almost equaling what all the candidates from both major parties collected in private donations in 2004.”
“It is a remarkable ascent to previously unimagined financial heights -- Mr. Obama’s September total more than doubled the record $66 million he collected in August -- that has been cheered by some and decried by others concerned about the influence of money in politics. The impact on the way presidential campaigns are financed is likely to be profound, potentially providing an epitaph on the tombstone of the existing public finance system.”
AP's Kuhnhenn writes, "The extraordinary sum vindicated Obama's decision. It also made a public finance system born after the excesses of the Watergate era look decidedly quaint." More: "But while Obama has rewritten campaign finance rules with his use of technology and personal outreach, he has also taken advantage of a changing social and political landscape that suited his message and his celebrity."
Politico puts Obama’s haul this way: “Barack Obama has raised more money for his presidential bid than all candidates combined raised in the open 2000 presidential race and is on track to top the joint sum raised by President Bush and John F. Kerry in 2004. The Illinois Democrat’s September haul of more than $150 million brings his overall contribution total for the 2008 raise to more than $600 million. Republican rival John McCain has raised about $250 million.”
The McCain campaign will begin a five-day series looking at what it says are Obama’s ties to the community group ACORN. Says a McCain spokesman, “Our hope is that Barack Obama will understand that the American public has a right to know about this troubling relationship with a quasi-criminal organization that is conducting wide-scale election fraud.”
Meanwhile, ACORN says it will hold a conference call today to note that one of its staff members has recently received a death threat, while two of its offices have been broken in and vandalized.
