Cracks, Part II.5

In scouring the internet, it was revealed that Obama had raised some $86 million this past quarter and that he was ahead of his projection to raise one billion for his campaign. But, like so many things put out by this cretin, it just doesn't add up. So I went back to the original Miami Herald article and did some math. I also consulted another site (and will continue to look for more sources) and saw that some other things didn't add up either.

First the math.

The Obama campaign has declared that they will raise a billion for this race and as one commented on that in the article:

Some observers downplayed the significance of Obama exceeding his fund raising goal.

"No one puts out a number they don't think they can get to," said Nathan Gonzales, the deputy editor of the nonpartisan Rothenberg Political Report.

I don't know what his starting point was, but let's forget that for the moment. According to the article, he has approximately $86 million contributed. That means he has to raise $914 million more to meet his goal. Presumably the deadline is November 2012 and let's start with June of 2011 -- the end of last quarter. That means he has to raise an average of $57 million per month from July 2011 through October 2012. That's $171 million per quarter.

He just finished his most recent quarter and officially reported that he raised only the $86 million. This included some 260,000 "bundled" donors and the Hollywood big-wigs.

I know those guys are well-heeled and all that, but my preliminary sense is that -- like current government spending -- the pace to the billion is unsustainable. One cannot believe that idiots like Katzenberg and Clooney will be donating the same amounts month-after-month. But I will keep my slide rule and calculator close at hand and will rework these computations as I receive additional data.

Now, the reality.

There is a good web site which will allow you to track this if this is/will become your obsession. It's called Open Secrets and will present the campaign contributions and spending for candidates as we roll along towards November 2012. Here is an except on The Chicago Jesus's efforts to date:

 

"..but, what's this, Uncle War Planner?" you say, "according to to Open secrets, he's only raised $48 million. where does the rest of the $86 million come from?"

Courtesy of the Miami Herald article:

The president's fundraising arm, Obama for America, pulled in $47 million, the DNC another $38 million. In a conference call with reporters, Messina said more than 260,000 contributors are "totally new" and had never given to Obama before.

I think the number that Open Secrets cites -- the $48,662,185 -- refers to the $47 million that the Mimi Heralds article attributes to Obama as collecting along with the DNC's $38 million.

Whatever.

But note that Open Secrets has Obama as spending $80,235,455 and that they have $37,110,346. on hand. Without going into a formal mathematical proof about what his starting figure was nor how much he is spending and to try to reconcile the two sources' figures, we can come to the following conclusions:

(1) Obama's campaign is collecting a lot of money.
(2) They are already spending the money on campaigning.
(3) They are NOT on target to meet their billion dollar projection.

Anyway, this analysis is getting pretty ragged (and math was never my strong suit). I do take heart in the following quote from the Miami Herald article, however:

Obama's healthy haul comes as Republican candidates have reported raising less than Republicans did in the year before the 2008 election.

But Messina warns "it's going to get tougher from here," noting that GOP outside spending "could be as much as $500 million."

Wertheimer said he thinks the eventual Republican nominee will enjoy "very substantial resources."
...
While Arterton said Obama has raised an impressive amount of money so far, it may not matter as much because the public will be more engaged as the campaign picks up steam. He expects high turnout in 2012.

"The more general attention there is on the race, the less effective money is," Arterton said.

Wertheimer thinks that both sides will raise and spend a total of more than $2 billion.

"This is simply opening day of an unprecedented campaign finance season," he said.

So the bottom line seems to be that no matter what the president or his opponents raise to fight this battle for the hearts and minds of the American people, Obama is selling a tired, old pig that has been on display for the past 30 months and has proven defective and incapable of accomplishing the job; the American public have become restive and discontented with his administration's inability to pull this economy from the recession it's in. No amount of money can buy enough lipstick and dresses to make this pig anything other than what it is -- a pig.

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