Election 2008

ClutchCityReturns · Oct 15, 2008

xelloss12 said:

Great video of Obama taking a question from a plumber on what looks like a rope line.

Whether or not you agree with Obama, this is how you answer a question.

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I kept thinking this plumber looked like one of the Ghost Hunter guys (far right in the picture...obviously). Then I remembered that the Ghost Hunter guy works for Roto Rooter as a day job. Pretty funny coincidence, I'd say.

rimrocker · Oct 15, 2008

rocket3forlife2 said:

This is why he needs more money, maybe that 50 state strategies is working in some of the states. He is going to force McCain to
Spend money in fl, Virginia, Missouri, North Carolina, and North Dakota and maybe even Georgia waste his money.
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He's steamrolling the Repubs... and it will also help down ballot...

Obama drowning out McCain in TV ads
By: Jeanne Cummings
October 15, 2008 09:07 AM EST
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=FD04426B-18FE-70B2-A865024A99747FBC

In the first three weeks of September, Barack Obama ran 1,342 television commercials in the Washington media market that reaches heavily populated and contested Northern Virginia.

According to The Nielsen Company, in the same period and market, John McCain aired just eight commercials on broadcast stations.

Similar disparities are playing out across the country as the Illinois Democrat flexes his financial muscle to outspend McCain and the Republican National Committee on television advertisements, in some cases by ratios of as much as 8-to-1.

As of close of business last week, Obama had spent approximately $195 million on primary and general election ads compared with $99 million by the Arizona Republican and the Republican National Committee, according to the Campaign Media Analysis Group.

And the gap is widening in the final weeks. As McCain constricted his Virginia ad campaign to cable stations and smaller, downstate media markets, Obama doubled down on Northern Virginia.

The Democrat’s average weekly broadcast buy of about $700,000 in Washington jumped last week by nearly threefold to about $2 million, according to station public records.

The spending figures are significant because they demonstrate how Obama’s fundraising advantage has helped him drown out his opponent and maintain a longer — and more positive — presence in the living rooms of voters in critical swing states.

“Obama is spending $3.5 million a day on television ads,” said Evan Tracey, CMAG’s chief operating officer. “If he does that through Election Day, it will be more than McCain got from the government for his entire general election campaign.”

Republicans are using every wrinkle and loophole in — ironically — the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law to try to keep pace and stretch their spending power.

The RNC is feverishly raising cash to augment McCain’s $85 million allotment from the taxpayer-backed presidential campaign financing account.

The party headquarters is expected to spend $19 million in coordinated campaign activities with McCain and another $45 million in hybrid ads that promote McCain and other Republican candidates.

The tactic, which was introduced by the Bush-Cheney reelection committee in 2004, allows a 50-50 split on ad costs for the RNC and McCain. But the results can be messy since the candidate isn’t in full control of his own message.

McCain’s much-anticipated first ad attacking Obama’s ties to former domestic terrorist Bill Ayers was widely panned because it also included an attack on congressional Democrats over federal spending, a muddling of messages deemed necessary to justify the RNC’s portion of the costs.

Even if the messaging went smoothly, though, the financial maneuvering would still only boost McCain’s spending to about $150 million for the general election.

The remaining spending gaps will have to be filled by the RNC with independent expenditures and transfers of cash to state party operations for swing-state voter turnout operations. According to Federal Election Commission disclosure forms, about $11 million has already been doled out by the RNC to seven states, most of which are in presidential battlegrounds.

But Obama’s recent purchase of two 30-minute blocks of time on two national networks — which could cost about $1 million apiece and negotiations are continuing with two other networks — has many Republicans worrying that they are up against an even bigger machine than they’d imagined.

The staggered release of fundraising disclosure reports isn’t helping their plight. Obama’s September donations totals will be released next week. Republicans won’t know how much he collects in this final month until after Election Day.

Meanwhile, Obama is urging backers to pony up for the final push and to grow his already record-breaking 2 million donors by at least 100,000 by this Friday.

The consequences of such a significant financial mismatch are already becoming evident on the Electoral College playing field.

Again, look at Virginia, a state that hasn’t backed a Democratic candidate since 1964 and is now considered a tossup.

During the heated primary with Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama spent $1.5 million in the Old Dominion. McCain, who was cruising to the nomination and had little money at that point in the GOP primary, spent just $330,000 on ads.

Since the Democratic primary ended in June, Obama has spent another $13 million in Virginia, compared with McCain’s $5.5 million, CMAG found.

Obama’s buying power allows him to run a mix of positive and negative ads and to spread them over a wider swath of turf. He is also able to play in all media markets, expensive or not. That’s a luxury McCain can’t afford, as evidenced by his near-blackout in Northern Virginia.

"McCain is virtually invisible in the commercial breaks,” said Bill Lord, vice president of news for WJLA-TV, the Washington ABC affiliate that is owned by Politico parent company Allbritton Communications Co.

To stay competitive in Virginia and elsewhere, McCain has made a series of ad buys in smaller markets or those that can provide a two-fer by bleeding into more than one state.

Nebraska is one of just two states that distributes its Electoral College votes based on the outcome in each of its three congressional districts, an unusual allocation that enticed the Obama campaign to fight for the Omaha-based district vote while all but conceding the rest of the traditionally Republican state to McCain.

While Obama is significantly outspending McCain in the Omaha television market, McCain has been making major buys in less expensive, nearby Sioux City, Iowa, which reaches both Omaha and Hawkeye State voters.

In the first three weeks of September, McCain ran more than 1,000 ads on those smaller stations while Obama didn’t run any.

Though Iowa voted for President Bush in 2004, it is another state that Democrats are confident they can flip from red to blue come November.

Dissatisfaction with the war and the economy are helping their effort. But Obama’s early work in the primary is also paying dividends and may have put the state out of Republican reach before the general election even began.

Since June, McCain and the RNC have spent about $4 million in Iowa, airing mostly negative ads aimed at raising doubts about his opponent.

But they appear to have had little effect on Obama, who spent $10 million on television commercials introducing himself to voters before the winter caucuses.

Since June, he’s invested another $2 million on ads in in Iowa — a paltry sum by Obama’s standards but one that may reflect confidence that a roughly 12-point lead in state polls will hold up until Election Day.

A study recently released by the Wisconsin Advertising Project, an arm of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, documented similar imbalances in other key states.

The report zeroed in on one week of spending, Sept. 28 to Oct. 4. It found that Obama was outspending McCain and the RNC by more than 3-to-1 in Florida, 2-to-1 in New Hampshire and 8-to-1 in North Carolina.

“Because of Obama’s fundraising advantage, his campaign is able to spend more in more states than we’ve seen in recent memory,” said Ken Goldstein, the project’s director.

McCain and the RNC are still trying to play a little offense: Pennsylvania is a rare state they hope will flip from blue to red.

Both campaigns have spent about $16.5 million on advertisements in the Keystone State since June.

But, as in Iowa, McCain’s messages are being delivered to an audience that has already had plenty of exposure to Obama.

When his primary television budget is added to the general election spending, Obama’s overall advertising in Pennsylvania — so far — comes to $27 million, compared to McCain’s $17 million.

"Obama is matching McCain’s negative ads and using the excess spending to do positive spots. He’s able to be both the good cop and the bad cop,” said Tracey.
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rimrocker · Oct 15, 2008

McCain spending his last dollars on robocalls... go to the link to listen...

New Robocalls From McCain Campaign And RNC Slam Obama's Patriotism, Charge He Put "Hollywood Above America"
By Greg Sargent - October 15, 2008, 11:12AM
http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/10/new_robocalls_from_mccain_and.php

The McCain campaign and the RNC are pumping new robocalls into North Carolina that question Barack Obama's patriotism by charging that he and his fellow Dems put "Hollywood above America," another sign that Republicans are seriously worried about losing the traditionally red state to Obama.

The robocalls -- which we obtained from a North Carolina reader -- hit Obama for attending a celebrity fundraiser in Hollywood while efforts to address the financial crisis got underway in Washington.

A second round of robocalls, also from McCain and the RNC, hits Obama as a tax-hiker, and stops just short of criticizing the big bailout package that McCain has repeatedly taken credit for helping get passed. Both the McCain campaign and the RNC declined to comment.

(Update: Readers in Missouri, Colorado and Wisconsin are now reporting they received the "Hollywood above America" call.)

Here's the first call questioning Obama's patriotism:
Video thumbnail. Click to play
Click To Play
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The audio doesn't represent the complete call, because our reader started taping once it began.

"Barack Obama and his fellow Democrats got caught putting Hollywood above America," the call says. "On the very day our elected leaders gathered in Washington to deal with the financial crisis, Barack Obama spent just 20 minutes with economic advisers, but hours at a celebrity Hollywood fundraiser. Where are the Democrats' priorities?"

The call closes with a disclaimer saying it was paid for by "McCain-Palin 2008 and the Republican National Committee."

The fundraiser referred to in the call appears to be this one in mid September, which netted Obama $9 million.

The calls are only the latest example of the McCain campaign claiming to take the high road while it does the opposite. In mid-summer, senior McCain adviser Charlie Black claimed that the campaign wasn't interested in talking about Obama's patriotism.

The second robocall is a more straightforward hit on Obama over taxes, but it edges up to criticism of what it calls the "Wall Street bailout."

You can listen to it here:
Video thumbnail. Click to play
Click To Play
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"With higher gas prices, grocery costs, and a struggling economy, we cannot afford Barack Obama's and the Democrats' one-trillion dollars in new taxes and spending," the call says. "With the Wall Street bailout we're simply in way over our heads. We cannot afford another one trillion dollars in big-government bureaucracy, higher taxes, and more wasteful spending that our children will have to pay for."

That the McCain campaign and the RNC resorting to such tactics in North Carolina, of all places, suggests real panic about a state that hasn't supported a Dem for President since favorite son Jimmy Carter in 1976 -- more than three decades ago.
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mc mark · Oct 15, 2008

But Obama’s recent purchase of two 30-minute blocks of time on two national networks — which could cost about $1 million apiece and negotiations are continuing with two other networks — has many Republicans worrying that they are up against an even bigger machine than they’d imagined.
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As IROC it would say...welcome to the campaign.

Faos · Oct 15, 2008

In other words, Obama is buying his presidency?

Faos · Oct 15, 2008

mc mark said:

So Faos are you just being respectful with this picture?
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The question is will he wait until his inauguration to put the hat on or the night of his acceptance speech?

BigBenito · Oct 15, 2008

Faos said:

In other words, Obama is buying his presidency?
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In other words, the American people are buying Obama's presidency.

GuerillaBlack · Oct 15, 2008

Faos said:

In other words, Obama is buying his presidency?
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Obama isn't buying a damn thing but ad space. It comes down to the American people.

mc mark · Oct 15, 2008

Faos said:

The question is will he wait until his inauguration to put the hat on or the night of his acceptance speech?
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You should turn on CNN right now and listen to Michelle Obama talk about what's at stake in this election.

rimrocker · Oct 15, 2008

Faos said:

In other words, Obama is buying his presidency?
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I would say he's using the money that hard-working people donated to keep the Repubs from buying the election.

Faos · Oct 15, 2008

BigBenito said:

In other words, the American people are buying Obama's presidency.
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If only it were American people who have donated to the Obama cause. If only.

DonnyMost · Oct 15, 2008

Faos said:

If only it were American people who have donated to the Obama cause. If only.
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Damn Iranians.

gifford1967 · Oct 15, 2008

Faos said:

In other words, Obama is buying his presidency?
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Do you do anything other than spout random gibberish?

The Obama campaign is funded by more small donors than any presidential campaign in history.

Would rather have a president who's campaign was funded more by corporations, special interests, and large donors?

RocketMan Tex · Oct 15, 2008

rimrocker said:

I would say he's using the money that hard-working people donated to keep the Repubs from buying the election yet again.
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Fixed it for you.

JeopardE · Oct 15, 2008

"You hear that Mr. Anderson? That is the sound of inevitability."

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/10/obama-dominating-among-early-voters-in.html

Early voting results from NM, GA, OH, IA and NC showing Obama leading by an average of 23 points. These all went to Bush by an average of 6.5 points in 2004. Article also points out that early voters in these states have historically leaned Republican rather than Democrat.

This one's over, folks. Unless something dramatically catastrophic happens in tonight's debate, the rest of the campaign is a mere formality in my opinion.

mc mark · Oct 15, 2008

Don't get complacent or let up! There's still work to do!

JeopardE · Oct 15, 2008

Actually, I think the most amazing part of this news (combined with new polls coming out today) is that GEORGIA is suddenly in play.

That's right. Georgia. Blood red, southern baked Georgia. McCain is still ahead in the polls there, but Georgia is suddenly turning into a swing state.

rimrocker · Oct 15, 2008

RocketMan Tex said:

Fixed it for you.

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I almost wrote it that way. Not sure why I didn't.

f_chowd0696 · Oct 15, 2008

pppbigppp said:

Hahaha, same guy immediate phones Falsenews and talk about Obama being a scary socialist. Another episode of self-parody bought to you by Fox.

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It would be really hilarious if that guy on the phone was different from the one who asked Obama the questions...

However it wouldn't be surprising since it is coming from Fox News.... I lose a part of my soul every time someone on Fox News says "no spin" or "no bias", or "no bull".

rimrocker · Oct 15, 2008

JeopardE said:

Actually, I think the most amazing part of this news (combined with new polls coming out today) is that GEORGIA is suddenly in play.

That's right. Georgia. Blood red, southern baked Georgia. McCain is still ahead in the polls there, but Georgia is suddenly turning into a swing state.
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Arkanasas, LA, and Arizona will soon be competitive.

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