Edwards, Obama Camps Massage Expectations In Advance Of Fundraising Deadline
John Edwards' campaign is either playing the expectations game brilliantly — or Camp Edwards is in big, big trouble.
"Thanks to you, we're within striking distance of our $9 million fundraising goal with just under 48 hours to go," Edwards said in an email to supporters today.
Nine million dollars actually happens to be more than Howard Dean raised in the second quarter of 2003, when he took the lead in the Dem field. But in today's environment it's simply a paltry total, particularly when compared to Hillary's predicted $27 million and Obama's potentially higher fundraising tally.
The Obama campaign today also sought to spin expectations in a similar fashion, sending out an email that explained and extolled their decision to seek funds only for the primary and not for the general election.
"In reality, the funds raised for the general election serve no purpose other than inflating a candidate's total," read the email.
The point being, of course, that if Hillary's total turns out to be higher than theirs, it's only because she's padding her numbers by including general election funds in their final tally.















You can call it spin, but it has the benefit of being quite obviously true. Any Dem nominee is going to be able to raise money hand over fist, and all of their max primary donors, and probably most of the max primary donors to the other campaigns, are going to max out for the general election as well.
So raising money for the general election now is pointless and including it in the fundraising totals is disingenuous.
June 29, 2007 3:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Eric - you're pimping the media's hype and implication that candidates raising the most money will make the "best" presidents.
Do you really think John Edwards, the Union Man, expected to raise lots of moolah via the national Chamber of Commerce?? Jeeeez!
Candidates who walk picket lines with union members and help place minimum wage on ballots while advocating for the working poor - are NOT expected to be well received by the corporate media and their anti-union corporate sponsors.
Thought you knew these basic facts.
June 29, 2007 4:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
"The point being, of course, that if Hillary's total turns out to be higher than theirs, it's only because she's padding her numbers by including general election funds in their final tally."
So you are saying Obama's camp is trying tamp down expectations? Kinda playing politics with their fundraising. Most likely they are gonna play the “Wow look at what we raised” card.
Ex. from the first quarter:
One week before Q1 ended, the Obama campaign predicted he'd raise $7 million to $12 million: The Washington Post reported, “Senator Barack Obama has similarly played down his goals, with aides saying they would be thrilled to take $7 million to $12 million this quarter.” However, the Obama campaign actually brought in $25.7 million.
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2007/06/28/how_they_set_expectations_last_quarter.html
Like they had no clue the total would be more than double. Please.
Edwards:
One week before Q1 ended, the Edwards campaign predicted he's raise about $7.4 million: John Edwards raised a record $7.4 million during the first quarter in 2003. The Cox News Service reported "This year, the Edwards' campaign is trying to tamp down expectations. Spokeswoman Kate Bedingfield said the goal was ‘to exceed our fundraising total from the last time.'" However, Edwards actually raised $14 million.
Hillary:
Just before Q1 ended, the Clinton campaign "stuck with estimates" of raising $25 million, according to the Wall Street Journal. The Clinton campaign actually raised $25.8 million.
So in the first quarter the Clinton camp nailed it. The other 2 top tier candidates were either playing politics or had no clue.
June 29, 2007 4:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Edwards, rightly or wrongly, has decided to set a goal of $40m in order to compete in the Jan primaries, on the assumption that a strong showing in Iowa will give him the momentum to compete on Feb 5th; perhaps even that the race might be over before Feb 5th. Raising $9m in Q2 is on target to meet their stated goal.
Now you may wonder about their strategy, but they have made their decision and determined how much they need to raise. So I don't think these numbers indicate that Edwards is in big trouble.
Edwards was never going to be able to match the amounts that HRC and Obama could raise. What he desperately needs is every vote he can get in the Jan primaries and caucuses and then hope it's a winning strategy. Personally, I'm not convinced but.........
June 29, 2007 4:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
You're mostly right, but it does show that Edwards' grass roots support is thinner than one might expect, because, thankfully, one positive thing about the internet is that anti-union corporate sponsors are not needed to raise millions of dollars. Obama is proving that by raising almost all of his money from small contributors.
June 29, 2007 4:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Marc Ambinder, of the Atlantic, on Fundraising
The Atlantic Blog
As for Obama's totals, he's reporting 348,000 total donations thus far on his website. His campaign said they expected the average donation to be less than the $247 they averaged in the 1st quarter. Even assuming its far less than that, say, only $150 on average for the entire year, that comes out to ~$52,200,000...which would put him right at Hillary's expected totals for the 2nd quarter, ~$27,000,000. However, he could've out-done that significantly. I mean, if he ends up with a, say, $200 average? That's ~$45,000,000 this quarter alone, I believe.
June 29, 2007 4:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Eric -
9million is double what he did in 2003.
Also, who the F cares about the money so much.
Hillary's taken in many millions from Lobbyists and PACs so who cares who has the most.
The fundraising is precisely why Hillary would not answer yes or no to pardoning Libby. The fundraising apparatus in DC likes Libby.
June 29, 2007 5:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
From the Washington Post, 21 Mar 2007:
According to this Washington Post article 10 days before the end of Q1, the official prediction from Hillary's campaign was $15 million, not $25 million.
June 29, 2007 6:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Allow Steven Levitt (co-author of everyone's favorite cocktail book: Freakonomics) to drop some knowledge on the subject:
http://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levitt/Papers/LevittUsingRepeatChallengers1994.pdf
Obvious caveat being that that was a study on congressional elections, I don't know of anyone doing something similar with Presidential elections, in fact, the same analysis wouldn't be possible, there's just not enough data.
Anyway, there's definitely a saturation point, with the best model from that paper being a squared relationship, in other words, diminishing returns above a certain level. Edwards is betting that 9 million this quarter, and 40 mil before Iowa, is the inflection point, the optimum amount to raise without having to sell your soul and still win.
The last paragraph is the most relevant here, with the media driving the perception that it's the most important thing. Eric, are you on the side of driving perception or maintaining reality?
UPDATE: if you click on the link to the paper, the site inserts a space after the last slash. That always happens with long links on here, and I don't know how to fix it.
June 29, 2007 6:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why not post the whole Edwards email and the entire Obama memo?
And doesn't the Obama point about general v. primary money have the added benefit of being true? The obvious political calculation is that whoever is the general nominee will see a windfall of general election money come his/her way as soon as the nod is all sewn up.
June 29, 2007 9:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
No. The obvious indication is that whatever HRC posts as her number cannot be trusted, because it will include money earmarked for the General. In other words, he's beating her in total donors, and total primary money raised, despite getting into the race 3 weeks after she did.
What I really want to know is campaign burn rate.
June 30, 2007 1:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think people should be a lot more concerned about where the money comes from.
Obama getting a widow's mite is a lot better than Hillary getting a bundle from a millionaire's PAC.
One of the most unlikely PAC's of all time was Alexander Cockburn's Liberals for Dole. I would love to know how much that raised. At least Cockburn understood that the Democratic nominee was furthest right and even meaner than Bob Dole.
The money chase gets sicker and sicker. A plutocracy is not the best form of government I think.
Best, Terry
June 30, 2007 6:31 AM | Reply | Permalink