Thanks! I've been wondering about this "roll over" issue for months and haven't been able to find the answer!

Hey, Greg.

Since we now have a re-constituted FEC, has anyone followed up to find out whether McCain will suffer any consequences for unilaterally opting out of public financing for the primaries, after officially opting in (and securing a loan based on that fact)?

Seems to me what he did was illegal. But do the laws actually apply to Republicans??

-- ARG

Poor Republicans. Pessimism just ain't selling like it used to, I guess.

Note that the low average donation also means that it's very likely that these contributors will be able to give again.

It also indicates that there are many big donors out there who may have contributed to another Democrat previously, who didn't contribute before the end of June, and who can still be tapped.

I want to take a moment to thank all of those new donors out there who initially supported candidates other than Barack Obama. You're invaluable to the campaign. Thank you and welcome aboard. We're going to win this thing... for all of us.

and also note:
all of McCain's millions he has raised must be spent by September 1.

It's worth pointing out that the Obama campaign's raising of most of this money for the primary is essentially by design.

They *WANT* to do so, and, infact, have made that option the default for all donations thus far on their website.

It's not about building a huge nestegg for Obama's campaign. It's about having a real fundraising engine in place that allows "just-in-time" spending, much like a factory would lower their costs by having just enough raw materials in the factory to manufacture to their needs, and just enough finished materials to meet the immediate needs of the marketplace.

Right now, the Obama campaign can easily spend every dollar that comes in to them with maximum efficiency, because there's so much work that needs to be done with opening new campaign offices and getting Democrats registered to vote.

This won't necessarily be the case in a few months, however, as voter registration will be less of an issue, the advertising market will be saturated, and the return on investment -- the number of votes delivered per dollar spent -- will be much higher.

That's why any money raised right now is so important. Voter registration and helping out local grassroots efforts right now is the best, most important longterm investment Obama's campaign can make, because if his campaign can get just 5% more Democrats registered than in 2004, that's the margin of victory.

Frankly, I think we can do *MUCH* better than that. People are politically energized right now, and John McCain is clearly going backwards, not forwards.

Hmmmm. Nice chunk of change, Obama. I guess all those commenters who kept telling us that Obama was not raising sufficient amounts of money because his anti-FISA supporters were withholding their donations was just plain freaking wrong.

Or is there some subtlety I'm not getting?

One other question. I'm pretty sure that if the bulk of the money had not been designated for the primary, he would not have been allowed to spend it before the convention if he'd taken public financing. I don't know, and I'm too busy to find out, whether that rule is still operative now that he's opted out, but I can't think of any logical reason why it wouldn't be.

Not that logic and the law necessarily have anything to with each other, especially when Congress is writing campaign finance laws, of course. Any chance someone can look into that?

LOL this still cracks me up. I am enjoying the WSJ and all of the other hacks/pundits yammering about his 'measly' 30mil looking like complete idiots. 'Considerably More' indeed.

Couple of comments on the posts -
All of the money that Obama raises between now and the convention is 'Primary' money unless an individual donates more than $2300. By definition, because Obama is primarily raising $ from small donors, there isn't much going into the GE kitty yet.

By opting out of public funding Obama sort of blurred the lines, he can spend primary $ anytime but any money from donors in excess of the inital 2300 is on hold until the convention.

So for those of us who have yet to reach the 2300 mark there really is no primary vs GE, it is all just money to Obama.

The fact that he only had 2mil for the GE means that there there is a lot more $$ to be had, on the other hand given that he sewed up the nomination, that also means there wasn't a big influx of 'all in' money. (4600 for the whole shebang) which could be an issue.

Although, the fact that he still got 50mil without that... who cares.

Since we now have a re-constituted FEC, has anyone followed up to find out whether McCain will suffer any consequences for unilaterally opting out of public financing for the primaries, after officially opting in (and securing a loan based on that fact)?

That probably depends on who's on the FEC. And according to the NYT, it looks pretty good for McCain.

“It is sort of further indicia that Senator McCain’s fingerprints are somehow part of the motivating factor of getting these commission seats filled,” Mr. Gross said. “I didn’t get a license in detective work, but I don’t think you’d have to be a certified detective to figure it out.”

More:
http://www.moresoftmoneyhardlaw.com/news.html?AID=1256

Also:
http://www.adam-b.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/5/8/10552/49428/718/510851

(Note: The NYT piece, a couple of days newer than the blog posts, does note that von Spakowsky was later dropped from the nominations list, after Bush and the Rethugs had insisted on him for months. But David Mason, also a Republican but highly critical of McCain's shell game during the primary season, was also dropped.)

For this maneuver to have been arranged for the benefit of Senator McCain, of all people--the John McCain who has regularly, severely criticized the FEC as a "corrupt" agency--is a remarkable turn in his career as a reformer. A Commissioner who acted to enforce the law, to just raise an important question of enforcement, has been stripped of his post. This was clearly in Senator McCain's interest, this raw power play. It is also in his interest to have the FEC, back in business minus Mason, arrange for his money for the fall campaign.

It is inconceivable that McCain was not informed of the plan. In fact, it is highly probable that he was in involved in its formulation or its approval....

Yesterday, Republicans could not have acted more narrowly in just this vein: effectively firing a Commissioner to immunize their Presidential nominee from enforcement action in a pending case but making sure that there is enough of an agency left to get him the money needed to finance his campaign.

http://www.moresoftmoneyhardlaw.com/news.html?AID=1256

Bottom line: Bush filled 2/3 of the FEC seats in June. There's no way he would have nominated anyone who would actually investigate McCain's shell game. None.

Seems to me what he did was illegal. But do the laws actually apply to Republicans??

Not usually. But you knew that already.