Clinton thread
Out of context: Reply #244
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"Another reason why despite the fun everyone is having, it's time for Hillary Clinton to recognize it's time to acknowledge that Barack Obama is our nominee:
Democratic talk of an early, hard-hitting campaign to "define" and tar Arizona Sen. John McCain appears to have fizzled for lack of money, leading to a quiet round of finger-pointing among Democratic operatives and donors as McCain assembles a campaign and a public image relatively unmolested.
Despite the millions of dollars pooling around Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, anti-McCain funds have fallen far short of the hopes set in November, when a key organizer, Tom Matzzie, reportedly told The Washington Post that the "Fund for America" would raise more than $100 million to support the activities of a range of allied groups.
The Democratic National Committee, too, is organizing an anti-McCain campaign, but a spokeswoman, Karen Finney, said fundraising to support that effort has met "mixed" results.
So while news releases and Internet ads have been launched, the largest-bore weapon in contemporary politics — a sustained television campaign — hasn't. That's because, people involved say, the soft-money groups don't have the soft money.
"Many of the people who would normally be involved in such an effort are overly focused on the primary, which is a mistake," said Michael Vachon, a spokesman for George Soros, who is the largest individual donor to the Fund for America, which in turn has passed on at least $1.4 million to what was expected to be the main attack group, an organization called the Campaign to Defend America.
"We know we're going to have a good Democratic nominee — it's time for Democrats to turn their attention to John McCain," Vachon said.
When John Kerry effectively secured the 2004 nomination at the beginning of March, he was broke. The Bush campaign and the RNC were waiting to tee off on him, and try to kill him in the crib. But it didn't happen, in part because the moment the RNC launched with something like $30 million in advertising against Kerry, the Media Fund—run by Clinton consigliere Harold Ickes—launched with a similarly powerful barrage against Bush. At the end of May or so, both sides had run a tremendous amount of early advertising, but the Media Fund had held off Bush's attacks, Kerry avoided significant damage, and he had reloaded his coffers so he could wage his own advertising assault.
This time around, nothing like that is happening. Some donors are waiting for the nomination to be settled. Others will only give if it's their preferred nominee. There are questions about who will staff some of the operations. And we have yet to arrive at the "everyone rally around the Democratic nominee, be unified and redirect our fire outward against the Republicans" stage. Until we do, independent operations against McCain will probably remain paralyzed.
By prolonging the race, Hillary Clinton is imposing Democrats a huge opportunity cost. Because she hasn't acknowledged that she won't be the nominee and it's time to support Barack Obama, John McCain is escaping early attacks by either our nominee or by independent groups operating independent of our nominees campaign but allied with our cause. "