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Politics : Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Kerry -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: American Spirit who wrote (19006)	4/28/2004 9:06:25 PM
From: Ann Corrigan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 81568

You are sooooo consistent.....wrong again. I saw the O'Neill/Kerry match up on C-Span. O'Neill is a man of character WITHOUT political ambitions. He was outraged by Kerry's post Vietnam congressional testimony & views the possibility of a Kerry presidency as dangerous for the USA(as do I).

To: American Spirit who wrote (19006)	4/29/2004 12:30:02 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 81568

Bush-Cheney misassumptions washingtontimes.com When the Bush-Cheney campaign announced in June that it intended to raise $170 million before the Republican National Convention, the figure raised more than a few eyebrows, even among jaded politicos. Indeed, President Bush had smashed previous records in 2000 when he raised $100 million in hard dollars. And early this month, the campaign announced it had surpassed its goal by the end of the first quarter, when its total receipts exceeded $180 million. Evidently content with themselves, Mr. Bush's aides told the New York Times that they saw no need to continue major fund-raising events because they had met their long-term goal. While the campaign would continue to solicit money by direct mail and over the Internet, the mega fund-raisers were over. The Bush-Cheney campaign is making a big mistake. The political fund-raising terrain has undergone huge changes since June — all of them contrary to the assumptions underlying the $170 million goal. In December, for example, the Supreme Court effectively upheld the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance bill in its entirety, including the provision barring national party committees from raising unlimited soft-money contributions. Second, believing that all Democratic aspirants would accept matching funds and the $45 million primary campaign spending limit accompanying them, everybody last June assumed that the eventual Democratic nominee would emerge destitute in early March. Apart from the limited amount of hard dollars that the Democratic National Committee could raise and spend on the nominee's behalf, it was further assumed that he would remain broke over the next five months. In late July, the nominee would receive a cash infusion from the government for the general election. Contrary to the second set of assumptions, Sen. John Kerry decided to forgo matching funds and the pre-convention spending limits, and today he is anything but broke. Having claimed the nomination on March 2, Mr. Kerry raised nearly $40 million last month. By the end of the first quarter, when his cumulative 2003-04 fund-raising total approached $80 million, Mr. Kerry himself was also well on his way to smashing Mr. Bush's 2000 record. About half of the $54 million that his campaign raised during the first quarter arrived via the Internet, suggesting the onset of a deluge that was unlikely to subside anytime before late July. Just last week, Mr. Kerry picked up $13 million at several events. His January-July fund-raising goal has skyrocketed from a hoped-for $80 million to a likely $120 million. Meanwhile, a gigantic shadow Democratic money machine has been organized by Clinton fund-raising impresario Harold Ickes and Ellen Malcolm of EMILY's List to mop up the hundreds of millions of dollars in soft money that used to be raised by Democratic Party committees in the pre-McCain-Feingold era. Financed largely by billionaire George Soros and the seemingly bottomless treasuries of labor unions, the shadow organization expects to spend more than $300 million targeting the president. Apparently spooked by McCain-Feingold's criminal penalties, countervailing Republican-leaning independent committees have been slow to evolve. And the possibility that the Federal Election Commission will adopt restrictive polices during the current election cycle appears remote. Given that today's political climate is utterly different from the fund-raising landscape assumed by the Bush-Cheney campaign in June, the president needs to re-examine his fund-raising strategy and needs. In today's world, $170 million to $180 million won't begin to meet the challenge being organized by Mr. Kerry and his allies.