Romney Donors Out in Force in Hamptons

EAST HAMPTON, N.Y. – A woman in a blue chiffon dress poked her head out of a black Range Rover here on Sunday afternoon and yelled to an aide to Mitt Romney, “Is there a V.I.P. entrance. We are V.I.P.”

No such entrance existed. The line of cars waiting to enter a Romney event at a waterfront estate here had reached 30 deep, testament to the Republican candidate’s fund-raising might on a weekend when he is expected to haul in $3 million in the Hamptons.

Laura R. Schwartz of New Jersey, the woman inside the Range Rover, complained that Mr. Obama had not visited Israel as president, a slight to the country, in her eyes. “I don’t think he is good for Israel,” she said. Mr. Romney, she said, “is a fresh face.”

A few cars back, Ted Conklin, the owner of the American Hotel in Sag Habor, N.Y., long a favorite of the well-off and well-known in the Hamptons, could barely contain his displeasure with Mr. Obama. “He is a socialist. His idea is find a problem that doesn’t exist and get government to intervene,” Mr. Conklin said from inside a gold-colored Mercedes as his wife, Carol Simmons, nodded in agreement.

Ms. Simmons paused to highlight what she said was her husband’s generous spirit: “Tell them who’s on your yacht this weekend! Tell him!”

Over Mr. Conklin’s objections, Ms. Simmons disclosed that a major executive from Miramax, the movie company, was on the 75-foot yacht, because, she said, there were no rooms left at the hotel.

Obama has not released his June figures. I have some real doubts that he has money problems. At the end of May, he had six times the money on hand as Romney.

Obama has a lot more campaign money than Romney

"The lie needs to be put to the very idea that President Obama might be outspent during the 2012 election. Nobody knows how much the candidates and campaign will raise in the weeks ahead, but, so far, the numbers are pretty clear. To date, the Democratic National Committee, the Obama campaign and Obama super PACs have raised $471,400,000. This does not include at least $400 million that the labor unions have pledged to spend on Obama’s behalf. The Romney campaign, Republican National Committee and Romney super PACs have raised $264,223,126 — and much of that was spent during the Republican primary contest.

Anyway, there is a myth in American politics today that Obama will be outspent by Mitt Romney. Maybe that myth exists because Democrats, including Carter Eskew and President Obama, say it is so. It must be a fundraising tactic to scare contributors into giving, because the numbers suggest something completely different.

If I’m wrong about these numbers, I wish that Carter, President Obama or other readers would let me know. Let’s not quibble over groups like the NRA or the Sierra Club. But any honest analysis of the funding at the top of the ticket confirms that Obama has a huge advantage. As more reliable information is confirmed, I will pass it along. In the meantime I think that the Obama campaign’s complaints about being outspent by Romney should be greeted with skepticism."

On the 2012 campaign trail, Obama is claiming that he was outspent by the Reps in 2008--a definite lie that showed Obama with twice as much money as McCain. In 2008 Obama raised close to $750 million. I have no doubt he will raise at least as much this time. Obama wants to be seen as the underdog.

As far as cutting the Dem convention by one day, it has less to do with funding as it does with making a big mistake by holding it in NC. Our first gay president does not go over well in NC nor do the Dems who have an unpopular Dem governor. And a significant number of Dems are bypassing the national convention. The real test of Obama's popularity will be how many Dem candidates/incumbents want to be seen with Obama on the campaign trail.

Obama’s campaign spending mythology

"Bizarrely, even though Obama was noted for pulling in a flood of campaign cash in his previous races – much of it from suspicious, unverified sources – his new campaign strategy involves whining about how Mitt Romney and allied independent groups are outspending him. Because the media was completely uninterested in harping upon the point in 2008, and certainly isn’t going to bring it up now, you might not recall that Obama actually broke a high-profile promise to abide by public campaign financing rules in 2008, because he was hauling in so much money from donors.

The often-repeated Obama lie about being outspent by Romney-aligned Super PACs was debunked last week. Obama Super PACs have spent more than Romney Super PACs, and the Obama groups have been far more negative. Perhaps the Romney groups will spend more during the heated final months of the campaign, but as things stand right now, the Obama narrative about evil Republican Super PACs burying him under negative ads, which his allies can’t afford to respond to, is simply false.

As for the campaigns themselves, Obama began with a $100 million cash advantage, and still has nearly $100 million more in cash on hand. Romney has been doing much better than Obama at fundraising lately, but he had to spend a great deal on the primary campaign, while Obama faced no serious primary opposition. Since the primary season concluded and Romney officially became the nominee, the Obama campaign has outspent Romney 3-to-1, and the Obama ads have been over 75 percent negative."

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