Free Republic

All week long, you and I have been blasting the bereft Beltway GOP leadership for their empty sloganeering and Obama-esque change obsession. Now, the NRCC is hearing it directly on its website. Reader Fritz e-mails that the comments section in the NRCC blog post by chairman Tom Cole is sizzling hot with aggravated grass-roots conservative feedback. Go check it out. A sample: This is not the message I am looking to support. The message of the Replican Part should be fundumentally different than the Democrats. We don’t need to “fix” the government. We need the Federal Government to do wnat...

A long-time friend and fundraiser of presidential hopeful Barack Obama was accused by prosecutors Monday of using his political clout to demand kickbacks, win government contracts and place associates in key state jobs.While Obama is not accused of any wrongdoing and has subsequently donated all the money raised by alleged influence-peddler Antoin "Tony" Rezko to charity, prosecutors have said that some of the kickbacks ended up in the Illinois Democratic senator's campaign coffers.Obama is also under fire for entering a land deal with Rezko in 2005 when it was widely known that the real estate developer was under federal scrutiny,...

With her campaign falling ever deeper into debt, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton spent a rainy Mother's Day seeking votes ahead of Tuesday's primary here, turning a deaf ear to calls for her to leave a Democratic presidential contest she has little hope of winning. Clinton aides continued to insist that she will remain in the race even while confirming that she is $20 million in debt. "The voters are going to decide this," senior adviser Howard Wolfson said on "Fox News Sunday," acknowledging the $20 million figure. "There is no reason for her not to continue this process." Wolfson said...

It took 20 years for John Glenn, the former astronaut and Democratic senator, to repay the debts that he ran up in his failed bid for the presidential nomination in 1984. Nobody is predicting that Hillary Clinton, whose campaign debts are estimated at between $20m and $30m – and rising – would take that long to meet her obligations. But the financial strain is getting more difficult with each day. Having raised little more than $1m (€650,000, £510,000) since her defeat in North Carolina and narrow victory in Indiana last Tuesday, compared to $10m in the days following her Pennsylvania...

WASHINGTON, May 9 (UPI) -- The cash-strapped campaign of Sen. Hillary Clinton has forced curtailments of political events and advertising as the primary season winds down, aides say. Advisers said Clinton would infuse her Democratic presidential campaign with more of her own money on top of the more than $11 million she already loaned the it, The New York Times said. Hassan Nemazee, a Clinton national finance chairman, said the campaign raised more than $1 million after her primary loss in North Carolina and her razor-thin win in Indiana.

Loan ties Hillary's campaign to Bill's fundraising Some say use of joint assets skirts finance reform WASHINGTON — Hillary Rodham Clinton's decision to lend her presidential campaign $6.4 million from assets she holds jointly with her husband is rekindling questions about millions of dollars that special interests have paid Bill Clinton for speeches and other work since he left the White House. In tapping some of that cash, "the Clintons have effectively bypassed campaign finance reform in a manner that's ingenious — using Bill Clinton effectively as a front for the fundraising," said Lawrence Jacobs, a University of Minnesota political...

WASHINGTON -- When they say, "It's not the money ..." -- it's the money! After all is said and almost done, the numbers that are dragging Hillary Clinton to the end of her campaign are not delegate counts but dollar amounts. She is already more than $20 million in debt, and her campaign is costing something like $1 million a day. No matter how gritty our girl is, she can't keep this up forever. The big donors she counted on when folks talked about the illusory "well-oiled Clinton money machine" have mostly dropped by the wayside, either having given all...

With rounds to fight running out, the self-described Rocky Balboa of politics will soon be forced to assess the damage sustained by the most expensive primary bout in history. Sen. Hillary Clinton doled out $6.4 million of her own money to her campaign since April, her campaign told reporters this week. That brings her total cash outlay to more than $11 million since January. . . . Experts disagree on whether or not Clinton will actually stick in the fight until the Democratic National Convention in August. But the date looms large for another reason—at least, if she hopes to...

Updated WOODBURN, Ore. – Senator Barack Obama said today that he would not rule out the possibility of helping Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton retire her campaign debt to bring her into the fold and unify Democrats. But he said no discussions have taken place yet. “Obviously, I’d want to have a broad-ranging discussion with Senator Clinton about how I could make her feel good about the process and have her on the team moving forward,� Mr. Obama said. “But as I said, it’s premature right now. she’s still actively running and we’ve still got business to do right here...

Hillary Clinton's decision to lend her presidential campaign $6.4 million from assets she holds jointly with her husband is rekindling questions about millions of dollars that Bill Clinton has been paid for speeches and other work since he left the White House. In tapping some of that cash, ''the Clintons have effectively bypassed campaign finance reform in a manner that's ingenious -- using Bill Clinton effectively as a front for the fundraising,'' said Lawrence Jacobs, a University of Minnesota political science professor. Beginning days after he left the White House in 2001, the ex-president has been crisscrossing the globe, speaking...

The once-formidable fund-raising machine of Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton has begun to sputter at the worst possible moment for Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign, Clinton advisers and donors said Thursday, with spending curtailed on political events and advertising as Mrs. Clinton seeks to compete in the last six nominating contests. Mrs. Clinton’s diminished political momentum, following Tuesday’s loss in the North Carolina primary and her narrow victory in Indiana, appears to have had a dampening effect on her fund-raising, aides said, increasing the likelihood that Mrs. Clinton will lend her campaign more of her own money beyond the $11 million...

A key component in the Democratic presidential race is all but decided: In fund raising, victory belongs to Sen. Barack Obama. As recently as a few months ago, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton had a seemingly invincible money machine -- a political ATM of well-connected followers who could raise tens of thousands of dollars with a few phone calls. But just as Sen. Obama has topped her at the polls, the Illinois senator's Internet-driven fund-raising model has eclipsed the one favored by the Clinton campaign. Sen. Obama overtook Sen. Clinton in total fund raising in February and has raised more...

Karen Bass, the speaker-elect of the state Assembly, gathered checks last month from big contributors at The Kitchen, the exclusive Sacramento eatery. The price of admission was $5,000, well above the $3,600 cap on direct donations she can receive in her re-election account. But Bass, like a growing number of the state's leaders, wasn't collecting funds for her re-election. Instead, the money went to a ballot measure committee she controls. Despite a 2000 law meant to curb the size of checks California politicians could collect from deep-pocketed interest groups, many lawmakers are skirting those limits by soliciting funds for ballot...

WASHINGTON — Running out of high-dollar donors, Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign is stepping up its Internet appeals in hopes of attracting enough contributions to keep afloat financially in the last stretch of Democratic primaries, aides say. As the marathon money chase has strained the limits of traditional campaign fundraising, Clinton aides have sought increasingly to shadow rival Barack Obama's Internet juggernaut that has raised more than $112 million via the Web, Through March 31, Clinton had corralled 70 percent of her $148 million in individual primary donations in amounts over $200, including $82 million from those giving between $1,000 and...

Corruption trial hears of plot to fire prosecutor By Andrew Stern Reuters CHICAGO A witness at the trial of political fundraiser Antoin Rezko testified on Thursday that then-White House aide Karl Rove was asked to replace the federal prosecutor in Chicago to abort a probe of Illinois corruption. Rove has denied knowledge of any discussion to replace Patrick Fitzgerald, the widely respected U.S. attorney in Chicago, when Rove was one of President George W. Bush's top advisers. Rove, who left the White House last year, could not immediately be reached on Thursday. A spokesman for Fitzgerald, who was appointed in...

Excerpt - The Democratic National Committee raised only $4.7 million in April and ended last month with a perilously low $3.7 million in the bank, a Democratic insider tells Washington Wire. Four years ago during the last presidential election cycle, the story was much different. The DNC raised $19 million in April 2004 and ended that month with $42 million cash on hand, Federal Election Commission reports show. ~ snip ~ What explains the cash crunch at the DNC? Some critics say it’s proof that Chairman Howard Dean just hasn’t been very effective at cultivating donors or managing resources. Dean’s...

A US campaign watchdog has accused presumptive Republican president nominee John McCain of violating election laws by accepting campaign contributions from two prominent Londoners. At issue is a fundraising luncheon held in March at London's Spencer House, during McCain's swing through the United Kingdom. An invitation to the event lists Lord Rothschild and Nathaniel Rothschild as hosts, and indicates the event was made possible with their "kind permission". Judicial Watch, a Washington organisation instrumental in the March release of Hillary Clinton's White House schedules, has asked US election monitors to investigate whether the Rothschilds improperly sponsored the fundraiser. US political...

WASHINGTON - Barack Obama's presidential campaign wants federal regulators to investigate fellow Democrats who are backing Hillary Rodham Clinton's candidacy, taking intraparty discord to a new level of confrontation. Obama's campaign lawyer, Robert Bauer, filed a complaint Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission, accusing the pro-Clinton American Leadership Project of violating campaign finance laws by running ads against Obama. The group is largely financed by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees and is run by Democratic operatives, many of them based in California and who have past connections to Clinton or her husband. Its organizers say they...

Baghdadi was listed among about 30 family members and friends of Rezko who reportedly put up cash or offered properties as surety to secure Rezko's $8.5 million bail. Baghdadi offered the court a two-story retail property in Chicago. Baghdadi also appeared at the Chicago federal court on April 18 to state he would be willing to post his home as collateral toward Rezko's bond. Baghdadi was quoted telling the court he had known Rezko for 20 years through their work with Arab charities.

<p>HOUSTON U.S. Rep. Ron Paul is considering using $4 million left over from his failed presidential campaign to start a for-profit publishing company that would reflect his Libertarian-leaning views.</p> <p>The move could test the limits of federal campaign finance rules.</p>

The explosive growth in online political contributions is helping to make this the most expensive presidential campaign in history. But lost in the money pipeline is the cost of point-and-click donations. An Arizona Republic analysis of campaign expense records shows that organizations that process credit-card transactions have collected more than $11 million in fees for handling Internet contributions and related services. Candidates in both parties, including the three major candidates still in the race, have divided the processing fees among several organizations, with some turning to openly partisan sources to process the bulk of their donations, the analysis shows. One...

Barack Obama is not telling the truth about his relationship with Bill Ayers. There is more to this story than is already known, but Obama and his campaign are working hard to obfuscate and cover up the matter. Why? Because Barack Obama has had a close personal and business relationship with Bill Ayers that predates his run for the Illinois State Senate, and it is incumbent on the Senator from Illinois to come clean. In fact, Barack worked for Bill Ayers for at least eight years and the press, so far, has not investigated this matter. I predicted on this...

When he effectively wrapped up the Republican nomination on Tsunami Feb. 5, John McCain completed one of the greatest comebacks in American political history. Unfortunately, while spending much of the subsequent 12 weeks taking well-deserved victory laps, Mr. McCain has also apparently taken a worrisome vacation from fund-raising. The McCain campaign recently filed yet another disappointing fund-raising report (this one was for March) with the Federal Election Commission. The presumptive Republican nominee raised only $15.2 million last month. In February, which included 24 days after he clinched the nomination, Mr. McCain raised only $11 million. That was actually less than...

Ugly locutions often crop up in the promotion of ugly politics. Consider the threat of "scrutinization." It has been made against some residents of Parker North, Colo., who expressed a political opinion without first getting their state government's permission for political activity. Herewith another example of what is being done around the nation in the name of political hygiene, as that is understood by "campaign finance reformers," those irksome improvers whose animating ideology is McCainism. Parker North is a cluster of about 300 houses close to the town of Parker. When two residents proposed a vote on annexation of their...

Shortly after Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s decisive 10-point triumph in Tuesday’s Pennsylvania primary, her campaign won another key victory. By trumpeting a record $10 million fundraising haul in the 24 hours after the primary, the Clinton camp managed to silence speculation about whether she’ll be able to compete in the next round of states after emptying her coffers in Pennsylvania. Even as questions were being raised about the timing, number and type of donations that comprised the one-day windfall, the cash-strapped campaign managed a rare political feat. It not only amplified the significance of Clinton’s decisive win, it also achieved...

While Democrats absorbed the lessons of Pennsylvania this week, John McCain was coming to a few realizations of his own. For one, "big money" in politics isn't so bad after all. That's the takeaway from the presumptive GOP nominee's new fund-raising strategy, which his campaign has quietly rolled out these past few weeks. The McCain camp is teaming up with the Republican National Committee to tap into big, big donations from big, big donors – hoping to close the big, big money gap with Democrats. Their effort to do so will involve some creative abuse of the campaign finance restrictions...

Big-time Republican contributors are complaining that prospective presidential nominee John McCain is poorly organized for the campaign and off to a bad start in raising money. McCain begins well behind Democrat Barack Obama in the 2008 money derby, and longtime Republican givers say there is no coherent plan for catching up and getting ahead. The bright spot for McCain in the opinion of the GOP money men is the presence in his campaign of New York investment banker Lew Eisenberg, an experienced Republican fund-raiser. Eisenberg, a pro-choice social liberal who has often contributed to Democrats, was attacked by conservatives when...

The Obama campaign quietly removed from its official website a page managed by a fundraiser tied to the Islamic terrorist group Hamas. The page for Hatem El-Hady – former chairman of an Islamic charity closed by the U.S. government for terrorist fundraising – listed Barack Obama's wife, Michelle, as one of three "friends" as recently as yesterday, according to blogger Charles Johnson. But by yesterday morning, days after Johnson's "Little Green Football's" site drew attention to the El-Hady page, Michelle Obama's name had been removed. Then, later in the day, the entire page disappeared.

Barack Obama is poised to run the first privately financed general-election presidential campaign since Watergate, giving him more control over his own operations than any candidate since 1972. Buoyed by record-setting fund raising, the Democratic front-runner already has laid the groundwork, through seeking a Federal Election Commission ruling, to reject traditional taxpayer funding for a contest this fall against Republican John McCain. If the Illinois senator were to win the Democratic nomination and take that option, he would be the first White House hopeful from either party to abandon completely the federal campaign-finance system, created in 1974. Obama spokesman Bill...

Transparency is a popular word in this presidential election, with all three candidates finally having released their tax returns. Yet the public still hasn't seen the records of an institution with some of the biggest potential for special-interest mischief: The William J. Clinton Foundation. Bill Clinton established that body in 1997 while still President. It has since raised half-a-billion dollars, which has been spent on Mr. Clinton's presidential library in Arkansas and global philanthropic initiatives. The mystery remains its donors, and whether these contributors might one day seek to call in their chits with a President Hillary Clinton. That's no...

John McCain is abandoning any hope of catching the Democrats in fundraising.Based on new financial disclosure reports released Sunday, and interviews with his finance team, the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee will instead accept taxpayer money to finance his general election and share other costs with the Republican National Committee. The strategy will allow McCain to stretch his campaign dollars by splitting the cost of television advertising and other campaign activity with the RNC. But the decision also puts the Arizona senator at risk of being badly outspent – even with RNC help – by a Democratic nominee who will be...

A Roman Catholic priest who floated off under hundreds of helium party balloons was missing Monday off the southern coast of Brazil.

To help ease their fund-raising woes, John McCain’s campaign has devised a new system to increase the maximum amount an individual can donate to the unofficial Republican nominee’s election efforts. Campaign manager Rick Davis released the details of the “McCain Victory 08” fund on Friday. He said the entity is a joint committee, combining the McCain campaign, the Republican National Committee and four key states under a “hybrid legal structure.” The idea is to tap donors for more than the $2,300 limit set by campaign finance laws. Under legislation pushed by McCain in his role as a senator from Arizona,...

MADRID, Spain -- Seven middle-aged Spanish moms who posed for a tongue-in-cheek erotic calendar - a fundraiser for their children's tiny, rural school - are now saddled with debt and 5,000 unwanted copies. One of the photos shows the mothers with discreetly placed Christmas tinsel as their only garb. Other goofy poses include a shotgun-toting mom wearing only a fox pelt, and another covering her body with a red umbrella. The calendars came out in November and at first were a big hit. But the plan fizzled. The women acknowledge being amateurs in publishing and advertising, and they missed the...

The co-founder of the radical anti-war group Code Pink has “bundled” more than $50,000 for Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, and pro-troops groups are demanding that he return the money. Jodie Evans, a Code Pink leader, gathered at least $50,000 from friends and associates and donated it to Obama’s presidential campaign, according to information compiled by the nonpartisan watchdog group, Public Citizen. Evans and her son, a student who lives at her Southern California address, each also gave the maximum individual allowable donation of $2,300 to Obama’s campaign. The donations have raised questions about Obama’s association with the more radical...

Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama's name came up again at the Antoin "Tony" Rezko corruption trial and in a way that earlier filings in the case did not telegraph. Stuart Levine, the prosecution's star witness, said he and Obama were at a party Rezko threw at his Wilmette mansion on April 3, 2004, for Nadhmi Auchi, a controversial Iraqi-born billionaire who Rezko was trying to get to invest in a South Loop real-estate development. Auchi, now a citizen of the United Kingdom, has faced criminal charges in Europe. He also figured in the revocation of Rezko's bond early this year...

PROVIDENCE — With the General Assembly elections less than nine months away, the Republican State Central Committee has one-tenth of the cash reserves of its Democratic counterpart and has undergone a heated internal debate over how best to spend its money to elect more Republicans to the legislature this fall. The GOP began 2008 with just $9,721 in the bank, according to filings with the state Board of Elections, after a fourth quarter in 2007 in which the party spent more than $50,000 on staff and fundraising costs. By contrast, the Democratic State Committee started 2008 with about $96,000.

(CHICAGO)(April 12, 2008) Chicago-based Obama expert and Internet columnist Andy Martin will hold a 1:00 P.M. Chicago news conference Saturday, April 12th, to condemn Senator Barack Obama for suggesting that small-town America is “bitter” about America and that Americans “cling” to “guns” and “religion” as an outlet for their bitterness. Martin will also demand that Obama end his “secret” campaign in which the presidential candidate uses meetings that are closed to the media to raise money from wealthy liberals by privately disparaging ordinary Americans. “In listening to Obama depreciate and disparage small town America,” Martin will say, “I am reminded...

Barack Obama declared this week that he has created a "parallel public financing system." Come again? Let him explain: Under parallel public financing, "the American people decide if they want to support a campaign, they can get on the Internet and finance it." Up to this moment, "public" financing has meant taking money from the federal government for the general Presidential election. Senator Obama's new system is public, because "the public" sends him the money.

Obama credits his presidential campaign with creating a "parallel public financing system" built on a wave of modest donations from homemakers and high school teachers. Small givers, he said at a fundraiser this week But those with wealth and power also have played a critical role in creating Obama's record-breaking fundraising machine, and their generosity has earned them a prominent voice in shaping his campaign. Seventynine "bundlers," five of them billionaires, have tapped their personal networks to raise at least $200,000 each. They have helped the campaign recruit more than 27,000 donors to write checks for $2,300, the maximum allowed....

Hard times may have settled over Wall Street, but campaign cash from banks and securities firms has flooded Washington as Congress and the White House gird for a regulatory revamp of the financial industry. The Democrats' 2006 retaking of Congress and perhaps the heated presidential race have sharply tilted Wall Street donations toward Democrats, though nearly every politician and both major parties are recipients... Data gathered by the Center For Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan Washington group whose opensecrets.org Web site tracks political giving, reckons that the banking-and-investment industry is giving nearly twice as much to Democrats as to Republicans in...

The RNC is not the GOP. It’s only a collective national action committee for the state Republican parties, a fund raising and steering committee. Yet for far too long, the RNC has assumed increasing power over the political process to the detriment of the party. Voter complacency and apathy towards the political process has left control of the party in the hands of a few centrist party elites and conservative voters have lost faith in their own party as a result. (snip) The Message in the Money? Is McCain Listening? Is the RNC Listening? So Who has Whom in Check...

WASHINGTON -Sen. John McCain raised more than $15 million in March for his presidential campaign, a top performance for the likely Republican nominee that still falls far short of the cash gathered by rival Democratic Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.The amount was confirmed to The Associated Press by two campaign officials speaking on condition of anonymity because the numbers haven’t been made public.One official said McCain intends to accept public financing in the general election — a sum of about $84 million. McCain donors are now being asked to supplement that public financing with donations to the Republican...

As a loyal Clinton campaign email subscriber, rarely a day goes by that I don't hear from Hillary or Bill. It's good to know they're thinking about me. But today brings some very troubling news: Hillary is WAY behind on her fundraising goal for TV airtime in Pennsylvania. The gist of today's message from Hillary is that we supporters are being given a cafeteria list of PA campaign expenditure needs, and we get to designate exactly where we want our contribution to go. I had been torn between door hangers and yard signs, when I decided to check out some...

HOUSTON -- A Texas oilman who's accused of defrauding the Nigerian government by illegally pumping and exporting 10 million barrels of oil is a major fundraiser for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. Kase Lawal of Houston is at least the fourth person accused or convicted of criminal wrongdoing to help finance Clinton's political ambitions since 2000 and the second in her quest for the White House. The list also includes Chinese and Pakistani fugitives and a former Miami lawyer, Peter Paul, who was convicted of defrauding Cuba. There's no indication that Clinton's campaign was aware of Lawal's legal problems when it...

Both Obama and Hillary Clinton have leaked preliminary numbers for March contributions. Obama, more than $40 million. Clinton, about $20 million. And, McCain? As I write this he's invoking the Fifth Amendment. That suggests only one thing to me - McCain's March number is so bad it's too embarrassing to leak. Check back in a month. I predict Independents and centrist Democrats will surge for McCain in April!

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has raised $20 million in March, the second best showing of her campaign. The amount is less than the $35 million she raised in February and half of the $40 million Barack Obama's campaign said he raised in March. Clinton has trailed Obama in fundraising. He has raised a total of $131 million so far this year and she has raised nearly $70 million. The disparity has allowed Obama to outspend Clinton in recent primaries in Ohio and Texas. He is already spending more than she is on ads in Pennsylvania, which holds its primary April...

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (D-N.Y) communications director Howard Wolfson said Monday that the former first lady’s presidential campaign is raising “a considerable amount of money” and that its “cash flow is good.” Wolfson reacted to reports stating that the campaign was experiencing a cash crunch during the home stretch of the primary season. “Our cash flow is good. Bills are being paid. We are continuing to raise a considerable amount of money. We had the best fundraising month in the campaign's history last month,” said Wolfson on MSNBC. “We are continuing to do well this month. The support that we’re...

With attention focused on the Democrats' infighting for the presidential nomination, Senator John McCain is maneuvering for the spotlight. But as he looks ahead to the general election, he has yet to sign up one critical constituency: the big-money people who powered the Bush fund-raising machine. As he reintroduces himself to voters this week, with stops like one at the Naval Air Station in Meridian, Mississippi, where he was a flight instructor, McCain will also attend to another pressing task by courting donors in Mississippi, Florida and Tennessee. Building up his fund-raising apparatus is essential at this point for McCain,...

Scoop du jour? Sneed hears major money problems in the Clinton camp may soon become a coroner knocking on her campaign door. • To wit:Word is the cash feeding into Hillary Clinton's campaign coffers has not only slowed down in a big way, undisclosed campaign debts that have yet to be made public could signal the end and have insiders biting their nails. • Translation: "It won't necessarily be politics which may force her out of the race," said a top Dem source. "There is no hanky panky going on, but Hillary needs to raise money to stay alive ....