Democrats jarred by drop in fundraising

[Pryderi]

Source: Washington Post

WASHINGTON - Democratic political committees have seen a decline in their fundraising fortunes this year, a result of complacency among their rank-and-file donors and a de facto boycott by many of their wealthiest givers, who have been put off by the party's harsh rhetoric about big business.

The trend is a marked reversal from recent history, in which Democrats have erased the GOP's long-standing fundraising advantage. In the first six months of 2009, Democratic campaign committees' receipts have dropped compared with the same period two years earlier.

The vast majority of those declines were accounted for by the absence of large donors who, strategists say, have shut their checkbooks in part because Democrats have heightened their attacks on the conduct of major financial firms and set their sights on rewriting the laws that regulate their behavior.


Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33017055/ns/politics-washington_post/

---

I've been donating to my local party

[Brickbat]

1. I donate only to candidates.

[Captain Hilts]

4. VERY smart. NEVER donate to a 'party'. I've worked with the RNC and DNC. nt

[Better Today]

33. I worked for the state party here and I agree wholeheartedly, The party itself

doesn't seem to have the interests of individuals in mind, only raising money and hiring folks as fast as they can to spend the money. Very little of what goes into the state party actually helps the candidates.

[Captain Hilts]

45. Or, fancy furniture and receptions. nt

[Nuclear Unicorn]

2. What? When you pee on your supporters they stop supporting you?

What?

That's just crazy talk!

[Mari333]

7. so demanding regulation of Big Business is peeing on them?

The article is more about how big business is pissed off because the Dems are not doing what they want, at least some of them, and they are not contributing.
fuck Big Business.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

14. I s'pose if you go for the spin but...

...we know that grassroots supporters gave Obama his biggest windfall and congress can't tap into that because we know they won't get their act together.

I'm reminded of a song where he sings:

They got the guns, but we got the numbers.

EDIT for spelling

[Better Today]

34. You and I are thinking the same thing here. I'm thinking there's some spin

in order to scare Dems into caving to big business.

[dusmcj]

51. poor widdew bidness peopew /nt

[dusmcj]

52. adios, free market ignorami

you thought you could buy the entire party, but you only bought some of the leadership, along with some useful idiots. Buy Republican, it's more your style.

The stench of well-off enthusiasm for the socioeconomic status quo, replacing the primacy of the public interest as the fundament of the Democratic Party was _not_ a move forward. A misinterpretation of the notion of "regaining the center". Glad it's over.

Oh yeah. Thanks for failing. The market has spoken after all.

[still_one]

3. Really, how about the "real" rank and file saying that unless you have a public option

and work for those who voted you in, and represent the people instead of the corporations, you can forget about donations

[hobbit709]

5. I won't donate to DINO's

I WILL donate to candidates that take stands I support.
The DNC can go screw itself for all I care.

[SomeGuyInEagan]

6. Well, some of us little people are mad about Dems' sellout on health care.

That single payer was not even part of the talks is a disgrace - THAT should have been the starting point with public option considered to be a compromise position.

I let my senators (both Dems) both know that they can kiss my vote, my work and my financial support goodbye if they don't fight hard for public option.

[wordpix]

54. +1 and some don't have jobs so are holding their savings until they're employed again

if they have any

[sofa king]

8. ...In a recession, in an off-election year, after an expensive election in 2008.

Yes, very jarring. No one could have predicted it.

[tavalon]

13. And they've pissed off their rank and file

Blame it on the high income donors but I seem to remember record breaking fund-raising from us, the ground troops, to get Obama elected.

[bemildred]

9. It's an off year?

Could that have anything to do with it?

[joeglow3]

29. They compared it against an off year.

So, no that has nothing to do with it.

[bemildred]

40. They need to compare it to 4 years ago, not 2, the whole piece reeks of bullshit. nt

[FloriTexan]

10. Some of us haven't been donating because of the economy.

There are a lot of unemployed people right now.

[jsamuel]

11. compared to two years earlier? you mean when we were gearing up for a presidential election?

[islandmkl]

12. i got my call yesterday...the 'congressional' committee...

the lady started her 'request' with the acknowledgement of my past contributions...

i wanted to cut to the chase, and told her i was in the virgin islands, at which point she said 'you must be having a nice vacation...'

and i told her that 'no, i live here now...but that as far as i was concerned, the democrats in congress were the ones on vacation...'

she paused, then wanted to continue her spiel...i told her i was a life-long democrat, but i was making no more contributions to national democrats until i started seeing them act in my best interests and what i thought were the best interests of our country...

she was very polite, and told me she understood and hoped that i would soon be able to help keep democrats in congress to try and achieve what i wanted...

i don't think my interaction with her was the first interaction of that type she had experienced...

[tavalon]

15. That has to be one of the suckiest jobs these days

[leftynyc]

27. I got a call last week

I told them to call me back when congress passed a bill with a public option with no triggers.

[greengestalt]

16. Party of sell-outs

The Democratic party has huge power these days and they do...nothing.


Actually, if only nothing.


Let's see, they banned "Flavored Cigarettes"... Nice vote getter there, protect people from themselves and live down to Republican Expectations...


They should have gone to the rich elite like a chainsaw, urging the president to abuse the "Patriot Act" on them and promising they'd back him up so he couldn't be impeached. Instead they putter and talk and mostly give the elites more and more money while tossing dimes to the people starving because of them.


My own senator is ramming through mandatory (at no price control) insurance plans for "Health Insurance" and openly receiving big gifts.

[totodeinhere]

56. I think we will soon see an increase in contributions as we get closer to the election. n/t

[JackRiddler]

17. Love that spin, MSNBC.

Yeah, business is angry at the Democrats because they've been so... why, I think the word is... socialist!

Trillions of dollars to the banks without accounting or restrictions on management and pay is pretty harsh on them, I must say. If only the government could give them quadrillions instead, maybe they'll like the Democrats!

[Lorien]

24. +1 nt

[FiveGoodMen]

30. Exactly! What a bunch of crap!

They'll lose money because we'll all have figured out that putting them in office doesn't help anything and we'd be better off keeping our money.

If they worked for us, then we might owe them something.

[KansDem]

35. Yesterday's USA Today headline: "GOP gets big bump of donors in August"

I think that's the current GOP "talking point"

Also, earlier this week Cokie Roberts trashed Obama's appearances on weekend political talk shows, saying, essentially he "looked okay," but the Republicans were feeling pretty good right now or some such crap. She compared 2009 with 1993.

It seems the US media wants to constantly paint Obama and the Dems as always on the defensive, unlike the ass-kissing they gave Bush for eight years...

[PassingFair]

18. Carville's face insures an immediate DELETE from my inbox.

Democrats will get the money AND the votes,
if they REPRESENT us.

Big money will always flow to the pukes,
who need authorities to tell them whether
they are doing right or wrong.

[Triana]

19. The "blue dogs" (ie: DINOS) aren't helping....

...I blame them. And, like someone else said - NICE SPIN from the lame$tream media. Pfft.

[joeycola]

23. neither is the WH and Dem congress members who act like Repugs!!

[xxqqqzme]

20. "...a result of complacency among their

rank-and-file donors??? I think they may be in denial over that one. Like others here, I only donate locally now. No money ever came back to our county even though SoCal is an ATM as far as the DCCC is concerned. I donated to the DNC while Dean was chair but I stopped that when he left.

[BR_Parkway]

22. There was no complacency involved with me writing "get back to me

after you get us single payer healthcare" in big red letters on every fundraising letter I've gotten and mailing it back to them

[Uncle Joe]

21. Corporate media manipulation and propaganda.

The Democratic Party is the party of the people, and as such should represent their best interests, the corporate media; represent the narrow spectrum of themselves and their corporate ad/commercial buying clients, the people are only customers or consumers to be a sold a product, candidate or down the river.

No doubt the corporate media; would love to see record breaking fund raising each and every year by both parties as this would ensure vast quantities of commercial buying dollars coming their way.

[tomm2thumbs]

25. Their hands are not outstretched for a handshake but a shakedown - enough

Maybe when they start acting like a Democratic Party and stop playing like they are GOP'ers there will be some funding

[Blasphemer]

26. "harsh rhetoric about big business"?.... LOL.... nt

[elocs]

28. From USA Today: " GOP gets big bump of donors in August"

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-09-24-party-money_N.htm

WASHINGTON — Despite being in the minority in Congress, Republican campaign committees outraised Democrats by $1.7 million in August as they have aggressively collected political cash amid the rancorous debate over health care. Republicans also held an edge over Democrats in the amount of money available, when counting debts, as both parties set the stage for the 2010 elections, in which more than three dozen competitive House and Senate seats are at stake.

The GOP spike is a departure. In each of the past four years, the party in power — whether Democrat or Republican — raised more than the minority's fundraising committees in August, a USA TODAY review of campaign records shows.

"Republicans have been able to tap into some of the anger against Democrats in power and translate that into fundraising," said Nathan Gonzales of The Rothenberg Political Report. "There are a lot of Republicans who wish the election were this November, not November 2010, because they feel like the momentum is on their side now."

In the Senate, where Republicans are far outnumbered, their fundraising committee collected $3.1 million last month, compared to $2.2 million by the Democratic committee. It was the second month in a row that the Senate GOP committee outperformed Democrats — bringing its fundraising total for the year to $26.5 million, just $1 million less than the Democrats.

Anyone who believes the GOP is dead and who have been dancing around like they are will be in for a rude awakening.

[Uncle Joe]

37. That's the result of corporate media; manipulation and propaganda, they're playing both ends against

the middle.

This is a direct result of the corporate media's; large scale abandonment of trying to enlighten, educate and/or lift up the American People as to truth or reality, while instead using a policy of deliberating dumbing down the people, obfuscating the issues, not calling other members of the corporate media or political "leaders" on their obvious lies, mistakes and misrepresentations.

The ludicrous issue of "death panels" is just one small but potent example, the current for profit "health" insurance system has De Facto death panels, even letting insured along with the uninsured people die for profit, and yet virtually all we heard about from our so called "Fourth Estate" was some mythical B.S. misdirection of the words toward the public option, as if the government was going to do what private industry was already doing.

The people became alarmed at this manipulation along with other manipulations by the corporate media ie; Pavlov's Dog Codewords such as "socialism":scared: without educating the people as to what that meant and the fact that segments of our economy already rely on socialism, ie; fire dept, police, etc. the heroes of 9/11 were making their living by socialist jobs.

The corporate media as an institution has two basic agendas.

1. Manipulate and shape the American People; making them willing subjects of the corporate media commercial buying corporate client's individual fiefdoms, aka; corporate supremacy over the people.

2. Control "We the Peoples" government by using demonzing propaganda against it, when that government actually tries to represent the American Peoples' best interests over that of corporations, the second part of this is the corporate media's mantra of continually making all things for profit virtuous.

I will acknowledge there are exceptions; in the corporate media with some individuals dedicated to good journalism and the truth, but they're as scattered oasis-es in a vast barren desert.

[AnneD]

31. It is not their harsh rhetoric about big business....

but the fact that they have done very little to help those with a little d beside their names. They bailed out banks with my money, they bailed out the auto industry with my money, they pay the pentagon with my money, and yet I get the Bankruptcy bill, the crappy credit card reform bill, and they don't even give me Vaseline with the health care reform bill. They forgot who brung them to the dance. My money is going to individual candidates and locally.

[NJGeek]

32. pass the public option and maybe i'll donate

got to be kidding me.

[benld74]

36. BUT this is Atypical of US Businesses short sightedness,,

it has plagued them for years and is the main reason they are in such a hole. As soon as the tide shifts they jump ship, they couldn't see what was going to happen to them when the new administration took office? Dumb Asses!

[robinlynne]

38. IO was expecting the opposite reason, because they are too close to big business....

[andym]

39. If true that large corporate donors are not gviing as much

That's all for the good. Less corporate influence means more reform.
It also means that they feel their money has not bought them what they wanted.

[ramapo]

41. They haven't done anything to deserve my money

I'm waiting. If they pass a gutsy health reform bill, then I'll donate.

[No Elephants]

42. The strategists referred to in the OP are making up crap to justify the alleged decline.

[Hannah Bell]

43. how we know this is bullshit: "the party's harsh rhetoric about big business"

[Vinca]

44. When the DCCC called, I told them to get back to me after health care

reform is passed with a public option.

[babylonsister]

46. AHEM! Dems "jarred" by drop in fundraising? Not really-false alarm from WaPo, again

http://mediamatters.org/blog/200909250023

The WashPost's dubious fundraising report

September 25, 2009 2:55 pm ET by Eric Boehlert


This A1 article is getting lots of attention, and fits in nicely with the Beltway's preferred Dems-are-in-big-trouble narrative:

Democrats Are Jarred by Drop In Fundraising

That's the headline. Should we count the problems with Paul Kane's article?

First, there's not one Democrat quoted in the Post piece who is "jarred" by the drop in fundraising, or anything like it. The Post simply makes that announcement itself. In fact, some Democrats quoted seem to suggest it was inevitable that a fall-off would occur given the historic amount of money the party raised during Obama's run. i.e. Don't fundraising tallies, even for committees that oversee Congressional races, often drop after presidential election year cycles, which now last two years long, including the primary season?

Yet Kane spends almost his entire article comparing fundraising tallies collected immediately after a presidential compaign, with tallies collected during one. Pretty obvious apples and oranges, no?

Then there's this graphic the Post used to show just how supposedly jarring the drop-off has been for Democrats.

[bemildred]

47. LOL.

You don't think WaPo would try to feed us bullshit do you?
:thumbsup:

[babylonsister]

48. I'm so glad someone saw this, and glad it was you!

Hope all is well, bemildred. Haven't run into you in awhile.

How silly this was swallowed hook, line, and sinker. Ugh.

[bemildred]

49. I'm OK, got a lot on my plate though.

So I come and go here. Hope things are well with you also.
:hi:

[Cha]

50. Never! Only, when I see wapo..I see

RED FLAG!!

[Overseas]

53. Thank you ! K&R !! /nt

[Zorra]

55. The subtle, and not so subtle, propaganda attack on Democrats by the MSM

has been continuous. The owners of the conservative MSM propaganda machine are amping up the conservative bullshit just like they did before the invasion of Iraq.

I listen to the on the hour AP news blurbs on America Left XM 167 very carefully. The subtle anti-Democratic propaganda by AP is disgusting. A couple of the newscasters constantly interject subtle language and innuendo that is so biased against Democrats it makes me want to hurl.

Where do they find all these corrupt, unethical, chickenshit losers that pretend to be journalists?

[Justitia]

57. This is a bullshit article from the Washington Post, using "anonymous sources"

More of their same crap.

And, it only references donations to the DCCC & DSCC - make of that what you will.

Never mind the paragraph it buried saying some large donors work in the financial sectors and didn't want to be seen as profiting at the expense of the administration - wanting to be sensitive to any perceived favoritism.

And, BTW, according to the article, donations to Dems were TRIPLE the donations to repukes for the entire first part of the year.

Sounds like a bunch of "anonymous" whining from the entrenched DLCers, bitching about "anti-business regulation" and threatening to take their ball & go home.

We're not falling for it.