After public financing forsaken, a dash for cash

(CBS News) President Obama and Mitt Romney have plenty to worry about: Running the country, rolling out a running mate, overseeing their campaigns and getting as firm a grasp as possible on the problems of everyday Americans. Despite all those duties, both men have spent the past few months making time - an awful lot of time, in fact - to raise campaign cash.

Since April 24th - the night he declared himself the presumptive Republican presidential nominee - Romney has held at least one fundraiser on 55 days. That's nearly every other day, and doesn't count Romney's three-day Utah retreat with donors or the fundraisers he's held without informing the press. Last weekend, meanwhile, Mr. Obama held his 200th fundraising event since filing as a candidate for reelection on April 4, 2011. Both candidates are holding fundraisers this weekend, with Romney hitting four different posh locations Friday and Saturday: The Hamptons, Martha's Vineyard, Cape Cod and Nantucket.

Why do the candidates spend so much time of their time raising money? Because they aren't getting it for free. Between 1976 and 2004, every presidential candidate accepted public financing -- money designated by the taxpayers to pay for their campaigns. Public financing was established to clean up presidential politics amid outrage over Richard Nixon's fundraising transgressions; in partially upholding a court challenge to the system in 1976, the Supreme Court said it could allow America to "reduce the deleterious influence of large contributions on our political process, to facilitate communication by candidates with the electorate and to free candidates from the rigors of fund raising." 

For candidates taking public financing, there was one huge catch: They had to accept limits on how much they could spend on the election. Which is why in 2008, Mr. Obama became the first major party presidential candidate since the system was put in place to turn the money down. Mr. Obama gave up $84 million in taxpayer dollars for the general election campaign; he ended up raising a record-breaking $745 million overall. (Sen. John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, took the money.)

"We have created a parallel public financing system where the American people decide if they want to support a campaign they can get on the Internet and finance it, and they will have as much access and influence over the course and direction of our campaign that has traditionally been reserved for the wealthy and the powerful," Mr. Obama said at the time.

Neither Mr. Obama nor Romney ever really considered accepting public financing this time around. That's because they knew the amount of money they could raise far exceeded the $91.2 million cap they would have had to accept on their general election spending if they decided to do so. (Consider: In July alone, Romney raised $101 million and the president brought in $75 million.) The only two candidates granted the money this cycle were Buddy Roemer and Gary Johnson, minor party candidates given the cash for their primary campaigns. 

"At the federal level, public financing is effectively dead," said Bob Biersack of the Center for Responsive Politics, who believes the caps on spending are far too low to keep pace with the unprecedented sums now flowing into the campaigns. "It's just that nobody told it it isn't breathing anymore." Strong public financing systems do exist on the state and local level.

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[GrampaSez]

Somebody double-check my figures (cut and paste this to notepad to see it line up):

South American Country 2012 Exported 2012 Imported % of INCREASE of 2012 Jan-Jun 2008 Annual
receiving aid from US to US from US US Balance of Trade Bal of Trade Bal of Trade

Barbados 218.8 27.3 8.10% 191.5 457.0
Bolivia 358.5 636.5 178.51% -278.1 -121.7
Brazil 20890.5 17225.7 -148.56% 3664.8 1845.7
Colombia 7644.9 12850.9 264.39% -5206.0 -1655.9
Cuba 256.1 0.1 14.02% 256.0 711.5
Dominican Republic 3453.1 2161.9 0.65% 1291.2 2616.5
Ecuador 3247.0 5112.9 -16.67% -1866.0 -5598.4
El Salvador 1609.8 1275.7 -92.74% 334.0 234.0
Guatemala 3125.7 2374.2 -9.86% 751.5 1255.5
Guyana 186.7 243.8 90.08% -57.2 142.7
Haiti 519.1 359.7 17.71% 159.5 493.9
Honduras 3019.1 2237.8 -47.06% 781.3 805.0
Jamaica 993.4 203.7 8.76% 789.7 1914.7
Mexico 106473.5 140396.9 2.41% -33923.4 -64721.6
Nicaragua 549.5 1374.8 85.45% -825.3 -609.3
Panama 4940.1 209.5 -54.94% 4730.7 4508.2
Paraguay 888.5 58.1 -4.22% 830.4 1531.5
Peru 4444.9 2953.7 -352.51% 1491.3 370.5

Totals 162819.2 189703.2 -1.84% -26884.1 -55820.2

*All figures from www.census.gov

So, you'd guess that the "balance of trade" has IMPROVED since Obama took over? You'd be WRONG. It's DOWN
by a couple percent overall. And guess WHICH of the above countries has NOT contributed to the Obama campaign?

[GrampaSez]

First column is: South American Country receiving aid from US
Second column is: 2012 Amount exported to the US in MIllions
Third column is: 2012 Amount imported FROM the US in millions
Fourth column is: % of INCREASE or DECREASE of balance of trade since the same period in 2008.
Fifth column is: The Amount of 2012 Balance of Trade, Jan-Jun
Sixth column is: The Amount of 2008 Annual Balance of Trade

[EmpireGeorge______--]

by troutfishman2 August 17, 2012 12:35 PM EDT
Did you know that at one time, men in this country wore hats that indicated their profession?
______________

Never knew that....like a conductor's cap ?

[EmpireGeorge______--]

Trout, may I ask you, What is an example of an "embarassing" occupation in your mind ? cause UPS drivers and Sanitation are now the ones with pensions and union benefits......maybe male nurse is one, or a cleaning maid....but what would be an embarassing profession in your mind ? cause any work, I consider to be honorable, as long as it's legal

[EmpireGeorge______--]

yeah, that would...or being a union thug, or bartender at a gay bar.....now that wouldn't jive.

I wasn't asking for me, I was asking in your mind, what do you consider embarssing professions

[EmpireGeorge______--]

troutfishman2, why, because I have knowledge of medicine and medical technology ? I actually don't like seeing males being nurses, not to take away from any that are, they perform a vital service to society...I must be biggoted.

[EmpireGeorge______--]

3 words "You didn't build that" (in Biden style)

[EmpireGeorge______--]

Or better yet, this election is about 3 things, the economy, the economy, and the economy.

[EmpireGeorge______--]

"If you own a small business, you didn't build that" better ?

what's wrong the etch-a-sketch, magic underwear getting old ?

[inthemidwest]

Romney should have no reservations in releasing 10 years of tax returns--that is if he has nothing to hide. If he were about to be hired as a federal employee he would have NO CHOICE in releasing 10 years of financial records as well as 10 years of personal information. Otherwise, no job. Every federal civil servant who wants a security clearance must do that. Romney should be held to the same standards as any federal employee who will work for him. Also, how about the Paul Ryan investment story in the Guardian from the United Kingdom? Ryan certainly took advantage of banking information obtained during a meeting with the Federal Reserve. While not illegal at the time (unethical, perhaps?) goes to show his character, for sure. "A man is usually more careful of his money than of his principles." - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

[GrampaSez]

Please point out to me where I can go to see 5 years of OBAMA'S tax returns, BEFORE HE assumed office as a "government employee"?

[GrampaSez]

However, your comment about INSIDER TRADING is well taken. BOTH Rep John Boehner AND Senator Tom Coburn said they "don't see the need for strengthened insider-trading laws, as they have seen NO PROBLEM and expect that all politicians KNOW AND ABIDE BY THE RULES". Then CNN uncovered and pointed out that a group of REPUBLICANS in the HOUSE had taken the "insider trading" law into a backroom committee, and changed the wording to EXEMPT their relatives and friends. Help me put THESE REPUBLICANS in jail, and I'll help you put the DEMOCRATS IN JAIL that would spend $1.5 trillion of MY GRANDCHILDREN'S MONEY each year, even though they KNOW that my grandchildren can't yet vote.

[esnation]

So Presidents are bought and sold, what did you expect?
This is NOT a democracy, never was, never was intended to be.
REPRESENTATIVE Democracy, those with the money and power ensure that
those without money and power don't break the golden eggs.
Tom Jefferson saw that the greater masses were too dumb to vote, he helped put this current -OUTDATED- system in place. Does anyone really think that we don't now have the technology to give every qualified American the opportunity for their individual vote to actually count? But that will never happen. It is MUCH too profitable to maintain the status quo, and much easier to keep the opium flowing for the masses, with them beleiving that they actually have any control over their lives.

[GrampaSez]

You have made an interesting observation. But also "interesting" is that your understanding of "historical" concepts of "representative semi-democratic republic", and your opinion that the CURRENT lowest common denominator of the democracy is somehow MORE INFORMED that our 200-year-old counterparts, is a non-sequitur. How do you explain that we are currently "writing ourselves checks" by piling on debt onto our grandchildren, by spending over $1.5 TRILLION a year that we don't have available to us from current revenues? THAT is proof of the validity of our founder's fears of a "straight democracy" tyrannized by the "lowest common denominator voters", who would be tempted to "write themselves a check from taxpayer moneys".

[OceViewan]

Elections in this country are an utter national disgrace.

1)The way they are funded is nothing short of bribery.

2)The candidates remind me of two teenage boys ( very immature ones at that ) calling each other names, running up to mommy ( the media ) and saying he did this or that and is a bad boy.

3)We have the wrong type of people running for office.

So what all this adds up to is that the core of the problems that face our nation are barely discussed, if at all, let alone get fixed.

[nickrhodes666]

oh yeah...if any so-called "evangelical" Bible-believing Christian votes for Romney..they are spitting in Jesus' face..yap I said it SPITTING in Jesus' face...Why you ask?..Jesus HATED false religion and false prophets..Romney is a Mormon...FALSE religion at its best. A DESTRUCTIVE CULT that deviates from the basic tenets of Christianity..So remember that when you vote for the cultist Romney----- Christian hyprocrites.

[GrampaSez]

Hypocracy and lies "spit in Jesus's face". You want people to vote for your buddy, the communist-atheist sympathizer, the "christian" wannabe, and call it a vote "for Jesus"? If you listen to Obama's OWN WORDS, he sat in the revolutionary-"christian" black-theology church for 20 years, but "didn't listen" to the sermons. Get a clue, you dishonest disciple of Satan.

[Think3Times]

hehe sky fairies!

[GrampaSez]

The difference? We aren't currently PAYING Romney to be our president. Obama hasn't sat in a "jobs" meeting in over 6 months. And the "jobs czar", Jeffrey Immelt, hasn't convened any such meeting in a like period of time, while his company, GE, continues wholesale mass-exodus of jobs to China. What's Obama doing for the ECONOMY? Driving up the price of CORN and OIL. And if you'll look, THAT was the same democrat strategy in early 2008, that successfully delivered McCain his "October Surprise".

[Fareed17]

All this fund raising puts Willard's candidacy in to question?
Mitt The Twitt can now release 5 years of Taxes and legally be the republican presidential candidate.
Will Etch a Sketch legally remain the republican candidate without producing 10 years of Taxes which has been the tradition started by his father in 1968? "Custom in law is the established pattern of behavior that can be objectively verified within a particular social setting. A claim can be carried out in defense of "what has always been done and accepted by law." Customary law exists where:
a certain legal practice is observed and the relevant actors consider it to be law (opinio juris)." The custom to produce 10 or more years of Taxes begun with George Romney, would make it legally binding on all presidential candidates; unless, the candidate released less and went unchallenged, or provided a religious, or moral reason to refuse. Willard has not claimed either exemption, and has been challenged on releasing more than 1 1/2 years of Taxes instead of the requisite 10 or more. For this reason, Willard Romney is legally unqualified to be a presidential candidate, unless or until, he now releases 5 or more years of Taxes that have reasonably been requested by President Obama to move on to begin the debates on the issues.