Jan. 22, 2008
Hopefuls Scramble In Super Tuesday States
Washington Post: Presidential Candidates Face Big Primaries With Smaller War Chests
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Play CBS Video Video Super Tuesday Explained Jeff Greenfield explains to Harry Smith how the two parties allocate delegates differently and what Super Tuesday on Feb. 5 will mean to each of them.
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Interactive The Money Race See the latest campaign finance tallies from Obama and McCain.
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News Tools Campaign Calendar The latest list of primary and caucus dates as states continue jockeying for position.
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With their campaign treasuries running on empty and only weeks to attract support in the nearly two dozen states that will cast ballots on Feb. 5, candidates for president are scrambling to find creative and unorthodox ways to grab the attention of voters with the funds they have remaining.
At least two of the 2008 presidential contenders, seeking bang for their buck, have privately discussed bypassing a barrage of targeted local ads in favor of buying a spot with potentially more impact to run during the Feb. 3 Super Bowl broadcast, at a cost of about $2.7 million. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) yesterday became the first to make a nationwide cable television advertising buy, and several candidates were devoting resources to new methods of targeting absentee voters.
None of the campaigns has decided yet to take the Super Bowl gamble, but it is one of scores of spending possibilities presidential campaign strategists are considering as they approach the biggest day ever of primary voting.
The Republican field faces one additional challenge: the presence of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney. He is increasingly relying on his own fortune to fund his campaign and could ultimately invest as much as $50 million in his bid for the GOP nomination.
Even those who are expected to have plenty of money will be stretched thin; Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Obama each raised more than $100 million last year but have spent it at a furious rate. The Democratic front-runners both broke away from campaigning in advance of last Saturday's Nevada caucuses to attend fundraisers in California.
Democrats will hold contests in 22 states and one territory, with 1,681 delegates at stake. Republicans have scheduled contests in 21 states for Feb. 5, known as Super Tuesday, with 975 delegates at stake. Voters in early-voting states experienced a blizzard of commercials and mailboxes jammed with literature, but those living in delegate-rich California might reach Election Day with little contact from the presidential candidates.
Romney could be the exception. He has told supporters he will supplement individual donations with a sizable investment from his personal fortune. He lent his campaign $17 million from January to September of 2007, and some in his camp say they expect him to spend $40 million to $50 million on his effort to secure the nomination.
Tom Stemberg, a Romney donor and longtime supporter, said most people close to the candidate assume a shortfall in fundraising will not be what ends his quest. "I think it's the one thing you can count on," Stemberg said.
One top adviser to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said the candidate recognizes that he will face a big financial disadvantage coming out of Florida's primary on Jan. 29.
"Romney has enormous resources to apply," the adviser said, speaking about internal campaign planning on the condition that he not be named. "While he may be able to compete everywhere, we've been hashing out a sort of hierarchy that looks tactically at where we choose to spend money."
McCain aides said that instead of relying on ads, he will schedule as many appearances as possible on nationa television shows, and he will try to capitalize on the momentum he earned from winning last Saturday's South Carolina primary.Campaign Calendar
Check out the upcoming primary and caucus dates.
Ken Mehlman, who helped plan President Bush's reelection strategy four years ago, said each campaign is trying to isolate demographic groups and geographic areas to target with phone calls and mail.
"I would assume smart campaigns already made pretty good investments in one or another early states," Mehlman said. "They probably have a pretty good sense of the voter profile they're going after."
Designing a strategy for what amounts to a national campaign has consumed top campaign strategists in both parties over the past several weeks.
Obama and Clinton have increasingly devoted attention to attracting support from "permanent" absentee voters in California. Mail-in voters are expected to make up about 35 percent of the Feb. 5 electorate there, and they began receiving their ballots Jan. 7.
Both candidates have undertaken what California political strategists call "chase campaigns," because they attempt to time voter contact to the arrival of absentee ballots in mailboxes.
"You're literally chasing the ballot," said Matthew Klink, a California campaign strategist who is not affiliated with a presidential candidate. "Once the registrar mails the absentee ballot, you have direct mail hit at the same time, you follow up direct mail with a phone call and personal visit. Then you can get paid phone banking to remind people to turn in their ballots."
© 2008 The Washington Post Company
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Best-selling author Mitch Albom on his first nonfiction work since "Tuesdays with Morrie."
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See all 22 CommentsWell said!
We already saw what the Clinton partisonship will bring Democrats..in 1994.
They handed the House to the likes of Newt Gingrich for the 1st time in 40 years and now that we''ve regained the House they''re going to do it again.
Most of the freshman Democrats in the House won swing seats in districts dominated by Independnets and Republicans, not hard-core Dems. How do you retain those seats with divisive partisonship? The answer is you don''t.
The Democrats will expand thier majority in the Senate regardless because of the greater number of GOP seats that''re up and the number of retirements. The House will swing back to the GOP if she''s the nominee.
disaaffected Democrats will know that a Democratic Senate will act as a buffer to any more right wing Judges being appointed to the court which will help them to justify voting for a moderate bipartison Republican like McCain.
We will have a Republican President and House and a Democratic Senate and McCain will repa the credit for uniting the country while Hillary divided it.
How an angry and fractured Democratic Party recovers from that I don''t know, but we can thank the slash and burn of the Clintons.
How can anyone recognize the ineffectiveness of our government due to insane partisan bickering and believe that Hillary Clinton will be able to get anything done as POTUS with her mentality of demonizing Republicans? How in the world will she be able to carry Democrats in Congressional races across the country in to office with her brand of polarizing politics?
Wake up! Democrats can not win the WH with just Democrats and Hillary''s rhetoric proves that we will see a continuation of the same type of "politics as usual" from not only the last 8 years, but the wars and hyper-distrust from the 90''s if she is elected. Where''s the attraction for Independents and disillusioned Republicans in that?
Obama offers the best hope to lead a unification of our country around healing our many divisions, achieving the big goals needed to move our nation forward domestically and internationally, and he has the proven legislative record and campaign success to show that he can draw Independents and Republicans to join in that goal.
Cynicism is not the answer, nor is hardened loyalty that diminishes if not outright ignores reality. We need that "working coalition" or else we''ll sink deeper in to the depressive malaise that has effectively paralyzed our once great American spirit.
Good luck to Congressman Dennis Kucinich, and thank you so much for standing up to the disgusting Corporate/AIPAC-owned fascist scum of the Republican and Democrat parties.
No one has the clear victory and it looks as though no one will.
This is going to be funny.
I can tell you are both Democrats living in the past. If you assume that the states that are red will stay red and the states that''re blue will stay blue than you also have to assume that a divisive campaign between democrats and Republicans will follow the previous pattern and democrats might as well hang it up.
I can''t say how much South Carolina is changing because I haven''t lived there.
What I do know is that I moved to the home state of Jesse Helms to take on the neo-cons on their own turf and what I found was a red state ripe for turning blue. Even the Republicans have moderated here since the days of Jesse.
The old democratic formula needs to change with the times and the changing demographics. These days there are as many progressive-minded people in the south as in the north and the dems are idiots if they write off
25% of the electoral votes.
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Posted by jack3213 at 12:54 PM : Jan 22, 2008
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LOL Yeah we know, it''s tough being a fascist these days isn''t it. We listened to you losers last time and look what it got us! I mean how much worse can we do that George W. Bush and the Republican Party. They started out with a good economy, the nation at peace, a balanced budget AND a surplus! Look at us now!! Maybe that''s good enough for you Kool Aid Drinkers but 4 more years of you and your "party" we can not stand... thank you! Sieg Heil Bush!!
EVEN IF Obama wins it... it''''''''s meaningless!!! It won''''''''t bring him any momentum.
Lucky him, though, the Blacks in S.C. feel Very Obligated to vote for him.
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Posted by metroduck75 at 02:20 PM : Jan 22, 2008
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Don''t you mean FASCIST state? SC is the state where the Traitors Flag is so great to them isn''t it? ROFLMAO Look anyone voting Republican after what we''ve seen from them the last 7 years needs to check in for some serious Mental help! They can''t govern and 4 more years of their Borrow and Spend garbage would most certainly wind us up as Third World. Sieg Heil Bush!!
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Posted by normsw at 03:00 PM : Jan 22, 2008
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BAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA you''re joking right?
Senator Obama appears to act as if he is truly shocked that the former President supports his wife and not the guy who last week said that his wife did not cry for Katrina victims and that they both Clintons were using racist code.............Jeeeeeeeeeezh imagine that
WHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHAHHHHHHHHHHHHH I keep losing, its all Bills fault, and after I called he and his wife racist now he is really mean to me Boo Hoo sniff sniff.
ohhhhhhhh big bad bill is a liar liar pants on fire meanie poor Senator Obama ohhhhhhhh he supports he wifes camaign hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm YEAH, and last week he was a racist dont you know tooo..............ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ YES HE LIED ABOUT GETTING HIS BLOWER AND WE DONT CARE.....didnt then dont now.....
He will go down in history as the worst Presidential Candidate ever.
The self-proclaim "Uniter" has become a "Polarizer". Way to go, Barrack Hussein Obama!!
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Posted by metroduck75 at 02:05 PM : Jan 22, 2008
Not true, I would vote in a second for a black female or black male who I believed to be qualified and personally up to the job.
Senator Clinton showed clear steady firm leadership when attacked, and the Dems need to start talking about the big tent other communities and their issues about what they bring to the table not just Obama, this may be a shock for the Dem Party but this election is about us We the People not your anointed heir.
And these cable pundit sponsored debates really suck, could we not political experts who can spell the word policy who aren%u2019t trying for WWW ratings, jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjeeeeeeeeeeeezhh MSNBC and CNN what an absolute waste.
The conservative GOP vote will shift to Mitt who is by far the most qualified candidate running from either party in 2008, no question about it!
..............GO MITT !
Sure she would!
Bleck..........!
Oh boo hoo poor little Senator Obama the big bad former President is being mean to him and dont forget last week he was also a racist according to this same fan club. SNIF, WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
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