For Sale: Presidency, $605,000,000 o.b.o.

A head fake in basketball is a good thing, in politics is should raise a red flag. When Obama pledged to take public financing and then reneged it was more than a head fake, it was an indication of things to come. Will Barack see the difference between broken promises on campaign financing and broken promises on raising taxes? To find out you would first have to elect him.

If you wanted to plan a presidential campaign and you had some issues regarding experience, past associations, ideology, and legislative mediocrity how would you proceed? You might first form a foundation based on current events. You might capitalize on an unpopular presidency due to a war and the economy. You might promise a better tomorrow, change and hope. This would be a good tactic because you don’t have to actually define the details as specific solutions to problems. You can simply say, “I can make the world a better place to live.”

With the platform of “Hope” and the policy of “Change” and David Axelrod to help you sell them you can get on the ticket, but you can’t win the primaries. In the primaries everybody is against the same foe – the other party. No, to win the primaries you have to have an edge and in Barack’s case his edge was race. The problem for Obama was that none of his opponents even remotely touched on this hot button. Not a problem for Barack because he didn’t actually have to be attacked. He only had to say he was attacked. That he did, over and over.

Running a campaign with no substance and little depth can be successful if you stick to your plan and attack any opposition to it as being racists. What that methodology requires is constant, loud, and widespread publicity. To get that publicity required one thing above all else, money. Truly you cannot win if you don’t have the minimum requirements but with enough money you can win with very little else than the bare minimum substance and depth.

According to the Obama Campaign they have taken in $605 million dollars since he began in 2007. They have consistently outspent their opponents in every market and on every level. It has taken this level of expenditure to tamp down questions on experience, past associations, ideology, and legislative mediocrity. It has also fed a media sorely lacking in ad revenues to the point in NBC’s case of actually paying advertisers back for failure to meet ratings expectations. Is it any wonder that the main stream media leans towards Obama?

The media’s infatuation with Obama is not only due to an exceptionally reliable stream of revenue in the primaries and during the campaign. The “Fat Cats” in Hollywood and New York can see dollar signs in the future with an Obama presidency. Once elected a President Obama would be the gift that keeps giving. Every valid charge leveled by the opposition in the campaigns can now become a feature scandal. In-depth reports that didn’t surface while campaign ad money was rolling in could then become the engine for ad sales when “exposed” by a truly responsible albeit tardy media.

Knowing where all that money actually came from would be a very interesting story, but understanding why it is necessary and how it is being spent is more important right now. Throwing cash at his opponents Barack Obama has only managed to keep slightly ahead in a race that should by now have placed him up by double digits. Constant pleas by Obama and Biden to not lose sight of the finish suggest he knows the dangers all to well. Rolling out last minute hold card endorsements like Powell only underscore the concern. Endorsements after all are supposed to help you early on with the base not swing the undecided.

The Obama campaign is painfully aware that in most of the recent presidential campaigns the Democratic candidate has gone into the final stretch with a lead in the publicized polls. With less contentious previous races the spread of some has been even wider only to end in a loss. Despite all efforts to publicly humiliate his opponent and running mate and his opponent’s supporters the polls continue to close. One might ask why, when all Obama’s surrogates say McCain is foolish for campaigning in Pennsylvania, a state Obama claims to have a lock in, they continue to spend record amounts in that state.

Breaking a promise to the American People to take federally matching funds, $605 million dollars. Pork barrel special interest earmarks $800 million dollars. Losing a campaign full of platitudes, pandering, and pernicious attacks on plumbers, PRICELESS.