I am on a number of Democratic Party email lists; now and then I report on what they are saying. During the last week or two of June, I received an average of around three emails a day from the Obama campaign and affiliated organizations pleading with me to donate money. The tone of the emails was hysterical: the end of the month is approaching; we will have to report how much we have raised; the Republicans are raising enormous amounts of money; the Obama campaign is in danger of being outspent; and so on. The appeals were dotted with disparaging references to Karl Rove and the Koch brothers.
The Romney campaign released its June numbers today. It took in a very impressive $100 million, the most ever for a Republican candidate in a single month. (Obama holds the record of $150 million in September 2008). The Obama campaign has not yet published its June numbers, but if the shrill tone of the campaign’s emails is any guide, it may not match Romney’s total, just as it failed to equal the Romney campaign in May.
At the end of the day, both candidates will raise plenty of money to get their messages out. This election will not be like 2008, when Obama outspent John McCain by around two to one. Moreover, Jim Geraghty reports that, contrary to popular belief and Democratic Party claims, Super-PACs supportive of President Obama have spent twice as much on anti-Romney ads as conservative PACs have spent on anti-Obama ads. One hopes that will change; but again, the playing field in 2012 promises to be essentially level.
Which means that the election will turn on Obama’s first-term record, as it should. Maybe that accounts for the hysterical tone of the Democrats’ fundraising appeals.
Notice: All comments are subject to moderation. Our comments are intended to be a forum for civil discourse bearing on the subject under discussion. Commenters who stray beyond the bounds of civility or employ what we deem gratuitous vulgarity in a comment — including, but not limited to, “s***,” “f***,” “a*******,” or one of their many variants — will be banned without further notice in the sole discretion of the site moderator.