Dean Threat May Help Bush Up Fundraising Ante

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23967-2003Nov10.html

With President Bush's reelection fundraising nearing the $100 million mark, several advisers said Monday that the new financial threat posed by former Vermont governor Howard Dean should encourage the president's donors to vault his campaign well past its ambitious fundraising goal of $170 million.

When Bush passes the $100 million mark, possibly Thursday, he will eclipse the amount he spent in 2000 and break the record for political fundraising.

But for the first time in either of his national campaigns, Bush has a competitor who can also spend limitlessly. Dean decided Saturday to become the first Democratic presidential candidate ever to forgo federal matching money, meaning he can raise and spend an unlimited total. Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) has said he will decide soon whether to go the same route.

Republican officials said that if Dean becomes their opponent, his campaign-financing decision could dramatically change the landscape for Bush in the months between clinching the nomination and the Democratic National Convention in late July. Bush's strategists had assumed the Democratic nominee would be low on money, or broke, during that period and would have to rely on advertising by outside interest groups, which cannot legally coordinate their messages with the campaign.

[jsw_81]

1. One thing to keep in mind

Bush outspent Gore by a huge margin in 2000, but Gore still won the popular vote and only "lost" the electoral vote because the court shut down the recount. Remember this whenever you hear about the "hundreds of millions" that Bush is allegedly raising.

[wtmusic]

2. Can't Buy Me Love

S'gonna take more than money for the Shrub