So with the deadline for decisions on matching funds getting close

[Egnever]

What will the rest of the field do?

Can anyone else afford to forgoe them?

Some obviously cant

What about kerry and clark?

Its a big risk.

Niether of them is close to the 45 million and with the matching funds only effecting the first 250 I am not sure how much thier totals would rise with the funds. But can they afford to go without them?

Kerry I suppose could use his own money to get him through till a stronger performance produced more funds but will he do this?

Seems like a rough choice to me. If you dont take the funds thats a lot of money you have to come up with, but if you do you limit yourself if you do indeed become the frontruner and cash comes pouring in.

what will they do?

[SahaleArm]

1. That's a tough one for Clark (and probably Kerry).

The Clark campaign publicly expects $6 million more for Q4, but that's a low ball. I think he'll get at least $10 million more this quarter. Say matching funds nets Clark ~$5 million, is it worth it? Matching funds limits him to another $25-30 million through the convention (6-months). If he becomes the frontrunner by March, the cap will become an issue, especially against the Bush-Rove war chest.

[Egnever]

3. Clark I think is the most interesting in this question

I am not up on his numbers really but i think he made something like 4 million last q no? and you say maybe 10 mill this one. That brings him to a total of 14m so far.

I tend to think Clark has the potential to be just as strong of a fundraiser as Dean is wich leads in the end to him blowing away the 45 million dollar cap in the long run but in the short run he is short on funds.

I think matching funds are distributed in january? Those bucks could be very usefull short term.

Does he have enough cash on hand to compete directly till his fundraising ability catches up to his late entry handicap?

with the deadline only 20 or so days away to decide on this thing its going to be really interesting where the top few of these guys end up.

[tsipple]

2. I'm Thinking They Don't

Gephardt won't. He just had to ask his staff to give up their pay.

Kerry is the closest to giving up matching funds, but his fundraising has got to have petered out in this 4th quarter. (He's got an overabundance of $2000 maxed out contributors.) I think he'll wait until the last possible moment and then...stay within the system.

Clark will stay within the system. He's got tens of millions to cap due to his late start.

Edwards will stay within the system.

Of course, anyone who does (has to) stay within the system is unelectable due to the Bush corporate money juggernaut from March to July. (There, I said it.)