We Are All Nutmeggers Now
Presumptive Republican nominee John McCain will be in Connecticut today on a fundraising tour through Fairfield County. “America’s ATM” will be churning out much needed funds for the McCain campaign, as they gird for a challenging autumn campaign against either Sen. Barack Obama or Sen. Hillary Clinton.Â
The Arizona Senator has spent the last few weeks drawing contrasts between himself and the mudwrestling contest that is the Democratic nominating process. Of course, no more clear a contrast than yesterday’s nationally-televised testimony of General David Petreaus and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker to the Senate Armed Services Committee.  While Sen. McCain asked several probing questions about the realities of Iraq - much like a President would do of his Generals in the Oval Office - Sen. Hillary Clinton opted to deliver the “Iraq section” of her campaign stump speech, apparently assuming that Petreaus doesn’t watch CNN in Iraq.  The General seemed unimpressed.
The fall campaign promises to be little more than a well-financed street fight, and both Democrats have had a tremendous amount of success raising money in the Nutmeg State this year. Barack Obama has raised $3,269,444 accourding to the FEC while Sen. Clinton has pumped $2,248,249 out of the state during the course of the campaign. Whatever the result of the Democratic nominating process, the Democratic nominee will likely have more financial resources at their disposal than McCain.
McCain’s trip through the State today is geared to keep the money gap as narrow as possible. McCain himself has already rung up $1.4 million from CT, and as such will almost certainly be looking to the donor ranks of his former competitors. Now-supporters Gov. Mitt Romney and Mayor Rudy Giuliani each generated about $1.4 million for their campaigns here. Capturing as many of those donors will be a priority for the McCainiacs. Look for Romney and Giuliani themselves to make fundraising swings through the state on McCain’s behalf in the not-so-distant future.
The money raised today and over the coming weeks will fuel the Arizonan’s bid for President across the nation - including in Connecticut. Though the Democratic competitors spent millions of dollars on infrastructure and media buys in the weeks before the Connecticut Presidential Preference Primary (February 5th), Senator McCain polls almost even with Senator Clinton, according to the recent Quinnipiac poll. In a match-up against Sen. Obama, who won the State’s primary and has been endorsed by a host of high Democratic officials - such as Rep. John Larson, Rep. Rosa DeLauro, Rep. Chris Murphy, and others - McCain trails52%-35%. Democrats have said that this shows how poorly McCain will do against Sen. Obama. Somehow, they must not recall that Mitt Romney was up by 17 points in New Hampshire barely a month before Election Day in the Granite State.Â
Make no mistake about it - McCain will make Connecticut competitive this fall.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
“…the Democratic nominee will likely have more financial resources at their disposal than McCain.”
Don’t you ever wonder why?
“Make no mistake about it - McCain will make Connecticut competitive this fall.”
We’re in a far left state. How is McCain going to make Connecticut competitive except by moving to the left? Is he going to promise people more federal handouts?
There are so many people with a financial interest in expanding the government that it is now impossible to actually shrink the size of government. They are in the majority. On one side there’s the Democrats promising $50 or $60 trillion in future entitlements and on the other there’s the Republicans promising trillions to prop up the military industrial complex for the next hundred years by blowing up bridges in third world countries and then rebuilding them five times as the terrorists they attract keep knocking them down. And let’s not forget the agricultural subsidies, the education subsidies, the pharmaceutical subsidies, and, of course, the home owner and bank bailout.
Like most people, I supported going in to Iraq initially. Back when the Administration said it would cost $50-200 Billion, largely financed by Iraqi oil revenue, and there would be no nation building - we would be in and out. Now estimates are north of $2 Trillion before it’s all said and done and, whether it was bad intelligence or the WMD’s were moved to Syria doesn’t matter at this point, because the current Iraqi government doesn’t want anything to do with them. I was fine with staying in Iraq until it had a government and Constitution. Done and done. Then Murtha goes on TV and cries for immediate withdrawal and the Republicans got suckered and took the most opposite position possible - send more troops.
There was no point to doing that other than the political one of trying to make the Democrats look soft on terrorism. Only an idiot would believe 5,000 Al-Qaida could topple an Iraqi government with 500,000 of its own troops. Now the Republicans are stuck because without any definable goals they can’t back out without losing face. Most Americans see that at this point and that’s why McCain is going to get slaughtered in this election. The only people who will be left voting for him are the ones that think it’s better to keep throwing money at Iraq for an indeterminate period of time rather than flushing money down the drain on permanent socialized medicine. Them, and the idiots that have a fetish for the letter “r” with no further thought behind it.
But, wait - McCain has an ace up his sleeve! The economy is in trouble and McCain is a budget hawk! McCain says he will cut the spending by cutting out the $15 Billion of pork in the $3.1 Trillion budget by “making the authors famous” (all 520 of them). And, who says McCain doesn’t know anything about economics? Besides McCain himself, I mean.
The funny part is, two months after Super Tuesday Ron Paul STILL has $1,840,000 more than McCain. It’s a good thing the Republican base didn’t nominate the one guy who was attracting new people to the party and could compete with the Democrats financially. Because then we’d have to stop rebuilding bridges in Iraq, and that would be bad…
April 9th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
All further comments on this blog shall henceforth be referred to as “Comments Added In the Wake of the Jim Palmer Manifesto”.