Why Obama means big bucks but small change

Last Modified: 15 Apr 2007
By: Felicity Spector

He's cast as the man with grass-roots appeal, who's turned down the cash-cows of Washington lobbyists, tapping the power of the internet to raise millions for his campaign.

But the Barack Obama story isn't as simple as that. This is the guy who's pulled in an astonishing $25m in the first quarter of 2007 - and it's not all from smalltime donors.

The full figures, published for the first time today, reveal there have been plenty of those online contributors, sending 50 or 100 dollars over the net. In fact the Obama campaign raised almost seven million this way. Plus a couple of mill from direct mailshots and telemarketeers.

So despite all the talk - and giving back tens of thousands donated by federal lobbyists - perhaps Obama's not so very different from those establishment candidates after all.

But the bulk of his war chest springs from some of the most powerful people inside the Democratic Party, those sporting a special gold badge with the letters NFC - or National Finance Committee. Unlike a gold Blue Peter badge, you have to raise a cool quarter of a million dollars to earn the right to wear one.

People like Hollywood moguls David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenburg - who said raising money for Obama was the easiest thing he'd done in 25 years. "It kind of blew me away," he's said. "If I made 100 phone calls, 90 of them were successes."

And the Hyatt heiress Penny Pritzker, a Chicago billionaire now installed as finance chair of the Senator's presidential race. She's already pulled in some fellow blue-bloods like the Crown family - worth more than four billion dollars. Hardly grass-roots folk, these.

So despite all the talk - and giving back tens of thousands donated by federal lobbyists - perhaps Obama's not so very different from those establishment candidates after all.

The perfect equation for the Obama team, though, remains the same - excitement plus money equals momentum, and success. Any evidence of that, to date? The latest opinion polls put Hillary Clinton further out in front, with 38 per cent of support compared to Barack's 19 per cent.

But among progressives, Obama's continuing to impress. Black fundraisers have tapped into new networks of supporters across America's black communities.

And when the liberal organisation Moveon.org held a "virtual town hall" meeting last week, involving hundreds of households around the States quizzing candidates live over the internet about their policies on Iraq, it was the Illinois Senator who emerged on top - and Hillary Clinton trailing in fifth.

So the first quarter figures have, as predicted, revealed some key insights into the presidential campaigns - how they operate, how they organise, and how they are supported. But at this oh-so-early stage of the game - no outright winners yet.

This article originally appeared on the Newsroom blog