Sen. Barack Obama is the most inspiring public leader in America. He has a bold vision to help the middle class and restore America's prestige in the world. Join this grassroots effort to support Sen. Obama's historic and uplifting campaign for president. Keep hope alive! Obama '08!
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Over the last several weeks I and three other wonderfully supportive neighbors have been organizing Bowl-O-bama!
You might have seen me walkin' around this past weekend's SDC, or you might have seen the event posted on any one of a number of online sites.
But what you might not have seen on those sites is that this event will be freakin' awesome!
We're going to have brewskies, chips and queso, Obama shirts, buttons, balloons, yard signs, stickers and some unique items available for bidding during the Silent Auction portion of the event.
If you plan on coming as a group, RSVP w/me soon. Otherwise, I'll see you next Saturday, June 21st between 2-6 at Saengerrunde Bowling Alley (next to Schulz's)!
A $50 million dollar month...
So rumors are startingtocirculate that Obama raised between 50 and 60 million dollars in February. This amount is of course staggering. Remember, Obama has led since day one in pledged delegates, and at this stage clearly leads in raw votes, number of donors, states won, caucuses won, contributions collected, but guess what:
and we lose in Texas. Along with the good, ah heck, great news has come a cooling of energy in some people -- but this is not wrapped up folks, not by a mile! Obama has trailed in Texas from the get go, and we trail now, or maybe we have gotten giddy with a margin-of-error tie. But to twist a phrase: 'Remember the New Hampshire'. What size was that polling lead when Obama lost?? Parallel to all the good debates and stunning money hauls, and superdelegate switcheroos, and wow-level early vote turnouts, there is evidence in reduced emails, lighter campaign office traffic, number of undecideds and 'already voted clinton' in the phonebanks that show we cannot slow down.
Don't let 'Clinton takes Texas' become the headline on Mar 5.
yes we can: Take responsibility for 5 friends to bring to the caucus,
yes we can: blockwalk at least your street,
yes we can: make 50 calls a day.
Barack Obama raised $32 million in the month of January from 170,000 individual donors. This is amazing, and it is a true sign of the breadth, depth, and momentum of his movement.
Hillary Clinton raised $13.5 million in the same time period, less than half of Obama's amount. But today we find out that she gave herself a $5 million loan. Clinton's donors are either maxed-out, weary, or waning.
Let's continue to give Obama our strongest support!
This is the result of just three emails sent by the Obama campaign. It's more than Mike Huckabee raised last quarter. It's probably more than any Republican raised online last quarter with the exception of Ron Paul.
The lesson here is get in the game. Always try new stuff. Do bold audacious things to first build your list and then monetize it. Try everything at least once, but don't get distracted by the shiny new Web 2.0 toys. Socnets still can't raise what email can. And realize that the Web is more than just a medium for getting your message across. It's a medium for moving people and money.
Hours before the close of the quarterly financial reporting period for presidential campaigns at midnight tonight, the Barack Obama campaign announced a few moments ago that it had attracted more than 350,000 donors since the start of his bid for the White House.
The Obama campaign has consistently reported previously unmatched numbers of donors each quarter this year.
The announcement today follows a pattern Obama has set all year long of first focusing attention on the numbers of people who have donated to the campaign. The campaign portrays the numbers of small donors as an indicator of grass-roots enthusiasm for their candidate.
Thanks to all our supporters for stepping up to the plate to help Obama. This is a well-researched article by Jason Embry at the Statesman, and be sure to check out this cool graphic that highlights Central Texas fundraising.
Obama, the Democratic U.S. senator from Illinois, collected more money in the Austin-San Marcos metro area in the first half of 2007 than any of the other presidential candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks campaign fundraising. Those totals reflect donations reported to the Federal Election Commission on July 15, a spokesman for the center said.
"Austin is a very insular, buzzy town, like Mayberry," said Austin-based Democratic consultant Jason Stanford, who is not affiliated with a presidential campaign. "You get good buzz in this town, and it quickly becomes conventional wisdom. What we're seeing with these numbers is that Obama really has the Austin buzz going in his favor. You have a disproportionately young, politically active population here."
Most major candidates have held fundraisers in Austin, but Obama's February rally at Auditorium Shores made the biggest splash in the area this year.
Organizers of the big-ticket house party - believed to be Obama's first in Brooklyn - tried to keep the event hush-hush. But it was clear that something unusual was afoot at Nina Collins's Columbia Heights mansion.
Naomi Village: In the heart of the Poconos
By 7 pm, Town Cars began pulling up to the three-story brownstone, spilling out expensive-looking men and women - a surprisingly high number of them alone and enamored of Obama.
"He's my TV boyfriend," said a Brooklyn Heights resident, who gave only the name Daphne.
"You know that movie, `Jerry McGuire,' when Renee Zellweger's character says, `You had me at hello?'" asked Daphne. "Well, he had me at the 2004 convention. … I think he is the best chance this country has had to pull itself out of this hell it has fallen into. This is the first time in my adult life I thought there was a chance to be proud of being American again."
There were also some entertainment moguls, like Deborah Pointer, the co-founder of HBO's Def Poetry Jam, who joined about 50 paying customers at the fundraiser.
"I like his honesty and his vision for change," she said.
On Monday, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama brings his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination to Gilley's of Dallas, where he'll hold a $250-a-ticket rally and fundraiser in between a couple of high-dollar events.
In fact, contributors making small donations are a greater part of presidential campaigns than in the past.
Donors who gave $200 or less accounted for 26 percent of the contributions that presidential candidates collected from individuals from April through June, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, which studies campaign finance. That represented an 84 percent increase from their giving during the first three months of 2007.
Mr. Obama, who raised $32.5 million for his campaign during the last quarter, left some supporters bemused when in April he held a fundraiser in Dallas that left most supporters peeping through the window.
"You have to do different things to reach different demographics and at the same time show you've got some hip, street credibility," said Dallas lawyer Michael Sorrell, who is one of Mr. Obama's North Texas fundraisers. "It's another chance to show people that you're one of them."
Dallas businessman Curtis E. Ransom, who has given money to Mr. Obama, agreed.
"You've got to get down into the grass roots," Mr. Ransom said. "That's where the masses are."
Here's a sampling of this morning's news about Obama's historic fundraising effort.
* Obama raises $32.5M, shatters record - - CNN
* Obama Outraises Clinton by $10 Million - ABC News
* Obama smashes records with 32.5 million campaign windfall - AFP
* Small donors boost Obama fundraising - Financial Times
* Obama Taps Internet, Small Donors to Top Clinton's Fundraising - Bloomberg
* Obama Campaign Raises $32.5 Million - New York Times
* Pressure on Clinton Is Expected to Grow - Washington Post
Thanks to all our Texas supporters for stepping up to the plate and contributing to this historic fundraising total. No presidential candidate in history has ever generated so much grassroots enthusiasm from so many small donors, and it's exciting to be part of such an inspiring movement.
Less than six months ago, we began this campaign with a mission.
Barack and all of us were determined to defeat the politics of cynicism and division that is so pervasive in Washington today and replace it with a politics of unity, hope and common purpose.
The pundits and political insiders questioned whether a new leader and fledgling campaign could compete with the big money and massive organization of other candidates who have been preparing to run for years, and even decades.
Well, for the second consecutive quarter, you've helped send a resounding answer.
I'm thrilled to report that in the last three months, the Obama campaign has set a new record for fundraising. Thanks to you, we raised at least $32.5 million including at least $31 million that we can spend on the battle for the Democratic nomination.
But as astonishing as that feat is, much more important is how we raised it.
To date, more than 258,000 Americans have contributed to this effort, much of it coming in small donations. This, too, shatters all records and sends an unmistakable message to the political establishment that the same old politics just won't do in 2008.
The American people are demanding real change, a politics of principle and not just expediency. They want to turn the page, and they're turning out and supporting this effort in unprecedented numbers. It has become more than a campaign. It is a movement.
That is more than what Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama's main Democratic rival, has said she would raise for the reporting period that ended Saturday.
At least $31 million of Obama's total is for party primaries, according to campaign aides.
The first-term senator from Illinois received donations from more than 154,000 individual contributors and through the first half of the year had 258,000 donors. Obama raised $25.7 million in the first three months of the year.
Only Republican George W. Bush, in each presidential campaign, raised comparable amounts in the second quarter of the year before the general election. The single-quarter record is $35.1 million, by Bush from April through June in 2003. Clinton had held the Democratic mark with $26 million, covering the first three months of this year.
"We are on a financial course that will allow us to both fully fund efforts in the early primary and caucus states, and also participate vigorously in all the February 5 contests, including large states like California, New Jersey, New York, Georgia and Missouri," Obama campaign manager David Plouffe wrote supporters Sunday.
Democrat John Edwards raised more than $9 million from April through June and relied on nearly 100,000 donors during the first half of the year. The fundraising total met the campaign's stated goal but was about $5 million less than what he took in during the first three months of the year.
At this point in the campaign, fundraising figures can act as an easy measure of candidate strength and create tiers of contenders based on their ability to amass money.
If you haven't given yet, then you still have time to join this historic movement. If you've already donated, then donate again! Click here to donate. The second quarter fundraising deadline is tomorrow.
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has improved on his stunning support in the race for campaign cash, raising his total number of donors to more than 250,000 people in the first six months of the year.
The freshman Illinois senator impressed rivals in the first quarter when he reported 104,000 donors, but he surpassed the mark with more than 146,000 opening their wallets in the second quarter, the campaign announced Thursday.
The campaign won't say yet how much the donors have given, but the large number suggests their fundraising will be competitive with the $25.7 million he raised in the first quarter. A campaign official speaking on the condition of anonymity tried to tamp down expectations by disclosing that the average donation in the second quarter is likely to be less than the roughly $247 in the first quarter.
The campaign set a goal of attracting 250,000 donors by midnight on Saturday, the next money reporting deadline, and ran a live tally on his Web site to help bring in more. The 250,000th donation came in less than 10 hours later from high school English teacher Angela Berg of Sumner, Wash., who donated $100 and was rewarded with a personal phone call from Obama just as he was preparing to take the stage in the third Democratic primary debate.
The campaign said it collected more than 343,000 contributions - meaning that many individuals made repeat donations - and its goal will be to reach 350,000 by the deadline.
"This campaign has become a vehicle for hundreds of thousands of Americans who believe that the people can take control of the political process again," campaign manager David Plouffe wrote in an e-mail to supporters that includes video links from donors.
Obama leads the pack with $5.7million raised from small donors, representing 22% of his total first quarter fund-raising, and 60% of all Dem candidates small donor fund-raising.
Is that enough, percentage-wise? It does seem proof-positive of the high-dollar skewing of Presidential politics, but remember the balance between 'imagining the world as you wish it would be' and 'acting according to how the world still is.' The real question: will small donors have enough resources to balance the big-boys? does it matter?
If there was any doubt that Senator Barack Obama could stand toe to toe with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, at least in raising money, the matter was settled on Wednesday as Mr. Obama's presidential campaign announced raising $25 million in the first three months of the year.
Sen. Barack Obama's announcement Wednesday that he has raised nearly as much money as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton this year, bringing in $25 million for his presidential bid from a wide array of contributors, shakes up the race and makes it clear no Democrat will enjoy the early dominance the former first lady had been trying to establish.
"Anyone who can put together $25 million in a quarter comes off as a very serious and credible candidate," said Chris Lehane, who was the spokesman for Vice President Al Gore's presidential campaign in 2000.
Had the New York senator been able to raise far more than her competitors, it might have helped her build the kind of inevitability enjoyed in 1999 by then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush, whose fundraising dominance helped drive challengers from the contest and secure the Republican nomination.
The figures were the latest evidence that Obama, a political newcomer who has served just two years in the Senate, has emerged as the most powerful new force in presidential politics this year. It also reinforced his status as a significant threat to Clinton, who'd hoped her own $26 million first quarter fundraising total would begin to squeeze her rivals out of contention.
While Clinton has honed a vast national fundraising network through two Senate campaigns and her husband's eight years as president, Obama launched his bid for the White House with a relatively small donor base concentrated largely in Illinois, his home state. But his early opposition to the Iraq war and voter excitement over his quest to be the first black president quickly fueled a powerful fundraising machine.
Clinton's campaign often solicited the $4,600 donations, while Obama's campaign focused on recruiting small dollar donors. In the coming months, he can return to those donors and ask those who haven't maxed out to give more. Unlike Clinton, Obama says he doesn't take money from the lobbyists or political action committees that are frequent contributors on other campaigns.
Presidential hopeful Barack Obama has raised $25 million in the first quarter of 2007, bolstered by an innovative Internet campaign that has helped him expand his appeal to a wider base of donors than his Democratic presidential rivals.
The Illinois senator's fundraising between Jan. 1 and March 31 brought in nearly as much as the $26 million raised by Democratic front-runner Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York. But his base of 100,000 supporters surpasses the combined donors of Clinton, with a reported 50,000, and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, whose campaign announced he had raised $14 million from 40,000 donors.
Obama, who has drawn thousands of California voters to huge rallies in the state in the past month, "has done very well in California ... connecting with voters on a retail basis,'' said Steve Westly, the former California state controller who endorsed the Illinois senator and is a co-chair of his statewide campaign.
Westly cited a mix of "a lot of sophisticated social networking tools, blogging teams and stuff that no one has been coming close to,'' he said. "They have taken campaigning and social networking on line to a whole different level ... because people don't have to wait for the top-down traditional approach. You've got the people fired up on Obama talking to each other.''
If money talks in presidential politics, Sen. Barack Obama has 25 million reasons why skeptical Democrats should start to listen.
"That should send a pretty clear signal that people are looking for a change," said another Iowa Democratic activist, Carl Grover. While he hasn't donated money to Obama, Grover said, "I'm definitely thinking about it."
In Iowa, which is nearly overrun this spring by Republicans and Democrats seeking traction in their campaigns, Obama's money report _ it said 100,000 people had donated _ was the buzz of a large and noisy crowd of political activists.
"The fact that he had twice as many contributors as Clinton is important," said Dan Courtney of Mason City. "I think it shows he's a viable candidate."
over 100,000 donors
over $25,000,000
over $23,500,000 FOR THE PRIMARY!!
over 50,000 donors online
over 6,900,000 raised online
over 50,000 my.barackobama members
it is a whole new game, and Texas will be in play for 2008 for Obama!
The sheer quantity of donors means a huge base of support. Richardson, looks stronger and stronger by standing as everyone's second choice since, and i am sure some will disagree, he really has no shot at being financial competitive -- and with what is now essentially a Feb 5 mock national election, it will take enormous dollars to compete.
Edwards and Clinton, that leaves yall.
There is NO Clinton inevitability. And unfortunately, Edward's chances to compete across the long haul seem unlikely with Elizabeth's cancer.
Of course, Mr. Gore might have a change of what seems his life's mission.... What a long strange road this is going to be for Democrats.
Obama used his conditional support of public financing as a means of distinguishing himself from the big money candidates, saying "The fact that I'm raising obscene amounts of money for this presidential race doesn't make me a hypocrite. … I want to see those systems implemented and have a track record of doing it."
The amounts of money raised by all the major candidates during this race amount to obscenity, but in Senator Obama's case, just how obscene are his numbers? We will probably find out later this week. A shortage of information about that number has led to an abundance of speculation.
From the CNS News Article,"Obama silence stokes speculation on fundraising"
"Clinton reported having raised the money from 50,000 individual contributors. Obama, while yet to release any figures, said his campaign has benefited more than 85,000 separate contributors."
We know Obama has collected some support from some former Hillary supporters, and that, at least at big political rallies, his magnetism is unprecedented. I have several longtime friends that have never expressed any political interest in anything or any candidate since I've known them. When they saw Obama's announcement speech, though, they gave $25 each to Obama's campaign. My friends are financially strapped college students like me, but they gave what they could to the man that finally understands. Another friends said about Obama, "I don't trust him. He seems too honest."
My optimistic prediction, and I'm being audacious here,is $31 million.
Thanks to all our Texas supporters for stepping up to the plate to help get Obama past the $20 million milestone. Every little bit adds up!
The fact that underdog Obama is in the same fundraising ballpark as front-runner Clinton is incredible. While Clinton may have much of the establishment lined up behind her, Obama is proving the power of the grassroots is alive and well. Getting 75,000 individual donors is a sign of good things to come. Each of those folks can give again, whereas many of the big donors for the other candidates have already maxed out.
Obama Built Donor Network From Roots Up
By CHRISTOPHER DREW and MIKE McINTIRE - April 3, 2007
CHICAGO - When Barack Obama announced to friends over brunch in 2002 that he planned to run for the United States Senate, one of their first questions was how he could possibly raise the necessary millions.
After all, two and a half years after he had taken quite a "spanking," as he put it, in his bid to unseat an incumbent congressman, he was still struggling to pay off a $20,000 debt, eking out donations of $1,000 here, $2,000 there.
Improbably, Mr. Obama, running as something of an outsider, wound up raising $15 million and winning that 2004 Senate race. Now that he is running for president, his fund-raising prowess has helped make him the chief rival to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.
Aides said Monday that he had collected more than $20 million in donations in the first three months of the campaign, enough to ratchet up the anxiety in the Clinton camp, which announced it had raised $26 million.
I'm proud to be one of the many contributors to Mr. Obama's campaign. While my contribution was not great, not even close to great, I take comfort in the fact that I can keep on giving because I'm no where near my $2,300 max. So thank you Mr. Obama for proving that all of our small time, regular folk donations really do count!
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License. Some Rights Reserved. TexansForObama.com 2007 Paid for by TexansForObama & not Authorized by any Candidate or Candidate's Committee. [ADDRESS] Austin, Texas 78768. blog@texansforobama.com
