Well, of course you’re going to have to go to a foreign newspaper to find out about the real movers and shakers in the American presidential race! The US news media isn’t going to tell you the following:
The US presidential candidates are heading towards the $1bn mark in campaign fundraising, shattering records as Wall Street and corporate America pump cash into a race that started early and has produced at least eight viable candidates.
snip
Barack Obama, the Democratic senator from Illinois, said he raised $32m (€21.5m, £16m) in January alone. Hillary Clinton, the New York senator and Mr Obama’s chief rival, said she raised $27m in the last three months of the year.
snip
In contrast to previous years, Democrats are solidly Bad American › Create New Post — WordPressoutraising Republicans, reflecting stronger enthusiasm for their candidates and some fatigue on the GOP side following eight years in control of the White House.
snip
Mrs Clinton had raised about $5m from securities industry workers through September, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. That amount took her just ahead of Rudy Giuliani, the Republican former mayor of New York City, who dropped out of the race this week.
Mrs Clinton has lined up support among many senior Wall Street executives, including John Mack, head of Morgan Stanley, who has been a significant fundraiser for Republicans in the past.
Mr Obama has generated widespread enthusiasm among younger Wall Street executives such as Eric Mindich, founder of hedge fund Eton Park, and Jamie Rubin, a private equity executive and son of Robert Rubin, the former Treasury secretary.
While trailing the Democrats, the leading Republicans have won widespread Wall Street support. Many executives have written cheques and raised money for multiple candidates because there has been so much uncertainty about the outcome in both parties.
Isn’t always funny that when a candidate like, say, Ron Paul, who raises enormous sums of campaign money from ‘ordinary people,’ get ridiculed for it in the media? As if ordinary Americans should stay out of the game so the big boys can play king-maker. ‘Oh, all his money is from small donors, on the Internet,’ you hear the talking heads say, almost disdainfully.
It used to be ‘our’ democracy, didn’t it?
