Monday, May 26, 2008

Obama Supporters Too Numerous for FEC

Not sure if anyone has reported on this topic this morning, so I thought I would take a stab at it. It appears that the U. S. government is having a hard time keeping track of all us Obama supporters.

From the Politico.com

The record-shattering fundraising by Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton has reshaped the financing of presidential elections and generated breathless coverage and analysis of the otherwise arcane area of campaign finance.
Yet it’s had another consequence that has gone all but unnoticed. The campaign finance reports filed by Obama and Clinton have grown so massive that they’ve strained the capacity of the Federal Election Commission, good government groups, the media and even software applications to process and make sense of the data.
A milestone of sorts was reached earlier this year, when Obama, the Illinois senator whose revolutionary online fundraising has overwhelmed Clinton, filed an electronic fundraising report so large it could not be processed by popular basic spreadsheet applications like Microsoft Excel

Although I'm sure the government will find some way to keep track of 1.5 million donors, this is a testament as to what is probably the greatest achievement of the Obama campaign so far.
1.5 million donors have financed this campaign, many of whom are donating only in small amounts. We have funded a successful campaign against arguably one of the strongest Democratic primary foes of our time, and have been successful in doing so.
So while the United States government tries to sort this all out and keep track off all the money, we should give ourselves a big pat on the back, because we've probably changed the way that Presidential campaigns will be financed in the future.

Cross-posted at DailyKos.com

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