Obama's Nebulous Campaign Funding Operation

There's a lot of disparate stories coming in on Barack Obama's nebulous network of campaign finance.

For one, the Washington Post notes, Obama's got some big money bundlers of various origins who are casting doubt on the campaign's claim that the preponderance of its support is in small contributors and middle American common folk (via Memeorandum):

Sen. Barack Obama credits his presidential campaign with creating a "parallel public financing system" built on a wave of modest donations from homemakers and high school teachers. Small givers, he said at a fundraiser this week, "will have as much access and influence over the course and direction of our campaign that has traditionally been reserved for the wealthy and the powerful."

But those with wealth and power also have played a critical role in creating Obama's record-breaking fundraising machine, and their generosity has earned them a prominent voice in shaping his campaign. Seventy-nine "bundlers," five of them billionaires, have tapped their personal networks to raise at least $200,000 each. They have helped the campaign recruit more than 27,000 donors to write checks for $2,300, the maximum allowed. Donors who have given more than $200 account for about half of Obama's total haul, which stands at nearly $240 million.

The Post article highlights the model of campaign finance that's emerged in presidential elections since George W. Bush's 2000 campaign, which was the first to eschew public financing in the primaries.

The campaign bundling's not as controversial as the hypocrisy of the message of preponderant grassroots support, Obama's scam of a "parallel public financing" system, and not to mention the large contributions that Obama's getting from Iraq defense contractors, donations which certainly raise questions as to Obama's fidelity to the hardcore base of antiwar supporters which has mobilized heavily to his banner.

The Wall Street Journal's got an editorial on Obama's shifting campaign fianance associations:

Mr. Obama has also made much of his campaign's pledge not to accept money from political action committees, raising the majority of his funds from small private donations. PACs typically make up less than 1% of overall election donations to Presidential candidates, so that's no sacrifice.

Industry PACs may not give directly to his campaign, but employees of industries may do so, and many of his contributors have come from executives and their spouses. For example, Mr. Obama leads all candidates in donations from the pharmaceutical industry and commercial banks, among other industries. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks fundraising in elections, Mr. Obama has received $528,765 from people in the pharmaceutical industry and $1,380,108 from commercial banks. He comes in second to Mrs. Clinton in donations from lawyers with $13,690,170, just over a million shy of her total.

There is in fact a real parallel financing system already in place and ready to support Mr. Obama. It's called George Soros and so-called 527 groups such as the Democrat-supporting Fund for America or the newly named Progressive Media USA. Progressive Media recently announced plans for a $40 million, four-month campaign against Mr. McCain, and that's only one group in the game.

The Politico reported yesterday on the Progressive Media Group's planned big-money smear campaign against John McCain, "Dems plan $40M hit on McCain."

But check out Chris Cillizza's post yesterday on the anti-McCain efforts:

The Fund for America, a political organization aligned with several major players in Democratic politics, has raised better than $11 million -- largely from wealthy individuals -- since its inception last November and doled out nearly half that sum to various progressive organizations around the country.

FFA, as its known in Democratic circles, is set to report collecting $4.1 million between Jan. 1 and March 31 when its report is due with the Internal Revenue Service on April 15. As a 527 organization, the group can take unlimited donations from individuals but must disclose the names of its contributors.

The vast majority of that cash comes from a stable of well-heeled donors who are familiar to any political junkie....

FFA is organized as a grant-giving organization -- using the cash it collects to fund a variety of progressive causes. Its founders insist it is not primarily an election-year vehicle but rather an attempt to put into place a longer-term conduit for major donors to fund key activities and groups throughout the country.

"FFA was created to promote and support the long-term strength of the progressive movement," said Amy Dacey, the group's executive director. "Beyond our efforts this year, we intend to raise and distribute funds in 2009, 2010, 2011 and beyond. We've got our eye on the long-term success of the progressive movement against the more established and aggressive conservative movement, and we'll settle for nothing less."

To that end, FFA's largest grants during the first three months of 2008 went to national groups with an eye on the presidential election.

FFA sent $2.5 million to Campaign to Defend America, a 501(c)(4) organization headed by former Moveon.org Washington director Tom Matzzie. That group -- and its plans for the fall -- remain something of a mystery to even some Democratic party insiders although the group did run ads last month in Ohio and Pennsylvania that labeled Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) as the "McSame" as President Bush on a variety of key issues. The ad buy was estimated at $1 million.

I wrote about these developments the other day, indicating how Mattzie's moved away from the discredited "Betray Us"-style of attack mobilization to a newer model of radical electoral agitation politics.

All of these trends point to Obama's operation as extremely opportunistic - even Machiavellian - in merging mainstream big-money bundling operations with hardline antiwar factions who're notorious political tools for the Democratic Party establishment.