That tops the $5.9 million one-day total Sen. Bernie Sanders announced after he launched his campaign. The closest other 2020 Democratic candidate to publicize their first-day fundraising total was California Sen. Kamala Harris at $1.5 million....Ha ha. Brilliant move, withholding the numbers and creating the space within which naysayers would neigh. It makes the good news sparkly bright.
[O'Rourke's] refusal to release first-day fundraising totals over the weekend had raised doubts that O'Rourke had met fundraising expectations around his campaign launch. He remained coy about his fundraising for days.
"I can't right now," he said Friday in Washington, Iowa.
A reporter responded that O'Rourke could share his fundraising totals if he wanted to.
"You're right," he responded. "I choose not to."
Oh, the anguish this must cause Kamala Harris pushers (like the NYT)! Oh, the pain to those who sought to create a fundamental belief that the Democrat candidate could not be a white man! The Bernie-Beto-Biden triad must be stopped, that was their message. But Bernie got in and raked in the cash, and now Beto's done even better. The non-whitemales are far behind. And the #1 white male isn't even in yet. But we know Biden will show up next, and the only question will be whether he'll out-fund-raise the other components of the triad, the other white males.
By the way: "Biden Accidentally Says He’s Running, Crowd Chants ‘Run, Joe, Run!’" (Rolling Stone).
“I know I get criticized. I’m told I get criticized by the new left,” Biden said told the audience at the First State Democratic Dinner. “I have the most progressive record of anybody running for the — anybody who would run.”
Before Biden even had a chance to walk the statement back, the audience was already on its feet, cheering him on, chanting, “Run, Joe, run!”
“I didn’t mean it!” Biden insisted, laughing, adding, “Of anybody who would run, because, folks, we have to bring this country back together again.”
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50 comments:
Money is the lifeblood of presidential candidates. But Jeb proved it ain't the end-all be-all.
Beto, Biden and Mr. Brown’s date need to get over to Western Iowa so DDB can question them.
Put not your faith in Princes.
My first thought was that Beto's $200k advantage was no big deal, but he doesn't have anything like the committed and committable Bernie Bros--yet.
All I see, 'I've been in the House for 6 years, and only 25% of voters I represent could name me...but watch me raise money. Accomplishments are for loses!'
More like Flee, Joe! Flee!
I told y'all not to underestimate Robert Francis. I live in the state where he made his senate run. He blathers the same feel good pablum that Obama did and people lap it up. He is a tool to be used. He's signaled his willingness.
I think Trump recognizes the white Irishman threat. He moved early with the hands/crazy remark to try to neutralize him. Big donor Trump haters upped the game.
O'Rourke is the kind of empty vessel that all the various factions of the Democrat Party can eventually embrace precisely because he's such an empty vessel.
But I don't think an empty vessel bodes well in a match-up against Trump.
I’m baffled by Beto-mania. He seems like a marshmallow with flailing arms and weird pseudo hip credentials. What is his appeal besides a vague resemblance to RFK? Seriously, what do people see in him? I’m beginning to believe in the simulation.
Suppose the Dems put all their focus on picking a sure fire Trump-killer for 2020, then, due to their own efforts to take him out, Trump is suddenly not in the race anymore and a guy like Beto finds himself up against somebody much less troubling to the centrist swing voters than Trump, a Romney, say, or a Pence?
If unintentional, Biden's slip should be a good reason he shouldn't run. But was he trying to steal Beto's thunder?
It's weird to have to ponder and massage one's poo before flinging.
Beta is as white as they come. The new left can’t nominate another white guy. It goes against all their principles...
What? Oh, they have no principles? OK Never mind. Run Beta run...
Seriously though, can you see him and Biden and Sanders competing over which is the most diverse intersectional candidate to represent the new left?
More popcorn please.
First day donation totals are a fake indicator. It is too easy to queue up serious and other donors to commit on a prearranged day.
Of course the MSM wants to highlight any D news.
BobBoyd, I doubt Trump will run if he thinks he will lose. Maybe a Haley-Crenshaw ticket. I want a pirate in the race.
R.F.K. = Robert Francis O'Rourke?
R.F.O.?
Or R.F...Oh?
Or U.F.O... Unidentified flailing object?
Some of this would just be who is plugged in to the serious fund-raising machine. Bundlers and all that. Sanders would be already from the last go-round and Beto is from his 2018 senate campaign where he got a lot of outside (of TX) money. Kamala Harris has never had to do any serious fund-raising up until now so she'll need to get really good at that really fast. And get some help with it, a rain maker. She'll get the CA money at least I would think.
“I have the most progressive record of anybody running for the — anybody who would run.”
That is the ground on which the campaign will be fought - "lefter than thou."
"... folks, we have to bring this country back together again.”
That is neither the goal nor the likely result of the next campaign. The number one criterion for choosing a candidate will be "Who is most likely to squash the Depolorables when it's over."
Cory Booker was questioned by DDB in Indianola, Iowa. The post is at Power Line.
I found Althouse via Power Line so I suppose I can state that here.
Blogger EDH said...
R.F.K. = Robert Francis O'Rourke?
Karl Rove was calling him "RFORK."
NTYDS
How long will we massage the money buys elections myth? I believe our last loser for President outspent her opponent by a multiple factor. The out spender loses local elections, too...
bland vanilla or skippy kennedy, turns out his father in law is a big time investor from Chicago, that owns much land where the wall would go,
A WikiLeaks with a new York magazine headline shows o'rourkes father in law would be materially affected by the wall extension,
Old Joe Kennedy said his son Bobby was "a good hater."
O'Rourke?
Beto knew the number he needed, and he made sure to hit it.
That money was just from his father in law. Wait till all those Hollywood liberals start writing checks. If they're willing they to spend that much for a USC admission, think how much they'd spend for a Presidential election. Isn't it about time that we had another thin, good looking President, someone that movie stars can hang out with?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't Bernie - Beto - Biden (love the alliteration) the ones that are least vocal about the racism of Trump and the voters of the right (deplorables)?
Cries of stolen elections.
Antifa in the streets.
Endless investigations.
Threats of impeachment without crimes.
Democrats running to “bring the country back together”...
You know what would bring the country back together?
When the Mueller report is a fizzle the Dems hang their heads in shame and give Trump his second term unopposed.
It’s only fair.
“I’m baffled by Beto-mania. He seems like a marshmallow with flailing arms and weird pseudo hip credentials. What is his appeal besides a vague resemblance to RFK? Seriously, what do people see in him? I’m beginning to believe in the simulation.”
How do any of these strident, dour, women, running on intersectionality, excite anyone, beyond their most devout base? They all come across as bland left wing whack jobs. Beto skateboards. How cool is that? And (supposedly) did psychedelics and was in a band. Yes, an empty vessel like Obama, something that his supporters can place all their hopes in. Imagine dropping acid and skateboarding down the driveway at the White House. How cool!! Bring in his bro and jam in the ballroom. Pocohauntis tried to be cool by drinking a little beer on that staged video. Looked and was really fake.
The Dems really need the youth vote. Gen Y and esp the Millennials. Sure, some of the feminists in those cadres believe that it is a woman’s turn now. But that isn’t going to excite the guys, and probably a lot of the gals that dig the same sort of stuff the guys do. Sure, whatever woman whose chances take off will get the votes of many of the man bun wearing ironic beta males desperate for female attention. Nobody follows them, though, because they are followers themselves. It’s a segment of our population where buzz is everything, and the only one to really get it seems to be Bobby O’Rourke.
I think that the resemblance to RFK is mostly that both of them are skinny guys with very Irish looking mugs. Ever notice how really ugly most of The Kennedys (the ones descended from Joe and Rose) are? (JFK, Jr, picking up his mother’s features, really was GQ good looking). My partner, with her French views of beauty, married into that sort of Irish family right after college. The one she got showed a lot of the Cherokee from his mother, which softened the Irish features, but some of the other kids could almost pass as Kennedys. Butt ugly. She retold a story last weekend of setting up her best friend with one of his brothers on a blind date. They tried to double date, but both were so insulted by whom they had been set up with that the date lasted under a half hour. But RFK had the hopes and dreams of a generation behind him. I think that there is a yearning right now in a lot of Democrats for someone to excite them, and tying into the dream of Camelot does that for some.
this link
https://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/98/98501_us-mexico-nyt-the-mag-piece-on-el-paso-juarez-very-good-read.html
“My first thought was that Beto's $200k advantage was no big deal, but he doesn't have anything like the committed and committable Bernie Bros--yet.”
Two things. First, it was a bit odd that the Bernie Bros could get so enthusiastically behind someone old enough to be their grandfather. I think that they were mostly dreamers, and it was hard to dream positively about eight years of Crooked Hillary, her petty meanness, vindictiveness, and money grubbing. More like a nightmare. I think that there is a decent chance that Beto can flip a lot of them to get behind him.
The other is that in the Internet era, buzz is everything. What’s trending, and what isn’t. Trump knew and knows this, which is a good part of why he won his nomination, and the Presidency. Think of Trump on the escalator. Beto seems to be the Democrat who really understands this. Sure, he might have gotten all that money behind him before announcing. And it may be mostly coming from his father in law. But BFD. The important thing is that he got positive buzz from his announcement, while a majority of his opponents seem not to have with theirs. Have fluffed it one way or another. Keeping the buzz going may be sufficient to keep him in the race, esp with the support of Millennials, whose lives seem to revolve around “Influencers”. Should be interesting.
I still think this is great. Beto gets rich, with much of that money coming from California and entering Texas. But I think Beto is the DNC equivalent of Jeb! The big money folks want Beto, but the voters don't. The only negative is that Beto will certainly use that money to make other statewide changes, and perhaps he will be more effective overtime in turning Texas blue. I doubt it, but I'm sure that's a long game for the donors. I don't think that long game is great.
Beto needs to start talking policy. What are his policies and why aren’t they being discussed. All that seems to be being discussed are his quirky, cute, boyish antics. I want to see more serious policy talk and for pity sake stop apologizing for everything, makes him seem weak and wish washy.
Somehow if I were Trump, I don't think these stories about Democrats would worry me very much--even the Wisonsin story.
Rich white males giving $$$ to other rich white males. I don't think this is making blacks, women or Hispanics happy. Beto seems to be dominating the news, despite holding no office and losing a race in Texas. Is he going to be everyone's new boyfriend?
Ford once spent so much money promoting the Edsel that it nearly killed the company. The point being money will get your message out but the message has to appeal to the voter and nothing Beta and the rest of the Democrats are selling is going to resonate in the majority of the states. Since no Democrat has spoken against the idiocy of The Green New Deal and it's premise we have only twelve years to save the planet it's really up to Trump to do something cataclysmically stupid to blow the election. The Democrats will raise epic sums of money for the 2020 campaign. The good news it will create a lot of temporary jobs in the political campaign industry.
That boy Beto should take some of that money and buy him some Gravitas.
Lloyd W. Robertson said, "Somehow if I were Trump, I don't think these stories about Democrats would worry me very much--even the Wisonsin story."
Were I a Trump supporter, I would worry. The Dems will congeal behind the eventual nominee if they think that's what it takes to beat Trump. Hillary was a special case of too much exposure and too many lies for too long.
P.S. I expect to vote for Trump in 2020.
I am excited at the prospect of a white male Democrat President. This white male will necessarily and by definition be blameless. He will be the one white male who is without sin. Perhaps not at first. Perhaps as he treads the path to the presidency he will first have to take on all his blame, all his sins, and he will have to internalize them, and then externalize them, and then seek absolution. But as a Democrat President absolution he must receive. And as a white male with him so will I be absolved.
As it was for men of power vis women After Clinton, so After o'Rourke, or After Biden, or After Sanders, will it be for men of white skin.
Well, Inga..
We know he wants to one up the rest by tearing down that wall. Say what?
So maybe his policy perspectives are better kept vague, aspirational..respirational.
Less hacker, more hacky sack.
I took a few minutes to look more closely at Beto. I saw an interview with Chuck Todd who has a man crush on him. Todd asked Beto what books are important to him and Beto had no trouble rattling off five or six, including the Odyssey, something by Joseph Campbell and a number of more contemporary works on economic theory. Todd asked about why Obama had failed to bring the country together and Beto gave a very positive précis of Obama’s policies on health care and Iran. He basically ignored the issue of whether the country was more united under Obama. Beto is a very smart guy.
Beto struck me as a prep school material and sure enough, he did attend a very fine private school his last two years of high school, Woodberry Forest School in Virginia. He then went to Columbia U. where he was captain of the rowing team. We’re talking IVY. BO’K spent a few years in NYC after college and then returned to El Paso, started a web development company and stayed with that for about six years, then ran for City Council, stayed with that for about six years, then ran for Congress, served for six years, then ran for Senate. His ambition is not casual.
He was asked what was the average donation to his campaign and claimed he didn’t know at that time. I’m sure that information was available in real time. Is he a liar? Yes. The other odd thing I noticed is how awful Beto looks in a white shirt and tie and in suits. He completely loses his cuteness and sex appeal. Maybe he needs to invest in better suits, and we'll be seeing him in something more tailored sometime soon. A change in branding. At this point I’d say the race is between Beto and Bernie.
Harris will have tons of money from Silicon Valley and the support of pretty much all of the media. O'Rourke, Biden, and Sanders will fight for the same pool of primary voters. Edge definitely to Harris.
Between the men- Sanders will benefit from the relentless media attacks on his candidacy, Biden won't benefit from them, and O'Rourke probably will be a wash.
As for the women, we already see what is happening- the poor coverage Klobuchar and Warren are getting is a tell- the media want Harris, and they will get Harris by eliminating the female candidates early- long before Iowa.
RJ,
I see he Chez Todd parsed his prior commitment to not run for prez:
“I was running to serve my state in the United States Senate, and I’d made that commitment that I was going to serve every one of the six years in that position of public trust,” O’Rourke told Chuck Todd of NBC’s “Meet the Press” in an interview set to air Sunday morning.“But I have an opportunity now to do something that I think the country badly needs,” O’Rourke said. “Or maybe I should put it this way, I get a chance to be part of something that the country badly needs and that is coming together at this very divided moment.”
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/16/beto-presidential-run-1224005
Of course, he said prior on 60 minutes "Win or lose, I'm not running.."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19ZzHwu7hjc
So what's the definition of "bringing the country together"? It can't be that we all should have the same opinion. If that were the case, what would be the point in having elections? We will always disagree on something. To me it sounds like a close cousin of civility bullshit.
JR,
Maybe this was all foreseen..:
He wear no shoeshine
He got toe jam football
He got monkey finger
He shoot Coca-Cola
He say I know you, you know me
One thing I can tell you is
You got to be free
Come together, right now
Over me
Turns out o Rourke only raised 1.5 mil, the rest came from his leftover fund.
But what's going on here is obvious. Bernie was proud to point out that his $5.9 million first-day totals originated from 225,000 people (grassroots donors), for an average donation of $27. But Beto won't release his donor transaction totals. Kyle Kulinski from Secular Talk has a great analysis of this.
What it means is that the corporate establishment Democrat party is coalescing around Beto as the candidate they can "sell" and then "buy" to suit their needs. In all likelihood Beto's supporters saw Bernie's Day #1 totals, and decided to use the dollar amount as a benchmark that they could just barely beat by getting a much smaller number of party bosses and big money donors to give the maximum. 1% the number of donors as Bernie's grassroots supporters - all giving on average 100 times as much - the legal total. And thus the DNC establishment has selected their horse and elevated him from his disastrous launch speech.
The party bosses are doing all they can to keep the progressives out. How they will beat Trump by being more "conservative" than him however nobody knows. These are the same people who were happy to remain defeated for the last several decades, as long as they retained power.
Turns out o Rourke only raised 1.5 mil, the rest came from his leftover fund.
Beto Bubble Busted.
"How they will beat Trump by being more "conservative" than him however nobody knows."
Well..Beto ain't that, so...
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