Dean leaving little cash in DNC coffers for elections

What you are seeing is bitching from lobbyists who are being pushed out by Dean and the Dems.

Drudge and Roll Call fail to point out that Dean raised 51 mil this year, a record for off-year money raising for Democrats. The also fail to note that he rolled the vast majority of that money into state parties and governor races.

What else should they have done? Keep all the money to spend millions on TV ads at the end? We've seen how well that has worked for Dems in the last ten years.

The Democracy Bond program is probably the greatest change in Democratic politics in Dean's time; the gift that keeps on giving. And it's only going to get bigger.

Cycloptichorn

And how many Governor elections were there in 2005? Two, as I recall, in VA and NJ and democrats won both, so I'll give credit to Dean for those. But it seems to have taken $46M to make that happen. This year he's only got nine months before the much more critically important 2006 mid-year elections.

I admire your confidence in the Democracy Bond program, but so far Dean's only gotten commitments for about $7M under that program. Would be interesting to see what dollars were usually available in DNC acccounts at the beginning of an election year, but I can't find the data.

The total bill for the two governor races, VA and NJ, was about 7 million dollars out of the budget, as far as I can tell.

The vast majority of the money has been rolled back into building a strong state Democratic party from the ground up, in over 30 different states. It is difficult to see where this money has gone by just looking at one article or table; but the formation of strong state parties, fielding candidates in EVERY election, and funding a strong GOTV effort in every state, are cornerstones of the 50-state strategy that Dean has advocated since day one.

The Roll Call article doesn't say that Democrats are pissed at Dean, it says that 'Democratic Leaders' are upset at the lack of money in the coffers. Dems across the nation love Dean, as he is one of the few leaders we have who seems committed to ridding our party of the stranglehold that Lobbying and Big Business has put on the party.

We will never win running as 'Republican light,' or the 'other big business party.' It is far better for the Dems, in the long run, to deliniate ourselves as a party who cares about the environment, the people, and the future of the common man of America. Democracy Bonds are one of the best ways to do this; I imagine that they will grow significantly in the coming years.

Cycloptichorn

Below's what I've been able to find after a little more research...news is not good for democrats



Cillizza Source

Cycloptichorn brings up a good point...investing in the future is never easy or popular, and only time will tell if the investment was worthwhile. But if one looks at Democrat successes over past fifteen years when MORE money was available to spend, I'd certainly be much less confident that Cyclop.

Well, should the Dems keep doing the same things that have lost them elections over the last fifteen years, or try something different? We all know that throwing money at a problem isn't the best solution in many cases, and it doesn't seem to be one here.

Cycloptichorn