Delightful news in the latest PDC filings [pdf] from anti-Dino Rossi PAC, Evergreen Progress - or "Evergreen Regress" as Joel Connelly has reported some Democrats are calling it.
They've raised $6.19 million through October 28th (which is pretty much it since contributions of over $5,000 to political committees are banned in Washington state from October 14th through Election Day this year). They have spent $6.078 million of that through the same date. Add in a little over $80,000 in liabilities and the anti-Rossi committee is about tapped out.
So, what's the point the loyal reader asks?
Independent political committees file c6 reports that detail their direct expenditures for or against candidates. Evergreen Progress's latest c6 [pdf] shows the PAC managed to spend only $4.4 million of that $6+ million on actual expenditures against Dino Rossi.
Where did the rest go?
Lots of money for consultants. Lots of money for polling. Less than $100,000 for direct mail. And, of course, $35,000 to fund a frivolous lawsuit for the purpose of generating negative headlines against Dino Rossi.
Meanwhile, it seems apparent that after the aforementioned October 13th came and past, someone in Democratic circles pressed the "oh, sh*t!" button upon viewing the difference between the war chests of BIAW's "It's Time for a Change" PAC and the RGA versus that of Evergreen Progress.
Thus, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees have thrown over a $1 million [pdf] into a last minute, Seattle-area broadcast TV buy. Concurrently, the NEA has dumped nearly $350,000 into a shotgun blast of a radio buy [pdf] in the closing week of the campaign.
The TV buy in particular simply pours more into an already saturated Seattle broadcast market, while ignoring the Spokane and Yakima markets - as well as cable - for which other campaigns and committees have been buying ads.
Either way, this flurry of late activity has all the signs of Democratic interest groups desperately trying to find ways to pump money into the race - however inefficiently - in an effort to hold on to the Governor's mansion.
UPDATE: I should add to that the AFSCME and NEA money noted above is exactly the kind of organized labor contributions Evergreen Progress was loading up on before that October 13th deadline. Independent spending by those groups after the fact indicates a decision was reached to spend additional money, at a later date, beyond which Evergreen Progress was already able to collect.
Posted by Eric Earling at October 30, 2008 09:33 PM | Email ThisSome lapel pins, several utility bills and dog licenses, a list of obituaries, high quality white paper, friends in high places in heavily Democratic King County and a few good printers and Gregoire is a shoe in.
Geez, doesn't anyone remember 2004?
Posted by: zapporo on October 30, 2008 10:04 PMMight they have booked some TV in advance? At this point, TV is sold out of ads for political candidates. They also could have prepaid a mailhouse.
The race has been within the MOE for a couple of months now. It's not as if this should be a surprise to them.
But then again they are Democrats and their ability to waste money is not limited to public money. They're pretty good at wasting campaign money, too.
Our local D candidate for County Commissioner bought an i-Phone out of her treasury and about 5% of the money she spent went to cell-phone charges at the close of the last month's report. It looked to me that she wasted about half the money she raised.
Not quite as sweet as napalm in the morning, but you got to love it when a plan comes together.
So much for the "Public" polls
Go ROSSI & Palin
dugg for "uff-da"
I love fellow Scandinavians. :-)
Posted by: blindman on October 31, 2008 12:01 PMYah, sure, y'betcha!
Posted by: Saltherring on October 31, 2008 12:48 PMIt is a case of throwing money and a fire and if you throw enough it will blanket the fire and smother it.
Posted by: swatter on October 31, 2008 01:39 PM