By John David Powell
Democrats think your money is theirs to give to other people, while Republicans believe your money is your money to do with as you please. Yes, that is a tired, old political cliché, but all clichés are born out some level of truth.
President Obama seems to be both a Democrat and Perpetuator-in-Chief of political clichés by coming up with a novel, yet oh-so-liberal, way of raising money for his re-election campaign. In the true fashion of someone who believes wholeheartedly that he can put your money to better use than you can, President Obama has set up an event registry (www.barackobama.com/news/
That’s right, my friends, thanks to the leader of the free world, there’s no more need to rack your brain about finding that perfect gift for a friend or a loved one.
We all know by now that it takes a whole lot of spending money to buy an election. The bigger the office, the more money you need. Dog catcher, not so much. With President of the United States, however, you cannot be a serious contender without access to hundreds of millions of dollars.
You are not going to come up with that kind of scratch by nickel-and-diming your family and friends. You are not even going to come up with that amount of cash if you held daily breakfasts, lunches, and dinners with every one-percenter from L.A. to D.C.
Mitt Romney’s Victory Fund (https://secure.mittromney.com
Romney also outraised Obama in May: $77 million to $60 million.
But before you go off with your hair on fire about this being another example of the evil GOP one-percenters with too much money that needs to be taxed, just remember than in September 2008 the junior senator from the great state of Illinois set a single-month fund-raising record by hauling in $150 million. And trust me, he didn’t get that from bake sales and selling campaign trinkets.
In fact, he recently reminded some of his deep-pocket pals just how big they came through four years ago, and he put the touch on them for more moolah this time around. Using what we’re told is a special campaign phone on Air Force One, the Pitchman-in-Chief tried to put the fear of GOP into them by threatening the possibility that Republican special interests are going to pool their cash and end up buying Congress and the White House.
Apparently special interests have no place in national politics, unless they are Democratic special interests.
But this bit of political irony is why Obama’s gift registry is such a brilliant idea. It has the potential to eliminate the financial influences of all special interests except for one: Obama’s. And that only works if you and all of your friends get all of their friends to log on and sign up.
The whole idea behind this event registry thing is to allow blushing brides-to-be a way to set aside their personal wants and needs for the good of their country by telling everyone to donate to President Obama’s campaign what they would have spent on wedding gifts.
That’s right, instead of starting a new life with a few things for the bed, bath, and, well, beyond, the most powerful man in the world would prefer your cold, hard cash so he can stay the most powerful man in the world.
What’s that, you say? No wedding in your future? At least not before the election? No problem. The president will gladly let you divert your well-earned birthday, anniversary, bar mitzvah and bat mitzvah, graduation, baptism, and tooth-fairy money to his re-election campaign.
In fact, that unemployment money you get will just go for food that ends up flushed down the toilet, so why not contribute it to a worthy and needy cause?
But just so no one can say the Obama campaign is a crass and thoughtless money machine, know this: the campaign did not ask you to donate your funeral benefits to the cause. Yeah, but that’s because they know Uncle Sam has first dibs on it.
John David Powell writes his Lone Star Award-winning columns from ShadeyHill Ranch in Texas. His email is johndavidpowell@yahoo.com.
