Yesterday John Edwards dropped a good sized bombshell on the campaign announcing he'll accept public financing. At first, I was a bit taken aback, and somewhat skeptical. But further thought and research I began to change my mind and wonder why other candidates weren't doing this.
One thing that particularly got my attention was how Public Finance will enable John Edwards to counteract the influence of Big Contributors. Because both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have big leads in money from maxed out donors
The following chart is the dollar amounts from Maxed Out Donors, who have given the maximum $2,300, for each candidate taken from OpenSecrets.org:
Hillary Clinton: $44,153,000
Barack Obama: $25,921,000
John Edwards: $9,714,000
So Hillary Clinton has a $34 million dollar Big Contributor advantage and the Barack Obama has a $16 million dollar Big Contributor advantage. The public finance match is about $21 million dollars, meaning Edwards will nearly wipe out the Big Contributor avdantage, while taking the high road.
All of the leading candidates claim to support public finance, Hillary even cites her theoretical support for public finance as an excuse to continue taking lobbyist money. But there is already a public finance system is in place, and while it's not perfect, it has helped clean up the money influence in days since Watergate.
Of course, many bloggers like to play keyboard consultants, myself included, and point to the total spending limits until the convention as a potential liability in the general. But, the Democratic party isn't going to hurt for funds this round, we'll be there to back up the Democratic Party with millions in small donations all next spring and summer. And our true strength (or what should be our true strength) field organizing isn't covered in the limits.
The Republican nominee is likely to emerge broke and beholden (as always) to special interests. John Edwards, should he win, is likely to emerge with money left over, a fightin' fit Democratic Party behind him and far fewer strings attached than any other candidate.
(Ed: Corrected typos)
Cross Posted at Boston for Edwards