They're sucking pond water now and they know it. They're used to being able to buy their way out of trouble at election time, but that won't be so easy this year.
By way of example, take a glance at these snipped excerpts from two articles currently on the AP newswire feeds:
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(AP) The Democrats' congressional campaign committees raised $15.5 million during the first 18 days of October, setting up their final push to reclaim both chambers. Republicans, meanwhile, raised $10.1 million for their candidates, continuing a pace that has lagged this election.
Republicans slightly beat the Democrats' House committee but stumbled on the Senate side, where a $5.5 million fundraising disparity emerged during the Oct. 1-17 reporting period. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee raised $9.1 million; the National Republican Senatorial Committee raised $3.6 million.
"In the world series of fundraising, Senate Democrats just hit a grand slam in the bottom of the ninth," Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the committee's chairman, said in a statement. "The rapid rate at which Democrats are raising money is the latest evidence that Americans want change in the Senate."
{snip}
(Full article is here, among other places --
http://tinyurl.com/wufjw -- and note that the numbers cited above are only current through 10/18, and don't include the most recent huge donations by and to the Dems as discussed here & elsewhere over the past week and a half.)
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WASHINGTON, Oct. 27 — Corporate America is already thinking beyond Election Day, increasing its share of last-minute donations to Democratic candidates and quietly devising strategies for how to work with Democrats if they win control of Congress.
The shift in political giving, for the first 18 days of October, has not been this pronounced in the final stages of a campaign since 1994, when Republicans swept control of the House for the first time in four decades.
Though Democratic control of either chamber of Congress is far from certain, the prospect of a power shift is leading interest groups to begin rethinking well-established relationships, with business lobbyists going as far as finding potential Democratic allies in the freshman class — even if they are still trying to defeat them on the campaign trail — and preparing to extend an olive branch the morning after the election.
{snip}
An analysis by The New York Times of contributions from Oct. 1 to 18, the latest data available, shows that donations to Republicans from corporate political action committees dropped by 11 percentage points in favor of Democratic candidates, compared with corporate giving from January through September.
Republicans still received 57 percent of contributions, compared with 43 percent for Democrats, but it was the first double-digit October switch since 1994. “A lot will hold their powder for now,” said Brian Wolff, deputy executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “But after the election, we will have a lot of new friends.”
{snip}
While Republicans and Democrats are feverishly soliciting contributions until Election Day, campaign finance reports filed this week provide a window into the final days of a raucous midterm election campaign. The analysis of 288 corporate political action committees, which have contributed more than $100,000 this election cycle, found that at least 65 committees had increased their ratio of contributions to Democrats by at least 15 percentage points, including Sprint, United Parcel Service and Hewlett-Packard.
{snip}
“The real story of the 2006 contributions is what happens in the early phase of 2007, with a change in party control,” said Bernadette A. Budde, senior vice president of the Business-Industry Political Action Committee. “There will be proverbial meet-and-greets all over town so we will have a sense of who these people are.”
Many of these meet-and-greet sessions will have a dual purpose: political action committees will offer contributions to help candidates wipe away debt their campaigns accrued during the race.
Spending in the midterm election campaign is forecast to reach $2.6 billion, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, including $1 billion from political action committees. While many business groups have been eager to appear as if they have been handily contributing to Democratic efforts, it was not until this month that the trend became apparent enough to quantify beyond party leaders or prospective committee chairmen.
Democrats who are not in tight races — or even standing for re-election in some cases — have seen their contributions increase more than some of those facing the most competitive contests. That is an easy way, lobbyists say, for political action committees to increase the share of their Democratic contributions, a percentage that is carefully tracked by party leaders when they reach the majority.
Representative Adam Smith of Washington, who leads a coalition of centrist Democrats, said he has detected a friendlier relationship with the business community in recent months, a welcome change from years of Republican rule when “Democrats were basically frozen out in every way.”
“I hope that the new Democratic majority will take a more open and cooperative approach,” Mr. Smith said in an interview. “I hope there won’t be a sense of, ‘Oh, you gave too much money to Republicans, so we’re not going to talk to you.’ ”
{snip}
(Full article is here, among other places --
http://tinyurl.com/uo6w4 -- and note that corporations consider both contributions to non-threatened candidates facing future races and contributions to retire individual candidates' campaign debts to be worthwhile investments of their political capital.)
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money talks and elephants walk,
Otter
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