$31 million well spent?

According to the end-of-the-year FEC reports, Bush spent a little over $31 million of his $130 war chest in 2003. By now, he has doubtlessly raised much more money and spent more too, by guess he is getting close to the $150 million range, which is obscene considering he has no primary opposition.

Meanwhile, Kerry has about a million or two to his name and 7-8 million in debt ($6M of which is his home loan) and spent about $35 million or so. So, what's Bush spending his money on?

According to a TIME magazine article, Bush has one of the best "grassroots" organizations I have ever heard of (I like to call it "astroturf" when you buy your grassroots support network).

And "what has given the Bush campaign the most confidence during these dark days is its ground organization." While Dems "were attacking, the Bush team says it was quietly laying track." The campaign "has county chairs in all the 1,189 counties in 18 of the target states from 2000. It has held 127 regional training sessions. By June, it will have made 800,000 phone calls to Republicans. Almost 200,000 volunteers have signed on. It boasts that it will be able to run the first 'national precinct campaign,' involving lieutenants in all the 10,020 precincts of every swing state, a level of blanketing usually reserved for smaller campaigns." If you are a "swing-state Republican, lean that way or happen to share an interest like NASCAR or the N.R.A., someone is probably going to knock on your door between now and Election Day. You may already know G.O.P. officials from the church potluck or Little League, but if you don't, they hope to lavish attention on you."

Holy Sh*t. I guess you could argue that Howard Dean blew money on crap like this too, but that was for a primary and for people that he needed to persuade, not religious nuts or gun zombies (of course, there aren't many of those, most gun owners and church goers are normal folks but they definitely lean GOP on issues like gay marriage and gun control). The whole grassroots are going to get all reved up by wedge issues. They're called, by the illustrious Ed Killgore "the 4 Gs:" Guns, Gays, God, and Gas chambers.

These issues are the reason Democrats lose in the South and Middle America. Because if people voted economic interest, Dems would win in a landslide. There aren't enough millionaires out there to vote for the president without his religious conviction (AKA gay marriage amendment). So the question will be, can Bush use these wedge issues to distract swing voters long enough for them to forget about 2 costly, badly run wars, 3 million lost jobs, a $1 trillion swing in the federal budget deficit, exploding health care costs, and a string of broken promises to the moon and back.

Let's work to open people's eyes to the facts: No one is going to take your guns away from you, unless you are a criminal. No one is going to force your church to marry gay people, unless they want you. No one is going to tell state's they can't execute heinous criminals, unless your state bans it. But some one is going to cost you jobs; some one will cost you more money than the pithy tax cut he gave you in higher state fees, health care costs, interest payments, etc.; someone is going to make you pretend to be Canadian when you travel abroad; someone is going to make this country more divided than ever; someone is willing to go to any length to win reelection lives or constitution be damned. Ladies and Gentlemen, that some one is George W. Bush.