OBama's Troubling Internet Fund Raising

Apparently it's not just this writer that's been wondering where Barak OBama's huge on-line campaign contributions have been coming from. 

With more than $200,000,000 (that's two hundred million dollars) in his campaign warchest, OBama has been out trolling for more money.

If it's true that OBama's average campaign donation is $15 as he says, that means that more than 13 million people have donated to his campaign.  That's a highly implausible number for any political campaign in this history of the country.  So where is the money coming from?

Well, we know it's not coming from Tony Rezko, OBama's close friend who generated more than $2 million dollars in campaign contributions to OBama over the course of OBama's "lengthy" (/sarc) political career as   Rezko now sits in a Federal Jail serving out a sentence for illegal peddling of political influence amongst other charges, here in Illinois.

As Maureen Dowd uncovers in an article dated June 29th (reprinted below) much of OBama's money is coming from sources in the Middle East, such as Saudi Arabia, Iran (a member of the Axis of Evil)  and other banks in MIddle Eastern countries.

Is this the Obama version of the Clinton's China-Gate?  We believe it is, and none other than a liberal lamestream media reporter Maureen Dowd uncovers the truth:

 

 

 

By MAUREEN DOWD

Published: June 29, 2008

OBAMA’S TROUBLING INTERNET FUND RAISING

Certainly the most interesting and potentially devastating phone call I have received during this election cycle came this week from one of the Obama’s campaign internet geeks.  These are the staffers who devised Obama’s internet fund raising campaign which raised in the neighborhood of $200 million so far.  That is more then twice the total funds raised by any candidate in history – and this was all from  the internet campaign.

What I learned from this insider was shocking but I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that when it comes to fund raising there simply are no rules that can’t be broken and no ethics that prevail.
Obama’s internet campaign started out innocently enough with basic e-mail networking , lists saved from previous party campaigns and from supporters who visited any of the Obama campaign web sites.

Small contributions came in from these sources and the internet campaign staff  were more than pleased by the results.

Then, about two months into the campaign the daily contribution intake multiplied.  Where was it coming from?  One of the web site security monitors began to notice the bulk of the contributions were clearly coming in from overseas internet service providers and at the rate and frequency of transmission it was clear these donations were “programmed” by a very sophisticated user.

While the security people were not able to track most of the sources due to firewalls and other blocking devices put on these contributions they were able to collate the number of contributions that were coming in seemingly from individuals but the funds were from only a few credit card accounts and bank electronic funds transfers.  The internet service providers (ISP) they were able to trace were from Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other Middle Eastern countries. One of the banks used for fund transfers was also located in Saudi Arabia.

Another concentrated group of donations was traced to a Chinese ISP with a similar pattern of limited credit card charges.

It became clear that these donations were very likely coming from sources other than American voters.  This was discussed at length within the campaign and the decision was made that none of these donations violated campaign financing laws.

It was also decided that it was not the responsibility of the campaign to audit these millions of contributions as to the actual source (specific credit card number or bank transfer account numbers) to insure that none of these internet contributors exceeded the legal maximum donation on a cumulative basis of many small donations.  They also found the record keeping was not complete enough to do it anyway.

This is a shocking revelation.

We have been concerned about the legality of “bundling” contributions after the recent exposure of illegal bundlers but now it appears we may have an even greater problem.

I guess we should have been somewhat suspicious when the numbers started to come out.  We were told (no proof offered) that the Obama internet contributions were from $10.00 to $25.00 or so.

If the $200,000,000 is right, and the average contribution was $15.00, that would mean over 13 million individuals made contributions?  That would also be 13 million contributions would need to be processed.  How did all that happen?

I believe the Obama campaign’s internet fund raising needs a serious, in depth investigation and audit.  It also appears the whole question of internet fund raising needs investigation by the legislature and perhaps new laws to insure it complies not only with the letter of these laws but the spirit as well.