Just anecdotal, but it seems that McCain is flooding the airwaves here. Obama has been here for rallies twice in the past 3 days...the second one Thursday during the early news hour, so it was carried live for a good bit of time on all 3 local stations. But ad time itself seems to be running about 3 McCain ads for every 1 Obama ad.

Then I received the following e-mail tonight:

I'm the Chief Financial Officer for Barack Obama's campaign. I track the donations coming in and the expenses going out.

I asked for the opportunity to write to you directly so that I could try to explain what's happening right now.

This organization has thousands of employees and spends millions of dollars a day -- and at the moment we're doing it without a safety net.

Our spending plans have been stretched by John McCain's negative attacks and the overwhelming resources of the Republican National Committee.

As of October 15th, John McCain and the RNC together had nearly $20 million more in cash than the combined total of Obama for America and the DNC. And just this week, we're facing new and unexpected spending against us in Montana and West Virginia.

Your incredible generosity has gotten us this far. But right now we need your help more than ever to get this campaign across the finish line.

Please donate $100 or whatever you can afford right now:

https://donate.barackobama.com/RNCadvantage

My team and I are working to stretch every dollar in order to keep as many paths to victory open as possible. But we need whatever help you can provide for this crucial final stretch.

Thank you,

MM

Marianne Markowitz
Chief Financial Officer
Obama for America


Hmmmm. October donations have supposedly dropped off sharply (after $150 bn September). And the Obama campaign has been run with honesty. This gives me pause. It might be that the Republicans are "laying in the weeds"...throwing big money into the final few days while they may have caught the Obama campaign off guard.

Anyway, I sent them some money (again!). You might do the same.