18 Million Cracks Votes Dollars

Barack Obama has been taking heat from all sides the last two weeks. His supporters (see Jessie Jackson) are stabbing him in the back. His friends (see Bernie Mac) are putting him on the hot seat with locker room humor. His donors (see Average Americans) have cut back on their donations so they can go to the beach.

And in the midst of all this turmoil, Hillary Clinton and her supporters have emerged, bright eyed and bushy tailed, ready to stick it to Obama for not doing more than he has so far to help retire her campaign debt.

The quote by one of her supporters Obama solicited recently was gutsy – "I’m waiting to see what you’re going to do about Hillary’s debt. And I’m watching to see what you’re going to do for her before I donate."

The DNC is broke, the staffs of both campaigns are gasping for air after a marathon slugfest, the Republicans are on track to raise 95 million bucks this month for John McCain, and you are holding your support for your party’s standard bearer over his head because he isn’t working hard enough to pay off the debt of his primary opponent?

You’ve got to be kidding me.

As I scrolled through some of the hundreds of websites committed to derailing the Obama nomination in Denver, seeing the constant refrain – “she’s got 18 million reasons to take this to the convention” – a thought hit me like a freight train.

Why not ask these “eighteen million cracks in the glass ceiling” to retire her debt, if they are so dedicated to the idea of resurrecting her candidacy?

I didn’t even need to whip out my calculator to do the math.

Eighteen million supporters could send her ONE DOLLAR apiece.

Okay, maybe that’s not realistic, seeing that gas is over $4.00 a gallon, and a good number of these people are headed to the beach.

So let’s say…hmmm…let’s say nine million supporters send her TWO DOLLARS a piece.

I don’t know, though – a fair number of this nine million might need to put that money on a PowerBall ticket.

And let’s face it – now that the primaries are over, and we don’t have Hillary chanting “w-w-w Hillary Clinton dot com” at the opening of her speeches, some of these supporters may have lost interest, or have forgotten how to get to the website.

So let’s knock this down to a number that is more representative of her hard core constituency.

One million supporters could send her EIGHTEEN DOLLARS a piece.

Am I making any sense here? Is this a trick question we need to ask on "Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader?"

If you apply the 80/20 rule, and forget about all the bitter, disgruntled malcontents who are usually loathe to put their money where their mouth is, you’ve still got two hundred thousand supporters – couldn’t they skip a few quadruple expresso shots, now that there isn’t a Starbucks on every corner any more, and pony up ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS a piece?

If you take Hillary’s personal IOU off the table, you could drop this to FIFTY FIVE DOLLARS a piece.

Just thinking out loud here.