Ron Paul 'Tea Party' Nets $6M

GOP candidate launches political zeppelin next week

(NEWSER) - The offbeat GOP presidential campaign of Texas Libertarian Ron Paul is soon to have a zany new form of publicity: a blimp. The blimp will launch next week in North Carolina and sail up the East Coast with banners in support of Ron Paul, Politico reports. Bearing slogans such as "Who is Ron Paul?" and "Google Ron Paul," the zeppelin will fly over those staple villains of Paul's rhetoric, the IRS and Federal Reserve. More»

Clinton, Obama 2007 totals top $100M

(NEWSER) - The race for the presidency is crowded, but that isn't stopping candidates from raising huge sums of money, the Washington Post reports. The power of the internet to raise cash from both grassroots supporters and wealthy donors is credited with helping Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama raise over $100 million each in 2007. It's the first time in history two candidates have passed that benchmark before a primary. More»

(NEWSER) - The $35 million Hillary Clinton has on hand for her primary campaign edges out the $32 million in Barack Obama’s coffers, according to financial reports acquired by the AP. But both have almost three times the money of any other campaign—Rudy Giuliani leads Republicans with just $11.6 million, less than third-place Democrat John Edwards. More»

How the candidate tied up some of the GOP's biggest donors

(NEWSER) - Of all the GOP presidential candidates competing to raise funds, Mitt Romney needs the money least, David Kirkpatrick ovserves in the Times. The founder of a giant private equity firm, he can afford to pay for the race himself. But he's pulled in the most—$20 million—precisely because he needs to show that he's not a Steve Forbes or a Ross Perot. More»

Even though Santorum didn't bow out until April 10

(NEWSER) - No one's been nominated yet—but the media crowned Mitt Romney the winner of the GOP primaries after he took Michigan on Feb. 28, a Pew report finds. Of course, Romney didn't essentially seal the deal until Rick Santorum dropped out. That happened on April 10, weeks after the media had effectively called the race for Romney, finds the report, which tracked 11,000 news outlets from Jan. 2 to April 15. After Feb. 28, we saw "a suddenly intense discussion of 'delegate math' and the conclusion that no other candidate could win," explains the report's co-author. More»