Oil Greasing the Wheels

We've done a fair amount of reporting here about the presidential candidates' June FEC filings. Hillary Clinton didn't have a great June, McCain is flush, and Obama raked it in.

However, Tom Abrahams of ABC television in Houston put me on to something very interesting from the FEC website: (from his column)

Note the vast majority of (Obama's) fundraising continues to filter in to his coffers in checks $200 or less. The other number than stands out to me is "Cash On Hand". It's a staggering 71 million dollars.

(McCain)'s spent far less than half what Obama has on "Disbursements". And yet he has a small (by comparison) 26 million in the bank. Remember, though, the GOP has a huge treasure chest in relation to the Democrats.

And I'm burying the lead here...but The 770-- zip codes in Houston are the most generous in the state for both candidates. McCain has pulled in $1,650,521 million. Obama's received a little more than $2 million.

Abrahams goes on to explain that those Houston zip codes have given more money to this year's candidates than 30 entire states each have. That's a lot of Texas tea.

The FEC has donation maps for each of the candidates. I had fun for awhile switching tabs, watching the little circles undulate like a heartbeat (smaller for McCain), before I decided to work up this scary (for McCain) overlay.


Here are the original maps: