Money Changes Everything

Excellent piece by the National Journal's media columnist via Atlantic Online. The NJ has a relatively small readership, but it is where many columnists and talking heads go for ideas. Excerpt:
Should fundraising prowess trump everything else in the coverage of presidential contenders? If a candidate isn't good at persuading people to write checks, does that mean, ipso facto, he'd be bad at running the country? How does a profession that worries so much about the role of money in politics square that position with its own daily complicity in the game?

In a long interview I had with Howard Dean last year, he predicted that no matter what ideas and experience he brought to the table, he wouldn't be taken really seriously by the politico-media establishment until he'd mastered the fundraising game. Since then, he's enjoyed a lot of positive coverage, but none of those front-page, paradigm-shifting stories in which the news class clears it throat and announces: "America, this could be your next president."

Until now. And it only cost $7 million. Dr. Dean may be even smarter than we realized.


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