Dear Barack Obama,
While I still haven’t made up my mind in the election (I can’t decide if I’m comfortable electing Tina Fey into the White House), I have to get something off my chest that’s been bugging me for a while now. To be blunt: It’s your emails.
Every single day of the week – Saturday and Sunday included, you send me emails. Actually, sometimes you send them, sometimes your wife sends them, sometimes your campaign manager David Plouffe sends them, but no matter, you have officially become a spammer.
Without fail, my inbox has been littered with your messages – asking me to donate to your campaign at every turn. And today, of all days – the day that Lehman Bros. files for bankruptcy and several other banks are on the verge of collapsing, your handlers send out a blast asking for donations so you can reach your goal of signing up 50,000 more supporters. And yesterday, you sent me a message that you raised over $60 million dollars during the month of August. Go you.
Senator Obama, I have a message for you: If that isn’t the height of insensitivity, I don’t know what is.
You should sooner take the money you are earning along the campaign trail and rather than use it to fuel jets and pay for television ads, perhaps infuse it back into our economy. If your goal is to raise $300 million dollars by November, I can see a lot of great ways to spend that money and it does not involve getting you elected to office. I would rather have received a heartfelt email offering a sound solution to our economic woes than yet another plea to dig into my pockets and DONATE NOW to your campaign.
While I am currently not supporting your opponent, I hope you will realize that sending out emails every single day of the week asking for donations can get a bit taxing on someone who is a small business owner trying to make ends meet with a husband who works in the crumbling finance industry.
Perhaps since I’m a New Yorker, the topic of finance hits close to home, but I’m sure you’re well aware this latest economic news will have implications for Americans across our country. So I beg you – please stop asking me for donations. And if you happen to wind up with extra cash at the end of the election, please use those funds to help those who need it more than our presidential candidates.
Signed,
One mom against campaign donations
Things that Bug Me
I have to admit, that in the wake of the current Wall Street crisis (if you haven’t been reading or watching TV, Shearson Lehman is going under as early as today – meaning about 25,000 people will lose their jobs and AIG is on the brink too), I have to say that an email I received from the Obama camp was kind of a slap in the face with all this financial news.
Amazing, but in the month of August alone, the Obama team raised more than 66 million dollars and McCain – he added another $30 million just because Sarah Palin joined his ticket and his approval rating skyrocketed.
Is it just me, or is this campaign fundraising craziness a bit rude considering people are losing their jobs, their retirement money, their livelihood and much more? I mean what do they use that fundraising money for anyway? Negative ads, air travel, email blasts to people who are tired of seeing the Donate Now button in their in box?
Wouldn’t they be better served by asking Americans to donate for causes that actually matter and stop raising money already? Does it really take $300 million to win an election? I can think of a lot of great places where that $300 million can go – perhaps back into our economy for one.
And one last gripe before I start my morning – with all this talk of our economy falling apart, is it just me or do any of the candidates have an iota of what to do on how to remedy our financial woes? At least Mitt Romney was an entrepreneur but he got the “No thanks, we’re not interested” sign from McCain.
Honestly, I think it’s time a board of financial advisers join the government and hatch out a plan to turn this economy around – now that I would pay good money to see.