In an analysis of the "Money Bomb" day planned by Rand Paul today, a WHAS Political Blog post by Joe Arnold is spot on:
By raising expectations for a "moneybomb" Internet fundraiser today (12/16), Rand Paul's U.S. Senate campaign is walking a high risk/high reward tightrope. If campaign manager David Adams' public hopes are reached to raise $700,000 in one day, even skeptics will have to take notice of Paul's sustained success. But, if the moneybomb falls far short of the goal, Paul's upstart candidacy could be walking into a warning sounded by rival Trey Grayson, who has suggested that Paul's campaign is likely to peak too soon.
Even the liberal leaning "Air America" has taken note of the Rand Paul phenomenon:
Rand Paul is building on the fundraising network started by his dad, Congressman Ron Paul. The Texas representative used the Internet to raise more than $35 million in his 2008 Presidential bid. Rand Paul, who has the same libertarian anti-big government streak as his dad, has already raised $1.4 million from conservative-libertarians. Now Ron Paul is soliciting another "Money Bomb" to put his son over the top in his race to succeed Republican Senator Jim Bunning of Kentucky.
Rand Paul faces a tough campaign for the open Senate seat in Kentucky against Secretary of State Trey Grayson, the establishment Republican candidate. The race is interesting because it exposes some of the same moderates-versus-conservatives fault lines that are evident the Crist-Rubio primary in Florida and appeared in the Owns-Scozzafava-Hoffman race last fall.
Is this the beginning of a Republican party crack up? Libertarian-oriented Republicans are increasingly looking like the new black. There are even inklings of this political trend in the Rick Perry-Kay Bailey Hutchison race for Texas governor. Though Perry is the incumbent, he is framing the race as the fiscally conservative outsider running against moderate Establishmentarian Washington insider. Sound familiar?
If nothing else, the Paul campaign has either very carefully crafted a method of getting gobs of attention, or they are very, very lucky.
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