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Subscribe to RSSAd spending in the presidential campaign has now topped $800 million and is on pace to reach or come close to $1 billion, according to an NBC analysis of data provided by ad-buying firm SMG Delta.
Jim Young / Reuters
President Barack Obama looks over at Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney during the second presidential campaign debate on Oct. 16 in Hempstead, N.Y.
So far, $807 million has been spent on political ads for radio and television -- local and national, cable and broadcast.
The Obama campaign is one ad buy away from reaching $300 million by itself. But with outside money factored in, "Team Romney" (the campaign plus outside groups supporting him or attacking the president) is outspending "Team Obama" $455 million to $352 million.
The Romney campaign, which has come on since Labor Day, is now the second-biggest spender at $164 million.
Time Magazine's Nancy Gibbs, Bob Herbert, the distinguished fellow at Demos, and Politico's Maggie Haberman join Chuck Todd to talk about the path to 270 and the town hall debate.
Following the Romney campaign are the combined Karl-Rove backed Crossroads groups -- American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS. Combined, the two groups have spent $124 million ($65 million for American Crossroads, $59 million for GPS).
GPS's spending has dropped off in the past couple of months, ceding the presidential ground to American Crossroads, which announced an $11 million ad buy just this week.
Other big spenders: Restore Our Future (pro-Romney) $69 million, Priorities USA (pro-Obama) $48 million, Americans for Prosperity (pro-Romney) $46 million, the Republican National Committee (pro-Romney) $24 million, and late-comer Americans for Job Security (pro-Romney) $9 million.
The states seeing the biggest spending are the usual suspects: Florida, Ohio, and Virginia, where more than half of all the money's been spent -- $452 million.
In the last three weeks, Ohio is gaining on Florida for the top spot. Florida still leads at $166 million, followed by Ohio $160 million, and Virginia $126 million.
Also rising fast -- Colorado, Iowa, and Wisconsin.
Colorado has now passed North Carolina for the No. 4 spot at $72 million spent.
North Carolina, which saw a lot of spending early in the campaign, has seen a reduction of the pace of ads since Labor Day. It now sits fifth at $69 million total.
Iowa is next at $62 million, followed by Nevada $49 million, New Hampshire $34 million, and Wisconsin $32 million.
What's fascinating about Wisconsin is it was barely a blip on the ad-spending radar before the pick of Paul Ryan to be Romney's vice president.
Markets like Green Bay and Madison are now routinely in the top 10 hottest markets by number of ads being run. In fact, this week they clock in at Nos. 1 and No. 5 on that list.
Top Markets:
1. Green Bay
2. Denver
3. Cincinnati
4. Columbus
5. Madison
6. Toledo
7. Cleveland
8. Orlando-Daytona Beach
9. Las Vegas
10. Reno
Despite polling showing the race closing in Pennsylvania and Romney's birth state of Michigan, little to no money is being spent in either state. Neither the Romney nor Obama campaigns, in fact, have spent ANY money at all on ads in Michigan. The Obama campaign spent about $5 million early on in Pennsylvania.
And of the 17 "swing markets," ones won by both Obama and George W. Bush, the only two that have seen little action are Grand Rapids-Kalamazoo and Lansing, both in Michigan.
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One billion in ad money. Do any of you people see what the hell is going on here? The government is for sale to big business, oil, and the banks. Those of you who think it is just one party are the real fools. Both parties are for sale and you are all to caught up in party BS to see it. WAKE UP AMERICA!!!!!!!!!! We are all being sold down the river.
Absolutely right. No matter which scumbag is elected, the result for us is the same: We get ripped off to pad the pockets of people who already have more money than they know what to do with. It's just a grab for power and imagined glory.
News of the Day:
"In U.S., Unadjusted Unemployment at 7.3% in Mid-OctoberUnemployment, underemployment lowest since Gallup began tracking.
by Jenny Marlar
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- U.S. unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, is 7.3% in mid-October, down considerably from 7.9% at the end of September and at a new low since Gallup began collecting employment data in January 2010. Gallup's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate is 7.7%, also down from September. October's adjusted mid-month measure is also more than a percentage point lower than October 2011."
Where's Jacko?
Intrade: 66-34
gObama!
Yep. And the November numbers will be right back up to 8.7%
What a surprise.
I have residence in both Tennessee and North Carolina. I have yet to see an ad from either candidate in TN. I guess both candidates know the state is red all the way and don't want to waste any money advertising. However, the airways are flooded with ads in NC. Obama won the state by less than 0.3% in 2008. Romney needs my vote in NC, so I changed my driver license and voter registration offically to NC.
LOL...that's it Repiglican...voter fraud.
You morons have been trying to suppress voter's rights for months.
Cheat/Lie/Steal...THAT'S the Repiglican mentality.
Good luck traitor..and good luck in 2016 when minority and female voting blocks take over the country.
You are a disgrace..and so is your disgusting party.
NikNik,
You definitely do not have the IQ to be a lawyer. What I did is perfectly legal. Plenty of blue staters have second homes in retirement states like Florida and they can choose which state to declare as their permanent residence, have their car registered in that state along with driver license and voter registration. Sorry you don't have that option, but don't be jealous because others do.
BTW, get ready for NC to return to red in 20 days.
At $800M it calculates to $50 per child living in poverty in the USA today, for just the advertisement spent on this election. This is shameful.
As Big Corporation battle to determine;
"WHO WILL BUY AND OWN THE NEXT PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES"
But the libs tell us all of Obama's contributions are of the $20 variety.
Strange place for Romney,he is usually on the other side buying the goverment
Romney, with or without money, you just plain stink.
Sick, Sick, Sick,, that they spend this much...
Ridiculous. Just ridiculous.
Just outta curiosity.. And for sake of discussion. I want to hear without argument what would you guys do if Romney Does win the election? Just a serious thought on this from the left. What difference would it make in your life? And why do you believe this?
The world won't end if Romney is elected. Live will go on.
What matters more is how the House and Senate will go.
I don't believe Romney is all that bad really. He is a moderate, crafted RomneyCare after all with Ted Kennedy. He is pandering to the conservative base, and now is pandering to the moderate independent voters.
What worries me about Romney is that he is very inconsistent. I also don't appreciate his 47% comments, even though I am not in that 47%. He is from a place of high privilege, born into wealth and connections, and suggested that anyone wanting to start a business should "borrow from your parents to do so."
I do not begrudge Romney because of his wealth. I just want someone in the White House from the middle class who understands our struggles.
Romney is a capitalist. I'm in the construction industry and investors are opitimistic when a capitalist is in the whitehouse. Thats means they are investing in expansion and new businesses. That is not happening right now, its just one big holding pattern, I've been seeing it the past two and a half years at least.
What difference will it make in my life? I don't know, probably not a whole lot. The President isn't King after all.
He is not Bush II either...and for that I am grateful.
For the record, I own an environmental consulting company. I am a private business owner.
Peace
@Chuck,
I hope work picks up for you soon!
I have had a framing company, when the market collapsed i had to lay off 3 crews, and work has been almost non existent, except for the odd jobs every now and then. And the bad part, it was already hard enough to compete with the companies that was hiring illegals. (Though it was getting harder for them to hire them) When the president passed the dream act, it really hurt more. A lot of the companies that was able to underbid because of them paying very little to the illegals, now was able to hire a lot of them back and not be scared of getting caught with illegals working and being fined.
That is why i believe myself Romney will help. And for many more reasons.
Whats really sickening is this country is in a tail spin due to debt and other money troubles and look at what is just wasted. Is it any wonder so many relate to Star Trek so much. A society exclusively for the enhancement and furthering of mankind instead of monetary gain. It'll never happen on this planet except in science fiction.
All this money on both sides it has really reached epidemic proportions. This money could have been spent to aid the people of the USA. All the corporate backers on both sides have plenty of money to dump on their candidate but don't have any money to increase wages.. What is wrong with this picture??? We need election reform where each candidate and i mean all party candidates have equal funding thru public money. The corporations are despicable and corrupt their money needs to be kept out of any election. In Idaho I have not seen a single presidential ad it is a forgone conclusion Romney takes Idaho.
INSTALLING PRESIDENT ROMNEY ....
█████████████▒▒▒ 85% complete.
Be careful installing that MalWare!
:)
People with no hopes and dreams are easily controlled by lunatics in the media (Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, etc)... It is not us against them (rich vs. poor). No matter how much money you have in the bank, there will ALWAYS be someone with more money then you.
We should be thankful for living in the U.S.A! There are many places in the world where a person can be executed for speaking out against the government.
Political contributions should be taxed at the top corporate or individual tax rate. The tax could be earmarked for debt reduction.
It's nonsense like this that prevents qualified candidates from ever becoming president. You need to have a lot of money to have any chance and the way that these crooks get their money is by accepting bribes from lobbyists and then pandering to them while in office at the cost of the rest of society! People need to stop falling for this two party scam and start voting for third parties so that we can show both of these major con parties that we're fed up with them! But Americans just don't think like that. If you're not a Republican or a Democrat then you stand no chance. People tend to think that you only have two options; it is a scam!
We live in a Capitalistic Society. To expect Capitalism to not control our elections would be considered "socialism".
With Capitalism, we must take the good with the bad...and vise versa.
It is ridiculous to spend that much money on a campaign! Especially when all the candidates do is bash each other. Romney and Obama fighting doesn't help me figure out who to vote for. Well actually I really want to vote independent. All Democrats and Republicans do is fight over everything! They can never come to a compromise. I'm just sick and tired of the government, lobbyists, politicians, so on so forth!
I would rather see a whole lot more of discussion debates. Have a series so that just a specified number of topics are discussed at each event while letting the candidates speak longer than frigging 2 minutes. What the hell kinda of substantive discussion can be held in 2 minutes.
How many of those more informative type events will $1,000,000,000 buy??
Obama so far has spent $455 million. Now that is wasted money. Obama will lose the election to Romney by a land slide.
That's right, you read that correctly, a "land slide". Remember, you read it here first.
This money in this campaign is obscene. We need strict campaign finance laws. WE need a congress to stand up to the supreme court and remove any justices who are acting like an activist justice and not serving the constitution. Only Congress can remove these bad justices. This 2012 congress is too lazy to do anything, let alone pass a jobs bill.
Correct K. and we the people must start by removing speaker boehner as the speaker of the house.
Obama might have won this debate (by a slim margin) but that won't matter. He's already lost the election. More and more people are realizing that The Obama Presidency is one of the biggest scams ever perpetrated on the American people, and many of those that voted him in are now realizing they have been duped.
I think it is ok to spend this kind of money but just like college they should have to borrow it from thier parents
The only problem liberals have with spending other peoples money on ads, is that Romney is doing it too...
BO2012 bayliee etc.
The transcript shows that the President mentioned the word terror. So if he was talking about the Benghazi incident why did he spend the next two weeks lying about what he got right from the start? What possible motive could he have for having everybody in the administration spinning the story in another direction? BO (the old definition) would seem to reveal that the complete reversal of what you guys said was the President talking about the loss of four American lives. Simply put the President's explanation last night smells and not in a good way.
In regards to the Obama $300 Millions spend that is incorrect according to international media. Also the Obama campaign donations which has reached and incredible amount ( never seen before) are untraceable. All campaign donation must to be traceable back to the USA and the way his system is set up doesn't allow donation to be traceable. International media say a large portion of his donations comes from China which by the way he acts and basically give the USA to China....I don't doubt. I don't have any parties. But this situation it's ridicule to us and our country. We need a change!!!!!
Most of Obama's ads address the abortion issue, as if that is the most important issue for women today. None of his ads talk about his track record. I wonder why.