Oprah Winfrey & Barack Obama

[August1991]

If someone like Oprah Winfrey can "buy" the presidency, then I tend to think that she deserves it. After all, JFK's father supposedly bought his son the presidency. Presidential politics is an expensive game and just to get a seat at the table requires alot of money.

Can Oprah buy the presidency? Well, we don't know how much she contributed to Obama's campaign (and we'll never know - Obama has opted out of federal sharing to avoid reporting requirenents).

McCain and Kerry has/had their wealthy wives. Hillary Clinton's husband is not wealthy like Oprah but Hillary had an extra advantage in knowledge/experience.

Call me naive. I don't think Oprah can buy the presidency anymore than JFK's father bought the White House for his son. Proof? If money were the deciding factor, Steve Forbes and Nelson Rockefeller would have been president, and Peter Pocklington and Belinda Stronach would have been our PMs.

It seems obvious to me; No one can buy political leadership in Canada or the US unless we radically redefine the word "buy". Buy votes? Yes. "Buy" Sussex Drive/the White House? No.

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Yet, I'm surprised about Obama and Oprah and their relationship. No one really talks about it. (Cue the ominous violin crescendo? No. IMV, there's no secretive conspiracy group here.)

Yet, what to make of this:

The item in today’s Drudge Report is categorically untrue," Winfrey said in a statement sent to news organizations in reaction to the DrudgeReport.com posting. "There has been absolutely no discussion about having Sarah Palin on my show. At the beginning of this presidential campaign when I decided that I was going to take my first public stance in support of a candidate, I made the decision not to use my show as a platform for any of the candidates. I agree that Sarah Palin would be a fantastic interview, and I would love to have her on after the campaign is over."

Fox

I gather Oprah wishes to see Obama in the White House. Well, her wish will cost her, and she won't be the first rich person to learn that the White House is not for sale.

And apparently, Oprah will only interview Sarah Palin after the election.

[August1991]

How times change.

In May, Winfrey affirmed her support for Sen. Barack Obama's presidential candidacy to Larry King, describing Obama's leadership as "worth me going out on a limb for." In September, the media titan feted Obama at a California fundraiser, raking in more than $3 million for the Illinois senator's White House bid.

ABC Dec 2007

After months of record-breaking fund-raising, a new sense of urgency in Senator Barack Obama’s fund-raising team is palpable as the full weight of the campaign’s decision to bypass public financing for the general election is suddenly upon it.

...

Meanwhile, Obama campaign officials had calculated that with its vaunted fund-raising machine, driven by both small contributors over the Internet and a powerful high-dollar donor network, it made more sense to forgo public financing so they could raise and spend unlimited sums.

But the campaign is struggling to meet ambitious fund-raising goals it set for the campaign and the party. It collected in June and July far less from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s donors than originally projected. Moreover, Mr. McCain, unlike Mr. Obama, will have the luxury of concentrating almost entirely on campaigning instead of raising money, as Mr. Obama must do.

NYT Sep 2008

Has Oprah's high-dollar network run out of money? Willingness to contribute? Or is the NYT article a nudge for them to pony up?

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In this day and age, if a single wealthy benefactor were bank-rolling the candidacy of a young, first-term, Republican senator, I think the MSM would pay more attention.

It's a noteworthy point that McCain is meeting federal campaign finance laws (and reporting requirements) whereas Obama is not.

[Carinthia]

And apparently, Oprah will only interview Sarah Palin after the election.

What a relief!

I will be watching Charlie Gibson's interview with her though. Not because I think she has anything earth crashing to reveal but because I want to have a good laugh listening to Gibson skirt around important issues and restrict the questions to field dressing moose (mooses?).

[Shady]

What a relief!

I will be watching Charlie Gibson's interview with her though. Not because I think she has anything earth crashing to reveal but because I want to have a good laugh listening to Gibson skirt around important issues and restrict the questions to field dressing moose (mooses?).

I'm sure you see him asking tougher questions than "field dressing a moose". Would you like to wager? How about say, $500 just to make things interesting?

[Moonlight Graham]

You can't buy the presidency with money alone, unless maybe a truly horrible candidate (ie: Paris Hilton) promised to give every American adult $15,000 if they won the election.

But beyond something crazy like that, money alone doesn't buy the presidency, but it CERTAINLY has a massive factor in the outcome. You can't even get yourself on the ballot without many millions of dollars, which is why billionaires are usually the only independent candidates who people have heard of nationally.

p.s. vote for T. Boone Pickens!