Let Them Eat Beanie Babies

by digby

Am I the only one who thinks this is the most ill-timed display of ostentatious wealth ever?

Meg Whitman’s record-breaking spending in the race for governor has enabled her campaign to blanket California with more TV ads and mailers than any other in state history, while also tapping new technologies to further broaden her reach.

With nine weeks left until election day, Whitman has donated $104 million of her own money to the campaign, more than any other candidate in California history and within striking distance of the national record for a non-presidential contest, the $109 million spent by businessman Michael Bloomberg to secure a third term as mayor of New York City.

Those donations have allowed her to target her campaign mailings to the smallest subsets of voters and sort out which television shows are popular among independent voters. (It turns out they are big fans of “Bones,” the crime show rife with romantic tension, on which Whitman has aired ads.)

Dozens of outside consultants and a paid staff the size of some presidential campaigns run an operation that seems to be the living embodiment of Whitman’s book title: “The Power of Many.” After record amounts spent on television advertising, mail and ground organization, there has even been enough money left over to sponsor a youth soccer team.

It’s not like we’re exactly living in good times here in California. I think this is a deadly strategy. The optics are just terrible and I suspect that subliminally people find it horrific that she’s spending like a drunken sailor in the middle of a terrible recession.

My one hope is that the lesson will be learned that wealthy CEOs with obscene golden parachutes are probably the last people we should be looking to for answers at a time like this. (Sadly, I’m afraid it will only female CEOs, but that’s better than nothing. After all, they’re all Republicans.)

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