The Rich Love "Wall Street Willie"

If you read this blog much, you'll know that I've started calling Willard Mitt Romney by a nickname -- Wall Street Willie. That's because with his massive income (more than $21 million a year) and tiny tax rate (13.9%), all of which he does without working a single minute during the year, he is the poster boy for Wall Street greed. And the charts above (from the website Talking Points Memo) show that the Wall Street bankers and corporate moguls love him and consider him one of their own.

But the ordinary citizens, those who make small donations to their favorite candidate, don't show him much love -- not even the small donors from his own party (the teabaggers and evangelicals). As the top chart shows, Wall Street Willie has received about 62.8 million from campaign donors, but only 10.19% of that money has come from small donors (people who donate less than $200). And as the bottom chart shows, nearly 70% of his donors have contributed the maximum legal amount of $2500 to his campaign.

The percentage of donors giving the maximum amount to Romney's campaign far exceeds the percentage giving the same to other campaigns -- whether it's his Republican opponents (ranging from 10% to slightly more than 30%) or President Obama (around 18%). And this is just donations directly to the Romney campaign. It doesn't count the many millions the Wall Street bankers and corporate moguls have poured into the Romney super-PAC (where there is no limit on giving).

But while the charts show the rich love Wall Street Willie, they also show something else. The small donors (aka the average voter) clearly favors the re-election of the president. The president has raised even more money than Romney (about $106.3 million) and most of it was raised from from people who gave less than $200 (59.92%). And 82% of the donations to President Obama came from those who could not afford to make the $2500 maximum legal donation.

Talking Points Memo says these two charts should make Romney gulp. I would go even farther. They should scare the hell out of him. The best indicator of how well a candidate is doing with the mass of voters is how many donations they get under $200 (since most voters cannot afford to donate more than that). President Obama wins that indicator hands down. He raised $63.7 million (about 60% of his total) from small donors, while Romney raised $6.4 million (about 10% of his total) from small donors.

Wall Street Willie has the love of the rich, but there aren't nearly enough rich people in America to elect a president. Money is nice, and I'm sure the Republicans will try to buy the election. But the president has the money to compete, and he has something even more important -- the support of the masses.