Well, the hard numbers are beginning to verify one common 2012 assumption with a vengence, per Politico‘s Abby Phillip and Kenneth Vogel:
For three years, Wall Street’s been telling the world how much it can’t stand President Barack Obama
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Now, thanks to campaign finance filings, it’s possible to put a price tag on just how much: Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign and the super PAC supporting it are outraising Obama among financial-sector donors $37.1 million to $4.8 million.
For the arithmetic-impaired, that’s better than a 7-1 margin.
Anyone trying to make the case that Obama “moved to the left” and abandoned these tycoons must account for the fact that many of them were Mitt fans back when he was running for president as the “movement conservative candidate” in 2008:
POLITICO’s separate analysis, which includes 19 former Obama donors who each have given more than $100,000 to Restore Our Future, showed that most of the 19 had also given to Romney’s failed 2008 campaign for the GOP nomination. The analysis found that Obama collected at least five times more from them than Romney in 2008, but that was before the age of super PACs, which have empowered wealthy donors to give much more money to boost campaigns.
Among the group is top Bain Capital executive Stephen Zide, who donated $2,300 to Obama’s campaign just before Election Day in 2008 after having contributed to Romney’s campaign during the Republican primary. Four years later, Zide has come back to Romney in a major way, donating $500,000 to Restore Our Future and $2,500 to the Romney campaign.
So a lot of these folk hedged their bets in 2008, but are doubling down on their good buddy in 2012, aided by the advent of Super-PACs.
One might even call it a form of “class warfare.” But that would be divisive.
