At least it makes it interesting...

The most humorous ongoing wager I've got going is a pool on the content of each new "I did it first" type email from Club Ed.

I can't tell if it's supposed to be a diversionary tactic to distract from campaign realities or if they really think people care if Ed was the first Senate candidate to wake up on Tuesday the 19th or that Ed has more two dollar donors in the 4th precinct of Cocke county than anyone else.

I used to think there was a strategy behind these press releases, now I'm wondering if Van has somebody planted in Ed's campaign with the sole purpose of making Ed's campaign seem nutty. I'm mean really, people aren't that stupid Ed.

Another fun oddity is their constant catterwalling, hounding Van to disclose how many of his donors have maxed out to him for both the general and the primary. I guess Ed thinks that there are a bunch more folks that think enough of Van to go ahead and donate the most they can than would do the same for Ed. I suppose their logic is that if Van had more maxed out donors than Ed then Ed could potentially have more money available for use in the primary.
That's coming from the same crew that won't disclose how poorly Ed did this last cycle. Is that a double or triple standard?

They are also the same bunch that say money doesn't matter. They are also the same bunch that say that it doesn't matter that 52% of Republican voters don't know who Ed is. If Van's bank account were looted so he and Ed had the exact same amount of money, Van would still be way ahead because most people actually know who he is. Ed needs at least $2 million more than Van just to come up even.

Logic dictates that in order to be elected, you either have to be known or have enough money to facilitate a promotional campaign to become known. Let's see where we are now:

Corker: bunch of money, 25% name ID
Bryant: less than $ 1 mill on hand (assumption) and 48% name ID
Van: more than $1 mill on hand and 79% name ID

Corker has the money advantage, Van has the name ID, Bryant has neither.

There is supposed to be a point of diminishing returns regarding primary campaign spending. The thinking goes like this, if you are starting from nothing (Corker), it will cost about 9-10 million to completely saturate the market and get your name ID over 85%. If you have great ID going in (Van) it will cost considerably less to do the same with less chance of burning out the voter (hearing the same ads 20 times). I've heard smart people say Van needs 3 million. If you've got <50% name ID it seems you'd need more money than somebody at 79%

The bottom line is, one of the two mentioned factors has to increase dramatically in order for Ed to win. There might be someway he can get enough free media to boost his ID - maybe if he found a flying pig or something that would look good on tv...) otherwise, he's got to start rasing at least $750k each quarter. The fact that his fundraising ability drops each quarter isn't a good sign, neither is the lack of momentum his campaign is showing. Ed can't win.