KEY POINTS:
A juggernaut of support for Barack Obama since Super Tuesday has raised an astonishing US$7.2 million ($9.1 million) for his presidential campaign - at a time when his rival Hillary Clinton's campaign is, in essence, broke.
Clinton had to quietly lend her campaign US$5 million from her private funds just to keep it afloat before the 24-state contest this week.
She has since successfully appealed to backers for more money to pay for the expensive battles ahead, but she lacks the broad base of enthusiastic supporters and volunteers that Obama enjoys.
Obama's promise to bring radical change to Washington and his rejection of lobbyist money has created an enthusiastic political movement, which eagerly responds to his personalised emails asking for cash.
There is no danger of Clinton and her husband Bill going broke, though. They have earned an estimated US$40 million from the former President's speeches, book deals and business partnerships.
Despite Clinton's impressive wins in New York and California, Super Tuesday ended in a draw. She was denied the badly needed fillip that might have sealed her status as front-runner and opened the floodgates to donor contributions.
Clinton has seen a surge of online donations since Tuesday, raising US$4 million from 35,000 new contributors.
Nevertheless, some of her staff are now voluntarily working without pay, and there are 16 more primaries and caucuses to fight between now and April 22 in Pennsylvania.
Another sign of Clinton's worries came in a letter that her campaign manager, Patti Solis, sent to Obama's headquarters yesterday, asking for five more televised debates between the Democratic candidates in the next three weeks.
Clinton performs well in debate and gets the added benefit of free airtime before millions of viewers.
"I am sure we can find a suitable place to meet on the campaign trail," Solis wrote. "There is too much at stake and the issues facing the country are too grave to deny voters the opportunity to see the candidates up close."
The Obama campaign curtly rejected a debate for Monday but have agreed to go head to head twice before March 4. One debate will take place on February 26 in Cleveland, Ohio, the other in Texas on a date to be set.
Obama is heading out to meet the public in Louisiana, Nebraska and Maine, and preparing for primaries in Washington DC on Tuesday and in Hawaii and Wisconsin.
Clinton is barely competing in those areas and concentrating instead on trying to pull off big victories in Ohio and Texas.
- INDEPENDENT
