It's the big money, stupid!

Maybe it's not just ego after all. For all the press Obama is getting for pulling in $40 million last month, it's also true that Clinton raised $20 million, which in a normal year would be record setting. Strikingly, they're doing things very differently, with Obama relying on small donations and Clinton working the established fundraiser circuit:

Obama's ability to capitalize on a sustained wave of online support has enabled him to spend almost all of his time campaigning. Clinton has attended more than a dozen fundraisers since Jan. 1, and her husband, former president Bill Clinton, has appeared at more than 40, while Obama and his wife have attended fewer than 10 during that time.

Sen. Robert P. Casey Jr. (D-Pa.), an Obama supporter, said he was shocked when he learned Obama attended just one fundraiser in February. Casey, by contrast, attended 450 fundraisers during his 2006 Senate campaign. He said a typical day involved three hours of calling donors, followed by as many as three fundraising events per night. "It was pick-and-shovel work, just chipping away."|Washington Post|

An integral part of Clinton's experience of the campaign is spending lots of time in rooms with or on the phone with big money donors. So she spends a great deal of time talking to the sorts of people who are willing to write a $2000 check in exchange for access and who, I'm guessing, aren't exactly happy about the fact that a candidate like Obama can fund a campaign without letting them in the room. Which is to say that Clinton is the candidate of big money access, and big money isn't going to give up without a fight.