The check is in the mail….or is it?

Uh-oh. Looks like when Obama said he didn’t care about people, just their checks, he wasn’t kidding. The Democratic Convention is now less than ten weeks away, yet the hosting committee is about $11million short of their $40 million dollar goal:

Facing an $11.6 million budget shortfall, organizers of the Democratic National Convention are cutting events while hoping Barack Obama’s emergence as the likely presidential nominee will spur his vast army of donors to pony up.

The convention’s Denver host committee reported it has deposited $29 million of the $40.6 million it promised to the Democratic National Committee by a Monday deadline. The overall convention budget is about $70 million.

Yeah, I’ll bet they’re hoping he’ll get them to pony up. Doesn’t look too good for him though. I love the stories from fellow conflucians about how they are responding to requests for donations from the DNC. I think Paul’s (plukasiak) was my favorite:

plukasiak, on June 17th, 2008 at 1:34 pm Said:

off topic, but…
Just got mail from the Obama campaign. So I wrote a check for $100, tore it in half, and am sending it along with this message…

Dear Senator Obama
On behalf of my friends in Florida, please find half a check for $100. Since your campaign saiid their votes should only count as half votes, I figure you’ll know what to do with half a check.
But, in case you need a hint – the RBC corruptly ensured your nomination while violating the DNC charter “sunshine” povisiions for meetings. In that spirit, you can take my half-check, and put it ‘where the sun don’t shine’.

But seriously, they are having some major problems, and as usual, team Obama is using the strong-armed approach in dealing with the host committee:

Organizers have moved to cut a number of the cocktail parties and other events associated with the convention and are consolidating vendors to trim costs. Those efforts are likely to shave up to $3 million from the budget, they said.

A planned media walkthrough of the Pepsi Center was abruptly canceled last week, alerting political reporters across the country that something was amiss. People close to the party’s convention committee said the event was scrapped in part to embarrass the host committee into stepping up its fundraising efforts.

So sad, hope that they don’t miss those cocktail parties too much. But don’t worry host committee people, there’s plenty of room with us under the bus. And then there are the Clinton loyalists:

Two wealthy Bill Clinton associates, supermarket mogul Ron Burkle and Hollywood producer Steve Bing, have made six-figure contributions to past conventions but so far have held off doing so this year.

Maybe the whole flap about canceling the convention had nothing to do with Obama wanting to avoid having to actually earn the nomination. It could be they just can’t afford it.