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For our Friday Follow-up, I bring you this kick-butt info-graphic, acquired through MyBlogGuest.Com.  It gives the raw skinny on campaign spending, as well as party and PAC coffers.  Description:

Running for president is very similar to running a business. When you want to succeed in business, you need to put your money into advertising that gets the word out about your product or service. With a campaign, you need to sell your candidate to voters. The campaign itself also resembles a business with people who are tasked to handle finances, public relations, advertising and more. Of course, not all campaigns will be successful in every state. When you break the numbers down to who spends the most in each state, it all depends on how many independent voters reside in that area.

It’s not just the big time donors that keep the candidates going either. Both of the candidates receive smaller donations anywhere from a few dollars up to $1000, which make up a good portion of their campaign funds. Where does all this money go? It goes to where the campaigns think it would be advantageous — advertising.

Source: Best Degree Program

When looking a this, I also stand corrected.  Contrary to strong impressions given by the DNC’s OFA emails (an avalanche of which I received as the election approached), Obama outspent Romney by far more than the margin of votes by which he won.  By using the formula I created to compensate for the influence of money,  this means Romney beat Obama.

First, let’s update the numbers from the graphic according to the latest New York Times numbers I could find.  Obama and company spent $852.9 Million, while Romney and company spent $752.3 Million.  However, Obama’s donors were smaller and greater in number, possibly due to truth in the stereotype Republican supporters, but also because of the same slick use of digital media by the Democrats that made McCain look like a Neanderthal four years earlier.

In any event, with Obama having spent 53% of the total spending between them and garnishing 60.84 million votes, he received an adjusted popular vote of 57.4 million; receiving 57.94 million, Romney’s adjusted popular vote total is 61.6 million.  Much closer, but as in 2012 the winner and loser shares are reversed.

Of course, there were a lot of other PACs not taken into consideration, with the graphic putting the heavier weight by far on the Red side of the line.  One could also consider an adjustment for Obama spending more on advertising, though phone canvassing is a bit two-edged, both annoying to some and effective with others.

But however you slice the cake, enjoy …

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