Is 5 million too high an estimate?

[Starks]

I don't want to feel depressed.

[Lord Xar]

I believe that 3.5mil is probably about right.. that is my guess.

I just hope that McCain doesn't beat him..

[Corydoras]

I think it's too high. But we'll find out soon enough.

Actually, I'm not sure why we shouldn't be kind of depressed about the money thing, considering how much money Hillary has.

[saku39]

I'm not bothering to think about the total.

Whatever it is, nobody here is going to stop the support.

[Cindy]

I don't want to feel depressed.

Then, the best way is to keep it at 2.5. You'll garantee yourself a positive experience when the numbers come out then. That's what I am doing.

Paul already said we beat last quarter. Thats encouraging enough without knowing by how much.

Think of how many candidates are going to come in below what they raised in Q2. How discouraging for them and their supporters.

[0zzy]

We have 6 million.

hah I lied.
I dono.

3.5 seems too small. We had more than 2.5 before the million dollar donation. they probably had like 4.5 and wanted a .5 boost, ended up getting a 1 boost so, 5.5?

[LibertyEagle]

Remember how we all felt when the FMN, or whatever it is, blared out that he had $5 million? Then, remember how we felt when we found out that was wrong?

Let's not do this to ourselves again. We'll know soon enough. Anything over last quarter is good news. It shows we are growing. The others are not.

[Original_Intent]

When you get depressed about the money....

Realize that the other spend money just like they do in government - and so does Ron Paul!

Realize that they are paying for virtually every "activist" on their team. Ron Paul has 40,000+ that are donating MILLIONS of dollars worth of supplies and effort to the campaign EVERY WEEK!

Realize that while their donations drop off (because many of their big money donors have maxxed out) Ron Paul's numbers continue to rise each quarter as new people drink the Ron Paul Kool-Aid!

And finally realize that many of the other candidates are paying themselves nice fat salaries out of their campaign contributions!

I would consider every dollar Ron Paul has is worth at least 4 times as much (for the amount of value he will get from it) as the same dollar in another candidates campaign. Don't get depressed, we are doing GREAT THINGS!

[Perry]

I think that 5 is a very good guesstimate.

[RP4ME]

what is a good amount for first tiers - in the GOP?

[Starks]

Is there any Everclear in the kool-aid?

[0zzy]

what is a good amount for first tiers - in the GOP?

15? :O

[honkywill]

When they wrote the letter requesting the surge I'm pretty sure we were already past 2.5.

The letter even said "I assure you that we will surpass our total from last quarter. The question is by how much."

I'm certain we are above 3 by now.

I'd saying we will probably be in the 3.5-4 range.

[cac1963]

I know it's not wise to compare this to Dean's campaign, but... Dean took in $40 million online by the time January rolled around. So if Paul isn't at least on the same numbers track I'd start worrying.

[Devil_rules_in_extremes]

I don't want to feel depressed.

I think RP can pull out 5.5-7 million.

We'll find out soon enough.

[fez2008]

If you want to expect less and feel good later: 2.2mil before this week + 1.1mil = 3.3mil

If you want to expect more and get upset: 4.5 mil before this week + 1.5 mil + 1 mil offline donations = 7mil

My guess: 3 mil before this week + 1.1 mil (online) + fundraiser(0.1) + offline donations this week (0.5 mil) = 4.7 mil (just about double the amount last time)

I think the push this week is not enough.. everyone is getting complacent seeing the meter go up quickly.. RPs goal of 1.5 (todays messge) may push it beyond 5 but it is a very hard goal

[ForLibertyFight]

5.5 million

[Man from La Mancha]

I think people are being too conservative. Here is 1 million in one week. I saw Ron with his time at Ca. paid for meals and online collect about a million, plus all the other weeks of collecting, I say at least 6 million to 10.

.

[Jon S]

If you want to expect less and feel good later: 2.2mil before this week + 1.1mil = 3.3mil

If you want to expect more and get upset: 4.5 mil before this week + 1.5 mil + 1 mil offline donations = 7mil

My guess: 3 mil before this week + 1.1 mil (online) + fundraiser(0.1) + offline donations this week (0.5 mil) = 4.7 mil (just about double the amount last time)

I think the push this week is not enough.. everyone is getting complacent seeing the meter go up quickly.. RPs goal of 1.5 (todays messge) may push it beyond 5 but it is a very hard goal

b-bb-bb-but ron paul supporters aren't REAL! how are us unreal people going to donate TWICE the donations of last quarter? its ludicrous i tell you. god forbid we may even have gotten some NEW supporters since then. ;)

[Duckman]

I think everyone will be pleasantly suprised.

Think about it: He'll have the 1 million by the end that we are raising now, plus the 2000+ donations made for Constitution week, and remember the big fundraising tour that we all heard pulled in some big bucks... there was a 75k donation day relatively early in the quarter... think about the increased exposure from the straw polls... plus there were the first mailings asking for donations (from people who don't use the internet and are thereby likely untapped) plus you got the news that people aren't maxed out at $2300.

The quarter has lasted a long time, and I think donations have been steady at a good pace for the whole time. In fact, I think he's raised at least 4M from that background activity without the fundraising trips or last minute hoorahs. If you combine that with the last-minute stuff I think you get $6m, but I'm hoping for $8m. But I'll be happy with any number, but I just really don't see it being as low as $3-4m as some have said.

[OptionsTrader]

Actually, I'm not sure why we shouldn't be kind of depressed about the money thing, considering how much money Hillary has.

Here's a mug for you:

http://i22.tinypic.com/mtvygn.jpg

[TheIndependent]

http://www.fmft.net/Kool-AidMan.jpg

Ohhhh, yeaaaah!

(But seriously, Kool-Aid has bad cultish Jim Jones implications. Let's keep Kool-Aid Man out of this.)

[LibertyEagle]

When you get depressed about the money....

Realize that the other spend money just like they do in government - and so does Ron Paul!

Realize that they are paying for virtually every "activist" on their team. Ron Paul has 40,000+ that are donating MILLIONS of dollars worth of supplies and effort to the campaign EVERY WEEK!



Actually, we probably have about 5,000 people who are active in the Meetup groups and I seriously doubt if they are "donating MILLIONS of dollars worth of supplies to the campaign EVERY WEEK".

Just be realistic.

[OptionsTrader]

(But seriously, Kool-Aid has bad cultish Jim Jones implications. Let's keep Kool-Aid Man out of this.)

Kool-Aid gets the bad wrap, when in fact it was grape flavored Flavor Aid.

[Paulitician]

Actually, I'm not sure why we shouldn't be kind of depressed about the money thing, considering how much money Hillary has.
Well, you have to take into consideration that Ron Paul only gets money from the individual "little person" like you and me. I wouldn't be surprised if Hillary's total fundraising comes from one-tenth of such donors. Most of her money comes from fugitive millionares, special interests, lobbyists, corporations etc. etc.

[Ron Paul Fan]

I don't like the estimation game, but I think we'll be a little surprised as well. I think we raised a little over a million online last quarter and we're going to basically equal that this quarter in one week. Someone figured out the number of online donators in the confirmation codes and it's about 42,000. If only we had a good estimate of what the average donation was we could give a good guess of what he raised online this quarter. If it's $50, then that's $2.1 million from just online donations. Then we add in whatever Dr. Paul raised at all of the fundraisers and we could be looking at $2-3 million. He got $500,000 from his west coast swing alone so for all we know it could be higher than that. So I think $5 million is an accurate guess given what we know thus far.

[TheIndependent]

Kool-Aid gets the bad wrap, when in fact it was grape flavored Flavor Aid.

http://mfrost.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/05/29/the_more_you_know2.jpg

:)

[kenc9]

what is a good amount for first tiers - in the GOP?

Here are the total raised by everyone last quarter.

http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/index.asp?cycle=2008

-ken

[reduen]

I say 3,500,000 online in Q3 and about the same offline so 7.5 million total..

[fez2008]

Heres an educated guess from a member:

Originally Posted by ronpaulyourmom
Between 11:00pm EST on the 23rd and 11:00pm EST on the 24th, the campaign took in approximately 1300 online donations. In a similar time period, they raised what looks like just short of $130,000. This equates to ~$100 average online donation. While we cannot know if this is higher or lower than what the average donation was during most of the quarter, we have to assume it's close to it. Thus:

$100 average donation?
x 27000 Q3 donations as of 11:00pm EST on the 24th
------------------------------------------------------------------------
$2,700,000 raised online as of the 24th
+ $300,000 for higher than average donations during meetup contest?
+ $1,000,000 for offline fundraising?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
$4,000,000
================================
Add another million to that (since 24th night to 30th night).. = 5mil

ok end of estimation.. lets get some extra money from new donors...

[Ron Paul Fan]

Heres an educated guess from a member:

Originally Posted by ronpaulyourmom
Between 11:00pm EST on the 23rd and 11:00pm EST on the 24th, the campaign took in approximately 1300 online donations. In a similar time period, they raised what looks like just short of $130,000. This equates to ~$100 average online donation. While we cannot know if this is higher or lower than what the average donation was during most of the quarter, we have to assume it's close to it. Thus:

$100 average donation?
x 27000 Q3 donations as of 11:00pm EST on the 24th
------------------------------------------------------------------------
$2,700,000 raised online as of the 24th
+ $300,000 for higher than average donations during meetup contest?
+ $1,000,000 for offline fundraising?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
$4,000,000
================================
Add another million to that (since 24th night to 30th night).. = 5mil

ok end of estimation.. lets get some extra money from new donors...

I think even these numbers are low. The # of online donations is up to about 42,000 now. So if the average donation is $100 that would be awesome because that would mean he raised $4.2 million just online. I'm not sure that the average is that high though. And he raised a little over $1 million offline last quarter so one would think it would be considerably higher this quarter considering his west coast swing brought in $500k alone. This is why I'm optimistic for a higher number than $5 million, but I won't be dissapointed if it's not higher because it's all just guess work at this point.

[TheIndependent]

Consider that he made $350,000 in less than a week on his West Coast swing not long ago. A lot's changed since Q2.

Still, I refuse to speculate. I want it to be a surprise rather than have expectations larger than life.

[AMack]

I'm a college student who doesn't own a credit or debit card. I've donated $300 by mail so far. I wish my totals helped the fund raising surge, but i figure that if I help inflate the offline donations more than people expect, they'll aim low in their fund raising predictions and we'll end up being pleasantly surprised come October.

=)

[fez2008]

this is the average this week: (777777)/(41714 - 33000) = 89.25

I think you are right... 100 avg. is pretty high. it might be 60 probably over the entire quarter...

that will make

Online:
30000*60 = 1.8mil - till 24th
= 1.1mil - 24th-30th

offline:
fundraisers: 1 mil
mail-in checks: 2 mil (doubling from last quarter)


ok I agree between 5-6 mil...

[Akus]

Is 5 million too high an estimate?Yes. It won't happen. I would give my left nut to be wrong on this one, but I won't be wrong. It is overly optimistic and we will end up the same way we ended up after 08/11/2007 IA thing.

Disappointed.

Look. Ron will make a million dollars. I was skeptical about that, but at the rate this is going, I do not at all see why this can't happen. With a buck or two or a thousand on top.

Let's just be happy this happened.

[TheIndependent]

Every time I donate, I earn AmEx reward points. Double score. ;)

[hard@work]

You know, I was happy with the little thermometer we have here. And the quills, those were fun. Then you evil people started putting numbers in my head. And now I believe that Ron Paul is coasting to victory with $347,302,119,920.

Stop that.

[steph3n]

A million? You gotta be kidding, thats going to happen in the final week, you think before this it was 0?


Yes. It won't happen. I would give my left nut to be wrong on this one, but I won't be wrong. It is overly optimistic and we will end up the same way we ended up after 08/11/2007 IA thing.

Disappointed.

Look. Ron will make a million dollars. I was skeptical about that, but at the rate this is going, I do not at all see why this can't happen. With a buck or two or a thousand on top.

Let's just be happy this happened.

[Paulitician]

Too high an estimate? Nah. An overestimate? Maybe, we don't know yet.

[I Am Weasel]

well, ya could sit here all night trying to estimate the 3rd quarter, or spend the last few days telling people about Ron Paul.. mercy..

[Harry96]

The other thing to consider is the rumors about other campaigns:

Thompson is rumored to have only raised about $5 million. If he spends money like a politician the way the others do, he'll probably have considerably less than that on-hand. RP may beat him on gross donations too, but he'll almost certainly beat him in cash-on-hand.

The Washington Times reported a couple of weeks ago that McCain has only raised about $3.5 million gross, so he's almost certainly bankrupt.

RP will probably be in third place in cash-on-hand, may be third in gross donations too, and will definitely have more money than all of the GOP candidates combined except Giuliani, Romney and Thompson, and maybe more than all combined except just Giuliani and Romney.

I'd really love to see Hunter, Brownback and Tancredo drop out when the new numbers come out. We need to thin down these debates.

Speaking of that, it's off topic, but Lew Rockwell verified yesterday on his blog that Keyes entered the race because his old roommate Bill Kristol asked him to so he'd take time away from RP in the debates. That shows the neocons know how much of a threat RP is.

[Suzu]

I say 3,500,000 online in Q3 and about the same offline so 7.5 million total..

I tend to agree with this guestimate.

[ctb619]

You think more was raised offline than online?

[V-rod]

I estimated 4-4.5 mil last month judging by the increasing rate per day of donations, but with the news of the surge of donations for constitution week, his increased fundraisers, and the possible 1.1mil+ online this week, I'd say slightly over 5mil would be a fair estimate. Not bad for a third tier candidate, eh?

[Akus]

A million? You gotta be kidding, thats going to happen in the final week, you think before this it was 0?

I meant just on that thermometer...

[FreedomLover]

I think everyone will be pleasantly suprised.

Think about it: He'll have the 1 million by the end that we are raising now, plus the 2000+ donations made for Constitution week


I think the donations from Constitution week carried over to the current fundraiser

[reduen]

I say 3,500,000 online in Q3 and about the same offline so 7.5 million total..


I change my estimate here. 7.6 mill :)

[rp08rp]

He will have raised 6.5M IMO

[CasualApathy]

"Fill the quill" gave close to 200k. Someone who had a link to the RP site that gave the number of donations plus the amount posted it a few days ago.

The money from "fill the quill, again" was added to the initial 500k drive.

[Original_Intent]

Actually, we probably have about 5,000 people who are active in the Meetup groups and I seriously doubt if they are "donating MILLIONS of dollars worth of supplies to the campaign EVERY WEEK".

Just be realistic.

OK just to be nice I will go along with your 5,000 active Meetup people. Do you think time and materials they average $200 per week? (let's say 10 hours @ $10 per hour and 100 buck in materials just to keep it simple) That's a million bucks.

Now let's also say that the other 40,000 meetup members average 1 hour per week (and I admit this may be high) and 5 bucks a week in materials. I am pretty inactive as far as my Meetup goes, but I easily triple this. But I also realize a lot of the less active Meetup people really do nothing.

So based on my assumptions (which may be completely wrong) that is 1.6 million per week that is completely underneath the radar. So you are probably right, not millions. But even if I am overguestimating everything by a factor of 4 that is still $400,000 per WEEK, and I still say that is freaking amazing.

note that my original post said "supplies and effort" not just "supplies".

[Bradley in DC]

I posted all we know here:
http://ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=21634

[zebov]

You guys do realize that if the (rather ridiculous) estimates of 7-10 million were true NONE of the mainstream media would believe it. I'm pretty sure it either wouldn't be reported initially or would be reported as presumed fraudulent numbers. It would take a while for ME to believe numbers that high.

Don't get me wrong, Ron Paul has great supporters, but we are not nearly as popular right now as the top-tier candidates (which is our job to fix). Beating Thompson, Edwards, McCain, et al at revenue is a little unbelievable right now (though cash-on-hand is another story; Ron Paul is slightly more frugal with his spending).

Personally, I think ~3.5 million is a good estimate and I would be greatly excited if that number were beat. I hope that number is beat, but I think 3.5 is a reasonable number. We need to keep in context how large a number that is (even if it is small compared to obama/clinton). Three and a half million dollars. Say it. That's a lot of money and we should be very satisfied with that amount if that is what it turns out to be (or even if it is a little less).

[reduen]

You guys do realize that if the (rather ridiculous) estimates of 7-10 million were true NONE of the mainstream media would believe it. I'm pretty sure it either wouldn't be reported initially or would be reported as presumed fraudulent numbers. It would take a while for ME to believe numbers that high.

Don't get me wrong, Ron Paul has great supporters, but we are not nearly as popular right now as the top-tier candidates (which is our job to fix). Beating Thompson, Edwards, McCain, et al at revenue is a little unbelievable right now (though cash-on-hand is another story; Ron Paul is slightly more frugal with his spending).

Personally, I think ~3.5 million is a good estimate and I would be greatly excited if that number were beat. I hope that number is beat, but I think 3.5 is a reasonable number. We need to keep in context how large a number that is (even if it is small compared to obama/clinton). Three and a half million dollars. Say it. That's a lot of money and we should be very satisfied with that amount if that is what it turns out to be (or even if it is a little less).

Ok, you got me to thinkin with this post. I will now say 7.4 mill..

[kylejack]

We had more than 2.5 before the million dollar donation.

No, that's not what was said.

[reduen]

Ok, I change it again to 5,080,000.00 :D :rolleyes: