FEAR THE MIGHTY POWER OF UNLIMITED AD SPENDING! (OR MAYBE NOT.)

How can the other candidates possibly withstand this onslaught?

Billionaire Tom Steyer ... who new federal filings show has poured nearly $48 million of his own money into his long-shot bid, is dominating television screens in the first four states that will hold nominating contests early next year.

Since entering the race in July, Mr. Steyer has spent more than $26 million on TV ads, airing more than 53,000 spots in markets that reach Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada voters, data from ad-tracking firm Kantar/CMAG shows. All told, that is more than six times as many as the rest of the Democratic field combined.

Nearly 20,000 of those ads have aired in Iowa alone, where in Davenport regular viewers of ABC’s “Good Morning America” have seen more than 200 ads from Mr. Steyer. The same is true of “Judge Judy” watchers in Charleston, S.C.

Tremble before this chart!



But here's the problem for Steyer: It's not working. In Iowa, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average, Steyer is tied for seventh place, with 2.3% of the vote. In New Hampshire, Steyer is also tied for seventh, and also at 2.3%. In South Carolina, he's tied for fourth, but he's at 3.8%, 35 points behind front-runner Joe Biden. In Nevada, he's tied for fifth, with 3.5% of the vote.

Obviously this is working to a very limited extent -- Steyer is outpolling candidates such as Beto O'Rourke, Julian Castro, Marianne Williamson, and Tulsi Gabbard in these states. But he's still losing. He's still going to lose. Money can buy a lot of things, but it can't buy Steyer a win.

The same appears to be true for President Trump. Here's another scary chart, from Axios a week ago.



How's that working out for Trump? As I mentioned in the last post, a new Gallup poll is just the latest to show majority support for impeachment and removal from office.

Currently, 52% say Trump should be impeached and removed from office, while 46% say he should not be. This is roughly the opposite of what Gallup found in June when asked in the context of special counselor Robert Mueller's investigation.

In politics, money has a huge impact -- but you can't sell something that most Americans don't want to buy.