Clinton Campaign's Highest Suggested Donation Is $2,700 in English, but Only $250 in Spanish [Updated]

    The brand new 2016 presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton will "[embrace] small donors in early fundraising," according to a Monday Politico story. The second-time presidential candidate wants to "make even small-dollar donors feel like they are part of the inner circle." Based on the campaign's website, however, expectations for those "small-dollar donors" who speak Spanish are considerably lower than those for their English-speaking counterparts.
    The main donation page for the site includes preset amount buttons for $5, $25, $50, $100, $500, $1,000 and the maximum for the primary election cycle, $2,700. However, the preset amounts for the Spanish language version of the donation page are significantly less: $3, $5, $10, $25, $50, $100 and $250. Both pages includes an "other" button where donors can fill in a different amount. Here are screenshots of the two different versions of the donation page:

    According to the Politico story, "the campaign isn’t asking for big checks... The focus for now, donors say, is to bring in $2,700 checks from individuals, or the maximum contribution for a primary." Based on the two-tier system above, Mrs. Clinton's campaign appears to expect most of those maximum contributions will come from English-speaking donors.
    The Clinton campaign did not immediately respond to a request from comment.

UPDATE: Since this article ran, the Clinton campaign changed the Spanish language donations page to match the English language page. As of now, the latest Google cached version of the page still shows the original lower amounts.

Note: A version of this post first appeared at The Weekly Standard.

The Presidential Inaugural Committee: Out With the Old, In With the... Old

    Daniel Halper of the Weekly Standard noted the following on Thursday:

Two days after reports that hotels in Washington are not filling up ahead of Barack Obama's second inauguration, the president emailed supporters to encourage them to come to the festivities scheduled for next month in Washington, D.C.
"Because of you, I'll be taking the oath of office again on January 21st," Obama wrote in an email to supporters. "I'd like you to be part of this historic moment -- whether that's in Washington, D.C., or wherever you call home. As we make plans, we want to make sure the people who made this inauguration possible are the first to know what's happening."

    Also being a subscriber to the Obama for America email list used incessantly during the campaign, I received the same email as did no doubt millions of others.  The email goes on to note that to be updated on further developments relating to the upcoming inauguration, one can sign up for yet another email list and a link is provided:

Sign up and stay updated: 

http://action.2013pic.org/Inauguration

    The link is to a website established by the President Inaugural Committee 2013 (PIC).  There a visitor can enter an email address to receive the updates.  Once an email address is entered, visitors are taken to.... (drumroll, please) a donations page!

    While this organization is separate from the President's Obama for America campaign organization, once one gets beyond the honorary leadership of the committee, quite a few familiar names pop up:

• Chair, PIC Board of Directors  Stephanie Cutter
• Chair, PIC Finance  Rufus Gifford
• Chair, National Day of Service  Jen O'Malley Dillon 
• Chair, National Mall  Patrick Gaspard
• Chair, Inaugural Parade  Jim Messina
• Chair, Inaugural Balls and Receptions  Julianna Smoot
• Chief Executive Officer  Stephen Kerrigan (CEO of the 2012 Democratic National Convention Committee)
• Executive Director  David J. Cusack (Senior advisor to the CEO of the 2012 Democratic National Convention Committee) 
• Senior Advisor  Clark Jennings (Senior director of convention operations at the 2012 Democratic National Convention Committee, March-Oct. 2012.)
• Communications Director  Brent Colburn (Communications director at Obama for America.)
• Technology Coordinator  Mackenzie Walker (Executive Tech Assistant at Obama for America from July 2012.)
• Compliance Director  Jesse Sendroff (Compliance director for the Democratic National Convention Committee, Dec. 2011-Oct. 2012.)

    Since it appears the Inaugural Committee is basically the president's reelection campaign with a new coat of paint, it can be assumed that the next three weeks will be filled with opportunities to donate to the 57th Presidential Inauguration.  And in case you were wondering, the PIC wants your donation to be as hassle-free as possible, so in keeping with the tradition established by Obama for America, you won't have to be bother to turn over your credit card and enter that annoying three-digit security code (security-schmecurity!)  It's comforting to know as we enter the uncertainty of 2013 that a new year always brings, some things will never change.

Drink, or Donate: Lesser of Two Evils?

    OK, if the dilapidated barn photo mystified you, try this one on for size:

DEADLINE: For the price of buying your friend a drink—pitch in $5 before midnight to help this campaign win: OFA.BO/oiu8sg
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 1, 2012

Is this the campaign equivalent of a designated driver?  Designated donator?  Is the campaign implying that its supporters might need to be persuaded to lay off the bottle?  Is this another subtle indication of the panic setting in among the Democrats?

Thanks For the Memoriam

    Lately, I feel that I have belabored the subject of the Obama administration's assault on parody, but they've done it again.  Yesterday, James Taranto closed his Best of the Web column with a piece commenting on the Obama campaign's latest effort to squeeze money out of supporters:

"President Obama is launching an events registry that will allow a birthday boy or a bride-to-be to encourage their friends to give to the campaign--instead of a gift," Politico reports:

"Got a birthday, anniversary, or wedding coming up?" the campaign wrote in a blog post. "Let your friends know how important this election is to you--register with Obama 2012, and ask for a donation in lieu of a gift."
"It's a great way to support the President on your big day. Plus, it's a gift that we can all appreciate--and goes a lot further than a gravy bowl," the campaign wrote.

Yes, it's for real. We're proud to say we got into the swing of things. The other day a friend's uncle died, so we bought him a card--"I'm so sorry for your loss," it said--and sent it to the Obama campaign instead.

So just for fun today, I checked out the donation portion of the Obama campaign's website, and low and behold, there it was:

In some respects, it's only right.  The dead have often voted for the Democrats in various parts of the country. It's about time they started paying their fair share.