VILSACK, RICHARDSON, AND MATT. I think Tom Vilsack's departure from the race provides an answer to the question Matt posed in his column the other day: Why is a popular second term governor from a swing state, like Bill Richardson, not being taken seriously by the national media? As Matt points out, those are the guys who used to win elections, and Vilsack meets that definition as much as Richardson. Matt argues that the media now only treats celebrities as serious candidates. Well, Vilsack's failure to gain traction hardly disproves that thesis, but I think Matt's is only a partial explanation. The real reason is a related one: It costs a staggering amount of money to compete in presidential elections these days, and neither Vilsack nor Richardson has raised very much money. Indeed, the cw is that Vilsack dropped out in large part because he couldn't raise enough to compete. Of course, celebrity candidates have an infinitely easier time raising money, but if, say, Jon Corzine ran a self-financed campaign he could probably hang on long enough to get taken seriously (I think Mike Bloomberg's financial resources are as much the reason that he is treated more seriously as a potential contender than he deserves to be as the explanation Matt offered -- his presence in the media capital of the world.)
--Ben Adler
