So what's up with Hillary's campaign debt?

[Taverner]

Is she still in the hole - or have donations covered it by now?

[Idealism]

1. She wrote off $11 million in personal loans

and won't have to repay debts until after her SoS term is up.

[SoCalDem]

2. Those vendors in all the states must be thrilled to wait even longer

to be paid for the donuts, snow shovels, stage lighting contracts, car rentals, hotel rooms, meals, etc..

I'd like to see a "New Rule" for campaigning.. balanced budget or you're done.. Candidates who run around ballyhooing their support for the "little guy..the entrepreneur", and then stiff the ones who stepped up to help their campaign, should not be allowed to just "not pay them"..talk about hypocrisy...Bah!!

[ThomWV]

3. I believe in this case "wrote off" means something a bit different

As it has been explained to me: when the campaign comes to an end a wealthy candidate, successful or not, will lend the campaign (which is virtually always a corporation) enough money to pay off the bills and then take it as a personal loss for their own tax purposes. That's what I've been told, haven't bothered to try to check it out.

[SoCalDem]

4. I hope that's it.. It always irks me when locals step up to provide things

for campaigns, and then get pushed to the back of the line when it's time to start paying people..:)

[Captain Hilts]

5. It's not unusual for presidential campaigns to take a couple of years to pay vendors...

this is something that makes Obama and Bush unique - paying promptly.

A friend of mine worked for a firm that did work for Bush/Quayle in '88 and by '90 debts STILL hadn't been paid.

[Captain Hilts]

6. "Balanced budget?" Would eliminate pretty much every candidate save Bloomberg, Obama, Bush...

and Romney.

All the others would be out.

[SoCalDem]

9. What it would do, is to eliminate people who had no

real support.. BUT, it would have to be instituted AFTER a revamping of the roooooolz..

Like campaigns HAVE to raise money in small amounts like Obama did.. The MORE supporters you have the more money you raise.. it's as it should be..

I loathe the "self-financers"..Being rich does not mean you know how to govern..

Obama showed everyone HOW you do it..

If campaigns can get back to ideas, not not so much about who can self-finance, we will all be better off..

[Captain Hilts]

10. Your suggestion is completely unrealistic and elitist. nt

[AtomicKitten]

7. Many colleges were stiffed, but I thought the $6+ million balance was for Penn's services.

I think they were hard-pressed finding anyone interested in paying off that a-hole.

[Taverner]

12. Well, Penn did not deliver

He hurt her campaign much much more than he helped it

Hopefully she has learned her lesson about the DLC, yet I doubt it

[AtomicKitten]

13. Penn's lobbyist ties to Colombia were grotesquely inappropriate.

The DLC will continue to try to assert/insert their policy positions, and I'm hoping they won't find a compliant Democratic president in Obama. This is the time for Obama to restore and reaffirm the basic tenets of the Democratic Party that have been muddled by the centrist policies that came before him.

[Doctor Cynic]

8. She should turn herself into a bank holding company to receive free Uncle Sam $.

[ThomWV]

11. Also, she builds about as many cars as GM these days so she might qualify there too.