Passing along the Inq's reporting, without comment:

Brady said he could have won the election if "cooler heads" in the appellate courts had struck down the city's campaign-contribution limits before the election. He said he had commitments from supporters, particularly labor unions, to pour millions of dollars into the campaign if the caps came off. "It was an unlevel playing field," Brady said.

Now Brady may have to defend his seat in Washington. He is the only white House member representing a majority African American district, and State Rep. Thomas Blackwell IV, whose father was a U.S. representative, said he was thinking of running. Some also are talking up State Sen. Anthony Williams.

"A strong nonwhite candidate could make trouble for him," said the Philadelphia NAACP chapter's president, Jerry Mondesire. ...

What, you thought that was the last election ever?

On Tuesday, May 22, the man who I hope will be the next president is coming to town, my former professor Barack Obama, and I hope we can all take the momentum and energy from yesterday into a hell of a fun rally for him at the Electric Factory.

I've blogged about this Community Kick-Off Rally before, but want to refresh everyone on the details.

Tickets are $25 for students, $50 for the general public, and $100 for the "VIP" area to be upstairs in the lounge and off the packed floor. That's all it takes. (If you want to give more, you can, obvs. But this is as cheap as presidential fundraising events ever get.)

Live results here, and Tom Knox is conceding as I type. If current numbers hold, it'll be somewhere around:

Nutter 35
Knox 28
Brady 18
Fattah 14
Evans 6

Two of the three new Council members -- Campbell and Savage -- look like they're falling to Curtis Jones and Maria Quinonez-Sanchez. Ben Ramos and Bill Green look like they'll be replacing Blondell Reynolds-Brown and Juan Ramos on the at-large side, but, still, this reform wave that led to 60%+ of the mayoral vote going to the relatively non-power candidates didn't lead to a big change in Council.

Congrats to Councilmen Kenney and Goode for retaining their seats. Posting on YPP makes a difference, people!

Let's talk.

Nutter 36%
Knox 25%
Fattah 13%
Brady 12%
Evans 6%
Undecided 5%

MoE at ± 4.2%. Nutter leads among both African-American and white voters.

Crosstabs here; "1000 city of Philadelphia adults were interviewed by SurveyUSA 05/11/07 through 05/13/07. Of them, 920 were registered to vote. Of them, 698 were Democrats. Of the Democrats, 560 were identified by SurveyUSA as likely to vote in the 5/15/07 Democratic Primary and are included in this survey."

In a typical presidential campaign, the candidates spend almost all of their time in the early primary states, typically venturing outside of those states only for high-ticket fundraising events put together by and for those who don't mind dropping $2300+ for dinner and a handshake.

Barack Obama is not running a typical campaign.

He's coming here on Tuesday, May 22 for a series of events, and the centerpiece is a Community Kick-Off Rally at the Electric Factory at 5pm. This is not a $2300+ per-person event, or a $500 cocktail party, or a $250 "stand in back of the people who attended the cocktail party to watch a speech on tv monitors."

You can join us for as little as $25.

I was still drafting and redrafting my testimony this morning until I heard the news this morning, but, I figured, I'm not just going to let this rot on my C drive for a few months. So, skipping the introductory formalities and with the understanding that this was just a draft, here goes:
+++++
I would like to make three general remarks, and then I am happy to answer questions. The first regards the purpose of campaign finance reform as it relates to these proposed bills; the second regards the ignored role of the Internet in this 2007 campaign and beyond, and finally, a note on the public financing bill also before Council today.

With regards to the first, the purpose of campaign finance legislation is not to ensure that campaigns are well-financed. The primary purpose behind laws like this is to attempt, as best we can, to curb the appearance and reality of corruption of elected officials through large political contributions. Under the law, contribution limits are reasonable so long as they do not prevent candidates from, as the Buckley decision held, “amassing the resources necessary for effective [campaign] advocacy.”

Neither of these bills are necessary in order for the candidates to be able to fairly and effectively compete with each other. On that, let me give some illustrative examples:

You rock.  Plain and simple.

Since I first announced this appeal for the key suburban Philadelphia congressional races, you've contributed  $3,175.10 combined to Lois Murphy, Joe Sestak and Patrick Murphy.  I've already invited five local online activists -- including Mr. U-A himself -- to the big-ticket fundraising event this Friday afternoon at the Franklin Institute with Sen. Hillary Clinton, and there's still room for me to invite at least one more.  Raise another $125 and we add another invite, and another person for every $300 thereafter.

(Some of the money already raised was $300 contributions from folks who plan to attend.)

Who's next?  That's for you to help decide.  Anyone who gives $20 has the right to nominate themselves or someone else for a seat at this event.  Give the PA 8-6-7 candidates $53.09, and you've got a real head start.   All you have to do is visit my ActBlue page for the event and make a contribution, and I'll make a decision later today.

As everyone here knows, these are among the biggest, tightest races in the country.  As just one example, Bill Clinton was here yesterday for rallies on behalf of both Patrick Murphy and Lois Murphy yesterday (after already having done a rally for Sestak last week), followed by Barack Obama last night, Al Franken, Howard Dean . . . you get the idea.  Or watch Patrick's appearance with Katie Couric from Tuesday night

So if you can, please give, and give generously. Winning's more fun when you're part of the team, and I'd love to see you there on Friday.

Any questions?  I'm here.

I think at this point, I don't need to tell anyone at YPP about the importance of the House races in the Philadelphia suburbs, in which Democrats Lois Murphy, Joe Sestak and Patrick Murphy (subject of a major profile in today's Inquirer) are facing vulnerable Republican incumbents in winnable races.  Take all three, and Democrats will likely take back the House.

My wife and I are serving on the host committee for a fundraiser for all three campaigns being held next Friday afternoon, October 13, at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.  In addition to all three candidates being there, Sen. Hillary Clinton is the featured guest.

Big races require big money, and this is no exception: the minimum ticket price is $300, which I know generally puts events like this beyond the reach of many.

And then I had an idea, and some help.  Because my co-blogger Matt Marcotte was generous enough to contribute $300 for the event, but since he can't make it, we wanted to invite one of you in his stead.

So here's the deal:  I have set up an ActBlue page for this event.  If you contribute at least $20 to the candidates -- in what ever distribution you like -- then you get the right to nominate yourself (or others) and explain why you should attend.  And for every additional $300 we collectively raise through this appeal, one more person gets chosen to attend the event.  

(Who chooses?  Me and Matt.  We will be fair, and we will heed the wisdom of the crowd.)

We want to open up this opportunity to as many people as possible, and with your help, we can.

If you need more information about the event, email me at acbonin -at- hotmail dot com and I'll forward an invitation and/or answer all questions.

Please give, and give generously.  The House is at stake, after all.