Obama proving unusually unreliable

The tradition is that the local host committee for each party's national political convention raises $50 million or so in private money to subsidize the big show.

Almost always, the host committee comes up short of the funds needed, a few weeks before the convention, and the party's presidential candidate and his organization help them out at the last minute, to put the fundraising over the top.

Barack Obama, in addition to opting out of receiving federal campaign funds, because he's proven he can raise far more than the available federal $84 million (which he pledged earlier to take), has let it be known that he wll not allow his organization to help raise funds for the national Democratic convention in Denver. He is shunning this traditional role of the nominee, even though he presently has $43 million in the bank. This is leaving his party in the lurch.

Obama is couching it terms of eschewing PAC and lobbyist money--the major private source for party convention funds. He is claiming to be all about reform and integrity, and that the system needs changing. It may well, but right dead in the middle of the campaign is not the place to start.

Obama is already in trouble with old line Democrats, who made their distaste for him painfully obvious by rolling up huge margins for his opponent, Hillary Clinton, in several major, big Democratic states. Hanging the party faithful out to dry on their convention is only making the problem worse.

A close Obama loss in November, and he'll come to rue the day he abandoned the federal election system and his party in its hour of need--all on the same day.

What a woeful campaign beginning!