Today's Chicago Tribune has an article on how the big money donors are still the ones who matter when it comes to Presidential races. These nuggets of info are the most useful from the article:

• "Among the three Democrats who raised the most during the quarter, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards collected the most in Iowa and South Carolina, while Clinton easily led in Nevada, according to a Tribune analysis. Obama narrowly outraised Clinton in New Hampshire."

This means that the love shown to Edwards in 2004 in Iowa is still there. And I don't expect it to go away during the 2008 caucus, either.

• "The other leading candidates from both parties relied even more heavily on big-money donors than did Obama, ranging from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who raised 74 percent of his funds from those who contributed at least $1,000, to Republican Mitt Romney, who raised 89 percent from such contributions. "

Mitt Romney has not tapped into the grassroots conservative base at all. I wonder whether those evangelical diatribes against Mormonism are too difficult to overcome.

• "At least 400 people gave to both Clinton and Obama, according to the Tribune's analysis. That group included musician Barry Manilow, who gave the maximum legal limit of $2,300 in mid-February to both. "

So goes Manilow, so goes the nation. Manilow has his finger on the pulse of America's heart.