It should be noted that Obama's financial advantage over McCain is offset in part by the resources of the Republican National Committee, which had far more money in the bank than the Democratic National Committee did. Both national parties can spend money on behalf of the presidential candidates. Both the Obama and McCain camps couldn't come to an agreement on how to limit spending by the campaigns and outside groups heading into the late summer party conventions. I'm not here to defend Obama, I'm just stating a simple truth that the current system is broken. To run a national campaign you need a lot of money, and that number is only going to get bigger in every election cycle.