If Boston College chose America's commander-in-chief, George Bush would have won the 2000 election in a nail-biter, - over Bill Bradley - John Kerry would have won with 91 percent of the 2004 vote, and Barack Obama would coast into the White House a year from now.
At least that's what the latest campaign filings from the Federal Election Committee tell us.
Every three months, the FEC releases a report listing the donations made to presidential, congressional, and other federal campaigns. Any donation over $250 is listed for the public - and plenty of donations have come from the Heights.
In 2004, those donations went in one direction. Everyone from then-track coach David Counts to Executive Vice President Pat Keating contributed to a total of over $20,000 in donations to Kerry, while that election's victor got exactly $2,000 from BC and that donation came from a single undergrad.
This year Barack Obama leads the way in BC donations, followed surprisingly by Chris Dodd, who sits at a lowly eighth in fundraising nationally. BC Law professor Scott Fitzgibbon wasted $2,300 on recent campaign dropout Sam Brownback, but it's doubtful he minds: Fitzgibbon has donated a mind-boggling $89,010 to federal campaigns since 1997, almost $20,000 more than Warren Buffett. Of the 15 contributors who listed BC as their employer this year, six are undergraduate professors, four teach at the law school, four are administrators at various levels, and one is a graduate student.
It's clear that BC isn't going to be a decisive monetary battleground for the candidates - let alone an electoral one situated in this bluest of states. BC's financial influence sits somewhere in the middle, well above the paltry $1,200 donated from Notre Dame to this year's crop of presidential candidates, but far less than the mind-boggling amount our Ivy-hued Cambridge neighbors has given thus far: $304,100.
But BC's numbers get more interesting, and more influential, when you take a look at the donations made by our very own aristocracy: the Board of Trustees.
