Jim Messina

The White House maintains that President Obama still is not in full-bore campaign mode yet. But in Chicago, his reelection team is marking a milestone and declaring itself "ready to go. " Fired up, too. "Happy bday OFA!" campaign manager Jim Messina announced on Twitter, using the shorthand for Obama for America. Indeed it was a year ago Wednesday that the campaign to reelect the president was launched, an announcement that came not from Obama himself, but in a YouTube video that aimed to present the effort as one driven from the grass-roots, not from the center of power in Washington.

President Obama's reelection effort added $45 million to its coffers in February, a boost in fundraising as the campaign builds up its national infrastructure. The $45-million haul was raised jointly by the Democratic National Committee, Obama for America and two joint fundraising committees -- the Obama Victory Fund and the Swing State Victory Fund. According to the campaign, 105,000 of the more than 1.5 million donors last month were giving for the first time. The average donation was $59.04, and 97.7% of donations were in increments of $250 or less.

The mood in camp Obama is picking up these days, with the president's poll numbers inching northward and Republicans mired in what could turn out to be a prolonged, expensive battle for the GOP nomination. When Obama campaign officials look at a map of the U.S., they see any number of viable routes toward the 270 electoral college votes needed to win the presidency. In a fundraising pitch Thursday, Obama campaign manager Jim Messina laid out five potential pathways to the magic number.

His approval ratings are down and the economic recovery is sputtering. But President Obama brings to the 2012 campaign one strategic advantage that previous Democratic presidential candidates would have envied: the money to compete everywhere. Flush with more cash than all the Republican candidates combined, Obama's reelection campaign envisions an electoral map every bit as expansive as that of 2008, when he picked up a string of states that had been safe GOP territory for decades.

President Obama raised more than $70 million this summer for his reelection effort, his campaign announced Thursday morning. That total is short of the initial $86 million Obama raised for his campaign and the Democratic National Committee earlier this year, but one that nonetheless will likely dwarf the combined efforts of his potential Republican foes. In an email to supporters, Obama campaign manager Jim Messina said that Obama for America and the DNC raised the $70 million from more than 606,000 donors -- more than the previous quarter -- and that 98% of the 766,000 total gifts were in amounts of $250 or less.

President Obama's vast campaign operation raked in $86 million for his reelection and for the Democratic Party during the last three months, breaking previous records with a total far greater than those posted by his potential Republican opponents in the 2012 election. Initially, the Obama campaign had set a goal of raising $60 million. Republican candidates combined are expected to raise less than $35 million this quarter. Obama's haul points to the fundraising advantages of incumbency and to the staggering cost of the coming election, which in this cycle will feature a new, powerful role for independent groups that can raise unlimited sums.

President Obama has said he will have plenty of time to campaign for reelection in 2012, but his fledgling campaign team is wasting no time. Days after leaving his post as White House deputy chief of staff, campaign manager Jim Messina spent the last week hopscotching across the country to hold sessions with prominent donors in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York and Boston. His outreach is part of an intense push to rebuild the finance operation that helped Obama raise a record $745 million in 2008.

Jim Messina has already enjoyed a pop music career many would envy. He was only 19 when recruited into the Buffalo Springfield in 1967 to play alongside Neil Young and Stephen Stills. He then co-founded Poco, and found his greatest personal success as part of Loggins & Messina. The singer-songwriter has lately been re-examining that history, after some years away from active touring.