$150 million in September

Exciting news for the ground-breaking Obama campaign that they have raised more than $150 million during September.

Even more impressively they received donations from more than 632,000 new donors and nowhave more than 3.1 million donors altogether who have given an average of $86.

This is very impressive on several fronts:

It once again demonstrates that Obama is creating genuine mass enthusiasm across the US.

It shows that it is possible to outraise the GOP's big donors and special interests by getting a large number of small donations.

And finally it means that Obama is going to be able to continue to out advertise and out organise McCain from now on in.

Are there lessons here for the Lib Dems? Yes - although we shouldn't pretend that it will be easy or that everything that works in the US will work here.

But it does reinforce what we already knew (and what a few of our seats alreay do) - money is out there if you can identify the right people to ask, put a convincing case that their donation will make a difference and demonstarte that you are spending money effectively.

One of the Local Parties I work for has a regular income (ie from Standing Orders) of nearly £3K per month now - enough to cover all the regular costs. 100% of anything else we raise from events, appeals etc. pays for extra campaigning.

All it has taken to achieve that - and there is still a lot of untapped potential - is to ask the right people in the right way and to build up over time.