August 23, 2012 1:34 AM
(CBS/AP) NEW YORK ? President Obama says the presidential contest is at a point similar to his favorite time in sports ? the fourth quarter of a tight basketball game.
Fundraising with the help of current and former National Basketball Association stars, Mr. Obama told a small group of donors gathered Wednesday night at Alice Tully Hall in Lincoln Center that the current campaign is like the final minutes of a basketball contest with his team up by a few points.
"But the other side is coming strong," Mr. Obama said. "And they play a little dirty. We've got a few folks on our team in foul trouble. We have a couple of injuries. And I believe they have one last run in them."
Mr. Obama raised $3 million with the help of the players, who included former Chicago Bulls superstar Michael Jordan and former New York Knick stara Walt Frazier, Bill Bradley and Patrick Ewing. NBA Commissioner David Stern also was there.
The president invoked Jordan's competitive nature, noting, "If you have seven minutes to go and you have a little bit of a lead, that's when you put them away."
The players were part a daylong fundraiser. Earlier, former and current players participated in a $250 per person autograph session and in a skills camp priced at for $5,000 for two people.
"It is very rare that I come to an event where I'm like the fifth or sixth most interesting person," the president joked at the Lincoln Center dinner.
Later, Mr. Obama changed out of his dark suit to shoot baskets with some of the players out of sight of the press. Mr. Obama, an avid basketball fan and a player, made a splash during his 2008 campaign by sinking a 3-point shot while visiting troops in Kuwait. His most recent star-studded game, also played in private, featured actors George Clooney and Tobey Maguire.
On a more serious note at the fundraiser, the president weighed in on Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin's controversial comments about "legitimate rape," mocking Akin by saying he "somehow missed science class."
"The interesting thing here," Mr. Obama said, "is that this is an individual who sits on the House Committee on Science and Technology but somehow missed science class," Mr. Obama said, "but it's representative of a desire to go backwards instead of forwards. And fights that we thought were settled twenty, thirty years ago."
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Source: http://www.benzworld.org/forums/off-topic/1669680-obama-raised-3-000-000-dollars.html
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