More bad news for the McCain camp

The Washington Times reports this morning that McCain’s campaign fundraising numbers continue to be low:

Sen. John McCain’s campaign has raised only $3.7 million to date for the third quarter, an influential friend of the Arizona Republican has told The Washington Times.

“The hope was to reach $4.5 million, about a third of what was raised in the ‘disastrous’ second quarter,” the McCain supporter told Ralph Z. Hallow, who will report the story in Friday’s editions of The Times.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity to protect his relationship with the senator, the friend said: “Those are gross numbers, not net. Plus the campaign is carrying $2.5 to $3 million in debt. [He’s] done for.”

But Jill Hazelbaker, press secretary for the McCain campaign, said her boss “is up in at least five new national polls by two to nine points. Pollsters and experts agree that McCain is clearly gaining traction.” Ms. Hazelbaker also denied that money is a vital issue for Mr. McCain.

In spite of the spin from the McCain camp, this is not good news for the Arizona Senator. His three top aides resigned in July, as did his campaign manager and chief strategist, and this was all going on around the same time McCain was having to make cutbacks in his staff.

There was speculation back in June that McCain would back out of the presidential race sometime this month. I predicted at that time that McCain would stay in it for the first few primaries, long enough to finally figure out that Republicans are not interested in having him be their nominee for president. But if the lackluster fundraising continues (and we all know that it will), I’m not sure his campaign will even make it to the primaries.

Via Brian at Liberty Pundit.