Last week I took a look at Mitt Romney's spending patterns ahead of the Ames, Iowa straw poll and determined that although Romney would likely get a bit of a boost from his win, the results actually augured poorly for his campaign because of the large amount of money that he had to expend in order to secure a win. Indeed at his rate of spending per vote in Ames, Romney would have to spend between $27.5 billion and $62 billion in order to win the popular vote, an amount of money that far outpaces his own vast personal wealth. As I noted at the time of my last post, perhaps that was an unfair comparison because it will undoubtedly cost less per vote in a general election than in a straw poll. That said, Romney's spending habits clearly are not sustainable, particularly because of the fact that he actually isn't bringing in such huge fundraising dollars (without his own contributions his campaign would have about the cash-on-hand of John McCain). And as a further indication of this unsustainability, Romney is reported to be drastically curtailing his expenditures on paid media. Marc Ambinder has the scoop.

For the time being, Gov. Mitt Romney's presidential campaign has stopped airing its television ads on network affiliates in Iowa and New Hampshire, Republicans who traffic in traffic say.

A rotation of ads is still running on cable television channels in those states. But the total volume will be markedly less noticable to television viewers than in July, when Romney's advertising saturated several Iowa television markets.

[...]

It's not unusual a campaign to pare down its advertising in the dog days of August. Romney's campaign had acknowledged that they would probably try to save a bit of money between the Ames straw poll on August 11th and Labor Day.

Romney's early advertising in Iowa and New Hampshire, his numerous visits to the states, and the mixed fortunes of his rivals are credited with his strong standing in early state polls. To date, the campaign has spent more than $6M on television and radio ads. Romney's ads have aired on cable in other early states, like South Carolina and Florida.

Sure, it sounds like there are some explanations as to why this might not actually be a sign of trouble for the Romney campaign, specifically that other campaigns traditionally have shied away from spending significant sums on ads during this period. But then again, the Romney campaign isn't exactly running a traditional campaign -- seldom have we seen a presidential candidate, outside of a Ross Perot or a Steve Forbes, self-fund to the extent that Romney has. So though there is an argument to be made about diminishing returns for advertising dollars, I'm not certain that it applies to Romney, who has spent like a drunken sailor and been able to do so by giving at least $9 million to his campaign so far.