"Jewish Donors Warn Obama on Israel," said The Wall Street Journal. "Obama's Jewish Backers on Edge Over His Mideast Peace Plan," proclaimed the Los Angeles Times.

The denunciations were swift and final. President Obama, it seemed, had made a fundamental error in calling for Israel to return to its 1967 borders, with land swaps. Donors, according to the new narrative, would soon be switching their allegiances to the G.O.P.

But conversations with nearly a dozen of the top Jewish fund-raisers in New York reveal a much different reality, as rainmakers say they continue to back the president they overwhelmingly supported three years ago.

"This is nonsense," said David Pollak, a former chairman of the state Democratic Party. "I think anyone who would not give money to Barack Obama because of remarks he made the other day wasn't giving money to him in 2008."

Last August, hedge-fund manager and Obama megabundler Daniel Loeb sent a kiss-off letter to his friends in financial services, expressing his sense of being betrayed by the administration and comparing the treatment they were getting to that of a battered wife. Mr. Loeb's sentiment was echoed by several Wall Street Democrats and taken as proof that the financial industry was turning its back on the party.

A similar letter from a major Jewish donor was feared to be forthcoming. But so far, only Haim Saban, the billionaire entertainment executive, has publicly declared that he was finished donating to the president. There was just one problem, though: Mr. Saban was a staunch supporter of Hillary Clinton and had never given money to Mr. Obama. Furthermore, Mr. Saban pledged to keep supporting down-ticket Democrats.

Mr. Obama's New York supporters said most of these accounts rely disproportionately on voices like that of Mr. Saban, or, more often, the heads of major national Jewish organizations, who have long been lukewarm about Mr. Obama.

"You've got all the professional Jews who are mouthpieces and speak for themselves. They don't like Obama," said one real-estate executive who has collected hundreds of thousands of dollars for Democrats. "There are people who talk to the press all day long, and they probably didn't support Obama last time."

The stakes are high for the Obama campaign. According to some estimates, nearly 60 percent of the money raised by the Democratic National Committee is donated by Jews, and any drop in support for the president's re-election could endanger the campaign's ambitious goal of raising $1 billion.

Earlier this week, a few dozen members of Obama's regional finance committee met with Jim Messina, the campaign manager for the Obama 2012 effort. According to one bundler present, they discussed how Obama can win, even if the economy remains in the tank, and how the campaign can attract the smaller, grass-roots donors. The topic of Israel didn't come up once.

"You have concerns among Democratic supporters of Obama, but they are concerns among friends," said Robert Zimmerman, a prominent fund-raiser. "And there is no trust or confidence in the Republicans."

Jewish fund-raisers say that they fear for Israel's future too, but continue to support the president, mainly because his Middle East speech didn't contain anything Mr. Obama hadn't already articulated. Plus, they point out, Israel is just one issue among several, and Mr. Obama remains more palatable than any of his opponents on issues ranging from the war in Iraq to the environment and preserving what remains of the social safety net.

"I have friends who are concerned, who wish Obama hadn't said that," said one bundler. "But at the end of the day, are they going to support Mitt Romney? I don't think so."

If they run into resistance from Jewish donors, bundlers said that they will lay out the many reasons they continue to support the president--reminding any reluctant supporters that Mr. Obama's speech only repeated the peace plan that has been accepted doctrine going back to George H.W. Bush, and that it's supported by Hillary Clinton, who remains a trusted figure in the Jewish community. And they will point to Mr. Obama's well-received address at AIPAC as proof that most Jews line up solidly behind the president, despite what the press might say.

The fund-raising has been a bit slow in the early going, according to several fund-raisers, but is expected to pick up once there's a real Republican opponent to contrast with the current president.

"The message is going to be simple, whether you are a Jewish donor, a black donor, a Hispanic donor, whatever," said one fund-raiser. "Re-elect Obama or this country is screwed."

dfreedlander@observer.com

Beyond just selling out the Skirball Center every month, the organization is seeking official status as a non-profit and adopting a set of Governing Bylaws. 

As part of this maturation, NYTM is creating a 13 member board, with four of the seats to be filled by community-elected members. 

The candidates for the first two community seats will introduce themselves tonight and voting will take place online over the next three days. 

It's a strong field of contenders. "Once I saw the folks running I called Nate and told him I was dropping out," says SeatGeek's Ben Kessler. "There are people I would rather vote for than myself." 

Check out The Candidates! >>

Hmmm. This rationale may have been convincing in 1845, when the law was passed that made Election Day a Tuesday. Now, it's just absurd.

As Dan Amira at Daily Intel points out, the number one reason people fail to vote is "No time off/too busy."

Amira has a great interview with Jacob Soboroff, executive director at Why Tuesday?, a group dedicated to changing when we vote. Soboroff would prefer a Saturday/Sunday vote, and says big names like Mayor Bloomberg and President Obama have endorsed this idea.

It seems like a good idea until you realize that it will completely disenfranchise the hipster vote, who consider Friday and Saturday sacred party days, and Sunday the Lord's way of curing a hangover.

bpopper [at] observer.com

@benpopper

Update - Noon: 11,751 voters have checked in from 7,440 locations. Video of Crowley talking elections and astronauts below.

Foursquare users who glance at their mobile apps this morning will notice something new: polling stations near them pushed to the top of the Places page.

On top of this, Foursquare has created a special "I Voted" badge, which unlocks as soon as a user checks in to a polling station.

Will location notifications and game mechanics help to get out the vote? It's certainly an interesting experiment. As of 9:15 a.m., more than 3,800 folks had checked in to vote at some 2,300 locations all over the country.

"We use game mechanics to encourage people to do things we think they'll be really excited about doing," Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley told Read Write Web. "It could be traveling to different countries or seeking out new places or new experiences. I don't think of it so much as a game. It's using the mechanics to, you know, influence behavior and try to change behavior a little. And I think that really plays into some of the stuff we're doing with the I Voted Badge.

The group skewed 2/1 male to female, although this probably reflects the demographic of Foursqaure more than gender participation in our grand democratic process.

When all is said and done, Foursquare should have some interesting data on which polling stations saw the most activity.

Add this to the city's official Twitter tag for reporting problems at polling places and there is going to be a more detailed snapshot of how the election played out at the street level than ever before.

bpopper [at] observer.com | @benpopper

Crowley Talks Astronauts, Voting via Game Mechanics and Foursquare's Incredible Growth