WOW LOVER 68

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Hello World

The annual Bill and Hillary Clinton cash caravan rolls onto the East End next weekend with a quartet of big-cash fundraisers -- even as some Clinton campers worry donors are feeling tapped out.

The Clintons' weekend out east marks the height of Hamptons checkbook season, but hardly its conclusion. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton returns on the night of Aug. 25 to raise cash for Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and might mine more seaside cash at as-yet unscheduled events that weekend, Democrats said.

The senator's campaign is reluctant to say how much the upcoming fetes will raise, but similar weekenders have reportedly brought in between $250,000 and $500,000 or more.

It's also not clear where the former first couple will rest their heads during their Long Island stay: In years past they have bunked at Steven Spielberg's mansion near Georgica Pond.

Clinton has already banked $22 million despite the absence of a viable Republican challenger, stoking speculation she's stowing the money away for a presidential bid. She kicks off this weekend's trip with a Friday night event at the East Hampton home of Ira Statfeld and Michael Recanati, a local Democratic power couple befriended by the Clintons.

The senator is expected to arrive hours before her husband, who will probably fly in for the next day's events.

On Saturday morning, the Clintons will be feted at a $2,000-a-plate brunch at the Sag Harbor house of philanthropist Lisa Perry, who was a Lincoln bedroom guest in the late 1990s.

After a stopover at another event at an undisclosed location, the Clintons cap off the weekend with a serenade from '80s pop-metal poster boy Jon Bon Jovi, performing at the East Hampton residence of cash register king Bill Nuti, president of retail technology company NCR.