There's a new study out this morning from the Campaign Finance Research Institute that reminds us — for all the talk of how much small money Sen. Barack Obama has raised on the Internet — of the role of big money in politics. It should be sobering to those who think that small donor money obviates the need for fundamental reform of the campaign finance system.

This study just looked at one path of big money: the broad array of nonprofits active in the 2006 election: 527 political organizations, Section 501(c)(4) social welfare groups, (c)(5) labor unions and (c)(6) trade associations, and "taxable" entities that operate as nonprofits. Check it out.

It should would be nice to get access to the databases the authors used for this study.