While we are still waiting for Rudy Giuliani to fess up about his cash, word is slowly leaking out about Mitt Romney’s third-quarter fund raising. According a report by the Associated Press based on an unnamed Romney adviser, the former Massachusetts governor will report about $10 million in contributions from July to September, not including a $6 million personal loan Romney made to his campaign during the period. If you’re counting, that means Romney has invested at least $16 million of his own money in his campaign for the White House so far. Sixteen million is a lot by most measures--ok, maybe not in Romney’s home base, where the owner of the Boston Red Sox just bought a $16 million house only to announce his plans to demolish it.

But the real news is linked to where most of that money likely went.

According to Evan Tracey, head of the Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks political ad buys, Romney has run nearly 10,000 TV spots since February, to the tune of nearly $8 million. That’s way more than his key GOP rivals--including Giuliani, who has aired zero TV ads; John McCain, who hit New Hampshire TV for the first time last week; and Fred Thompson, who aired literally one ad on the Fox News Channel the day before he formally got into the presidential race. In fact, it is more than anyone in the race. The only Democrat to come close is Bill Richardson, who has aired 4,000 ads, mostly in Iowa and New Hampshire. According to Tracey, Barack Obama has spent $2 million on TV ads, with Joe Biden and Chris Dodd next at roughly $1 million apiece. Hillary Clinton and John Edwards, fairly well known to early-primary-state voters, have spent very little on TV so far.

So what have 10,000 ads done for Romney’s campaign? It’s hard to say. On one hand, he’s leading in local polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, where most of his ads have aired. Yet Romney is still a blip in many national polls, where he has lost some ground in recent weeks. The latest ABC/Washington Post poll out Wednesday morning has Romney at just 11 percent, trailing Giuliani (34 percent), Thompson (17 percent) and McCain (12 percent). Still, the Romney camp is hoping to reverse the trend. The campaign is said to be expanding its TV ads to two more key primary states, South Carolina and Florida, in coming weeks. The big question: What happens to Romney's poll numbers when Giuliani and the others finally go big on TV?

Campaigns can be so tricky sometimes. Barack Obama had hoped to dominate the news cycle today with a big foreign policy speech and a trip to Iowa, but all it took was a little link forwarded to reporters by the Clinton campaign to upstage things. If you haven’t heard, Clinton, according to a very short post on her campaign website, raised $27 million over the last three months--making it the first quarter she’s out-raised Obama. No question it’s a significant accomplishment. July to September is a traditionally slow fund-raising period for candidates, which makes her numbers all the better. And yeah, Clinton has finally raised more money than the guy who’s had all the buzz. (Anyone remember that Oprah fundraiser a few weeks back?)

But as with most fund-raising numbers, there is the fine print. For one thing, the only cash that really counts right now is contributions dedicated for the primary. And in that department, Clinton raised $22 million vs. Obama’s $19 million over the last three months. Sad to say, but in a campaign year like this, when every financial record has been thrown out the window, a $3 million difference in a single quarter isn’t all that.  The big picture, based on the summary numbers (since we have to wait until they file the nitty-gritty to the FEC later this month): it looks as though Obama still leads when it comes to fund-raising strictly for the primary. According to his campaign, the Illinois senator has raised roughly $75 million to spend on the primary campaign. Clinton, meanwhile, has raised about $62 million for the primary alone. Of course, that’s not the only thing the two Democratic frontrunners are quibbling about. Last week, the Obama campaign talked up the fact that it had at least 93,000 new contributors during the third quarter. Today, the Clinton camp boasted of 100,000 new donors. Wow and wow-except that the Obama campaign admitted earlier this summer that its “donors” include people who buy campaign t-shirts and bumper stickers, a tally not often included by other campaigns, since many farm out their merchandising to outside groups.

As crucial as these numbers are, we're still waiting for the most important figures when it comes to Clinton v. Obama.  The big question facing the Dems: How much did each campaign spend over the summer? Did Clinton continue to play it frugal? And how much money does each side have in the bank to spend on the primaries? We’ll have to wait for more fine print.