Richardson gellin’ after joke fest on The Daily Show

Gov. Bill Richardson was funny and competent on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Wednesday night.

During an appearance that was technically tied to the paperback release of his book “Between Worlds: The Making of an American Life,” Richardson managed to get in his familiar points about experience and policy while also cracking a few jokes and taking Stewart’s shots in a lighthearted manner.

Stewart started by asking Richardson, “What will be the secret that derails your campaign?” Richardson didn’t really answer, but said his campaign has shown progress.

“I started below the margin of error, and now I’m moving up,” he said. “… We’re in the second tier, but I’m doing better.”

When discussing the world leaders with whom he’s negotiated, Richardson mentioned Saddam Hussein, the Taliban and North Korea’s leader.

“That all worked out very well,” Stewart said.

Richardson described meeting with Hussein a decade ago and securing the release of American hostages. The way he tells the story, he offended Saddam by crossing his legs and showing the former Iraqi dictator the bottom of his shoe – a grave insult in Arab culture that could have resulted in his death.

Richardson was able to recover from the misstep and secure the release of the hostages.

“That’s an absolutely wild story,” Stewart said. “Were you gellin’ at the time?”

It was a reference to Dr. Scholl’s gel insoles.

“Yeah, I was,” Richardson said.

The money game

On the money front, Richardson is just over $100,000 short of his goal of raising $500,000 before Saturday’s midnight reporting deadline, but he has plenty of time left and will likely get there. The reports, filed next month, will be the first major indicator of the financial health of campaigns.

Many analysts think candidates will have to raise $15-20 million by the end of June, the next reporting deadline, to stay competitive. Richardson apparently doesn’t think so.

His campaign has refused to release any information to the media about how much he has raised, but Steve Terrell is reporting on his blog today that he has seen a fundraising letter the governor’s campaign sent out. The letter implies that Richardson had raised $3.22 million as of March 22 in setting a goal of raising another $2.7 million, bringing his total to $5.92 million, by the end of June.

Why $5.92 million instead of $6 million? Who knows.

Either way, expect the cash given to Hillary, Obama and Edwards to dwarf that given to Richardson.

Update, 11:45 a.m.

Here’s a comparison: Edwards, in an e-mail I just received, reported raising more than $1.8 million on Wednesday night alone, given by almost 19,000 contributors.