Sign of weakness for the O’Malley campaign.

For a successful campaign, the opportunity costs now of opting into public financing given how it restricts spending are just too high:

The last major candidate to adhere to such strict spending limits was John Edwards, the former U.S. senator and vice presidential nominee who opted into the matching program in the fall of 2007.

His campaign manager, Joe Trippi, now likens a publicly financed candidate to a terminally ill person on life support. If O’Malley goes through with his plan to accept matching funds, “that is effectively the end of his campaign,” said Trippi. “No campaign that is serious can win taking that money.”

“It is a brutally tough decision to make,” he said. “They know this — it’s akin to a doctor sitting down a patient and telling them they are terminally ill, informing them that they have days to live and there is nothing that can be done to save them, but there is something that can be done to give them another few months of life.”

And given the choice, “who wouldn’t pick extending the inevitable?” said Trippi.