This Week in National Insecurity: Orwellian Edition

DOD photo / <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:US_soldiers_stuck_in_sand_in_southern_Afghanistan.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a>

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Whichever side of the fence you land on, chances are you agree that America’s not a very secure nation these days: economically, electorally, or physically. So we grabbed our lensatic compass, rucksack, and canteen, then mounted out across the global media landscape for a quick recon. Whether you’re scared because our military isn’t good enough—or you’re scared because it’s too good—here’s all the ammunition you need, in a handy debrief.

Today is our special Orwellian edition! Black is white, down is up, and we’ve always been at war with Oceania! In this installment: Islamophobia is the new Beatlemania; Iraq is the new utopia; Afghanistan is the new Iraq; a robot heat ray is the new billyclub; virtual war is the new war war; and sometimes James Bond loses…his life.

The sitrep:

The United States government’s national threat level is Elevated, or Yellow. You’re welcome.

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We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

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