By This Logic, Any East Coast Mayor Could Be John McCain’s VP

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If you’ve read any coverage of Sarah Palin’s interview with ABC, you know that she is continuing to insist she has foreign policy credibility because you can “see” Russia from her state. Mike Tomasky takes the idea for a test run.

“Russia,” as a political entity, isn’t a bunch of rocks in Siberia. It’s Moscow. We don’t dispute that, right? Right.

So let’s do a little experiment. How close is Juneau, Alaska’s capital, to Moscow? It’s 4,559.6 miles. Meanwhile, how close is, say, Boston, the capital of Massachusetts, to Moscow? It’s 4,498.8 miles. (Distances calculated using this site.)

So there you have it. Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick is more geographically qualified to speak of matters Russian than Palin is. I wish someone would make this into a commercial. They’d never trot this argument out again.

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A full one-third of our annual fundraising comes in this month alone. That’s risky, because a strong December means our newsroom is on the beat and reporting at full strength—but a weak one means budget cuts and hard choices ahead.

With just hours left, we need a huge surge in reader support to get to our $400,000 year-end goal. Whether you've given before or this is your first time, your contribution right now matters. All gifts are 3X matched and tax-deductible.

Managing an independent, nonprofit newsroom is staggeringly hard. There’s no cushion in our budget—no backup revenue, no corporate safety net. We can’t afford to fall short, and we can’t rely on corporations or deep-pocketed interests to fund the fierce, investigative journalism Mother Jones exists to do. That’s why we need you right now. Please chip in to help close the gap.

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