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In some biography of FDR that I read once, I remember learning that one of Roosevelt’s parlor tricks was to have a guest draw a straight line anywhere through a map of the United States, and he’d then name every county along the line, as well as the party leaders and other political VIPs in the county.  Impressive.

Compared to that, I suppose that drawing a map of the United States freehand isn’t that big a deal.  Still, it’s impressive in its own way.  Maybe we should make all our U.S. senators perform patriotic tricks like this. Via James Joyner.

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In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

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