December 4, 2009

Death Threats Remain Steady

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Secret Service director Mark Sullivan testified before Congress yesterday about PartyCrasherGate (or whatever they’re calling it), and it’s only at the very end of today’s LA Times account that we actually learn something interesting:

[Sullivan] pushed back Thursday when Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D–D.C.) suggested that the event may not have been properly staffed given reports of a rise in threats against President Obama.

Sullivan said that the number of threats against the nation’s first black president was now “at the same level it was” during the two previous administrations.

Same level as always, eh?  So why is the belief so widespread that death threats are up?  Bob Somerby speculates here.  (Warning: as usual, not for the faint of heart or easily pissed off.)

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THE BIG PICTURE

You expect the big picture, and it's our job at Mother Jones to give it to you. And right now, so many of the troubles we face are the making not of a virus, but of the quest for profit, political or economic (and not just from the man in the White House who could have offered leadership and comfort but instead gave us bleach).

In "News Is Just Like Waste Management," we unpack what the coronavirus crisis has meant for journalism, including Mother Jones’, and how we can rise to the challenge. If you're able to, this is a critical moment to support our nonprofit journalism with a donation: We've scoured our budget and made the cuts we can without impairing our mission, and we hope to raise $400,000 from our community of online readers to help keep our big reporting projects going because this extraordinary pandemic-plus-election year is no time to pull back.

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