Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Email from a reader my age in the the Midwest:

Trouble with the base comes and goes for a variety of reasons. Even in the troubled periods, there are people (like me) who will work hard. I stumped hard in 1984 — of all years — and actually ran for the state legislature against an incumbent Republican in 1994 (duh).

Last weekend after the [xxx], I gave up my County Central Committee seat (which was hard because no one wanted it) for the first time in fifteen years. And before that I was on the Central Committee from a different precinct and before that in two different [xxx] counties. And that decision was based on my reaction to the health care nonsense. The spending freeze is actually dumber. Now I’m just one guy, but I’m one of the ones traditionally telling Democrats not to give up. In 1984, I was door knocking before the polls closed to get people out for Mondale. If the party loses a bunch of me’s, it is in trouble. If they have to spend time motivating me the party is in bigger trouble.

But by the time you wrote that you had never been more embarrassed to be a Democrat, I had already said similar things, though less eloquently and using terms that my children should not hear.

This is a very big mess. And I feel like I’ve wasted thirty-two years of political work. We are the majority party for crying out loud. In the prophetic words of Bugs Bunny, “What a bunch of maroons!”

No comment. I’m just sharing.

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate