January 22, 2013

A Sports Rant That Isn’t

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And in local news today:

The Dodgers have agreed with Time Warner Cable on a new television contract that will provide the team with a channel of its own, according to two people familiar with the deal but not authorized to discuss it.

Great. I suppose that means my cable bill is going up again even though I never watch the Dodgers. This just warms the cockles of my heart.

I feel like I have an epic rant about modern sports seething around inside me, but it always just fizzles out into nothing. Yeah, it’s a business and the owners are assholes. Yeah, football is dangerous. Yeah, sports leagues are all effective monopolies. Yeah, the entire public is forced to pay for obscene contracts and profits, via both direct tax subsidies as well as sports programming that’s shoehorned into basic cable rates. Yeah, sportsmanship has gone the way of the dodo. Yeah, the NCAA is practically a criminal enterprise.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But when I’m bored, I still turn on the TV and surf over to ESPN. Old habits die hard.

WE CAME UP SHORT.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

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