April 25, 2017

Is Obama Already Buckraking on Wall Street?

Zbigniew Bzdak/TNS via ZUMA

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Matt Yglesias is pissed:

Former President Barack Obama’s decision to accept a $400,000 fee to speak at a health care conference organized by the bond firm Cantor Fitzgerald is easily understood….

Wait. Obama is raking in $400 grand for a Wall Street keynote address? Really?

There’s something funny here. The report comes from Fox Business Network, and I guess it’s true. But it hasn’t been confirmed or reported by any mainstream outlet. Just lots of conservative sites, who are naturally hooting and hollering about it.

Yglesias makes lots of good points about why Obama shouldn’t do this, and normally I’d sign on. But I want to wait a bit. I wonder if there’s more going on here that we don’t know yet?

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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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