July 13, 2017

Conservatives Have a New Free-Speech Warrior

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We have news from National Review today:

National Review Institute is launching the Center for Unalienable Rights, created to be the home of free-speech warrior David French, whose new podcast, The Liberty Files, is a must-listen for anyone who cares deeply about combating the leftist assault on the First Amendment, whether on our campuses or in any other place patrolled by the ruthless Thought Police.

….The Left wants to gag, marginalize, intimidate, shut up, and, if they can, even criminalize conservatives for what we think and what we say. We intend to fight the intolligentsia, in a more focused way. We intend to beat the determined enemies of our unalienable rights. Help us prevail.

You are expecting me to mock this, aren’t you? But I’m not! Instead I have a serious suggestion.

Believe it or not, there are plenty of liberals who are concerned about this stuff too. The safe spaces/microaggressions/heckler’s veto/trigger warnings movement is not entirely beloved on the left. If this project were toned down and aimed at free speech repression on both sides, it might actually attract some bipartisan support.

I know that’s not really plausible these days. I just felt like mentioning it.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

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.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

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