November 12, 2018

What Is Donald Trump Doing Today?

Let me get this straight. On Saturday Donald Trump skipped a memorial service for Americans killed during World War I at Aisne-Marne American Cemetery in France. Today he’s not bothering to attend the Veterans Day wreath-laying at Arlington Cemetery even though he’s in Washington. And later this week he’ll be skipping both the ASEAN and APEC summits in Asia.

So what is he doing today? Stewing over his mammoth loss in the midterm elections? Trying to figure out a way to get partisan hack Matt Whitaker confirmed as attorney general? Trying to remember what’s actually in his income tax returns now that there’s a chance they might become public? Throwing temper tantrums over the possibility that Robert Mueller plans to indict Donald Trump Jr.? Watching CNN and shaking his fist a lot? Working up the nerve to fire Ryan Zinke? Thinking up new ways to insult the memory of Californians who died last week in the state’s worst wildfires in recent memory? Or maybe just nursing a cold?

Who knows? But whatever it is, it sure doesn’t look like anything presidential is on the horizon.

UPDATE: I misinterpreted the tweet above, thinking that it meant there was an official wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington Cemetery today and that Trump was skipping it. There isn’t. All it means is that Trump did nothing public either yesterday or today in memory of Veterans Day. Apologies.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT.

We have a considerable $390,000 gap in our online fundraising budget that we have to close by June 30. There is no wiggle room, we've already cut everything we can, and we urgently need more readers to pitch in—especially from this specific blurb you're reading right now.

We'll also be quite transparent and level-headed with you about this.

In "News Never Pays," our fearless CEO, Monika Bauerlein, connects the dots on several concerning media trends that, taken together, expose the fallacy behind the tragic state of journalism right now: That the marketplace will take care of providing the free and independent press citizens in a democracy need, and the Next New Thing to invest millions in will fix the problem. Bottom line: Journalism that serves the people needs the support of the people. That's the Next New Thing.

And it's what MoJo and our community of readers have been doing for 47 years now.

But staying afloat is harder than ever.

In "This Is Not a Crisis. It's The New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, why this moment is particularly urgent, and how we can best communicate that without screaming OMG PLEASE HELP over and over. We also touch on our history and how our nonprofit model makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there: Letting us go deep, focus on underreported beats, and bring unique perspectives to the day's news.

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