October 11, 2005

Are Democrats trying to shoot down Paul Hackett in Ohio?

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Just posted at Mother Jones: “Friendly Fire,” by David Goodman.

For a candidate who just lost a congressional race, Paul Hackett has been a popular guy this fall. The tough-talking Iraq combat veteran turned a special-election fight in Ohio’s Second District into this summer’s political sleeper hit, energizing Democrats and converting Republicans in the deep-red counties outside Cincinnati and pulling 48 percent of the vote in a district where John Kerry got a mere 36 percent. Soon the national party came courting: Hackett met several times with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sen. Chuck Schumer, chair of the Senate Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), both of whom encouraged him to run for the seat of Ohio’s senior senator, Republican Mike DeWine, in ’06. Hackett said he would—after been told by Ohio Congressman Sherrod Brown that he wasn’t planning to run—and on October 3 he publicly threw his hat in the ring.

Then, last week, his phone rang again. It was Sherrod Brown calling to tell Hackett he’d changed his mind: he was running after all. Then Schumer called, and this time he wasn’t delivering a pep talk. Hackett got the distinct sense that he was being asked to make way for the party insider. “Schumer didn’t tell me anything definitive,” he says. “But I’m not a dumb ass, and I know what he wanted me to do.”

Continue reading “Friendly Fire” at MotherJones.com

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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.

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