January 10, 2009

Spider-Man Vs. Obama: This is Gonna Be Lame

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obama_spidey300.jpgMarvel Comics has announced that it’s cashing in on—excuse me, commemorating—a “Brand New Day for the United States” by sticking Barack Obama into its next issue of Spider-Man. The story, set on Inauguration Day, “finds one of Spider-Man’s oldest foes attempting to thwart the swearing in ceremony of the 44th President of the United States.” Wait, Spider-Man has done battle with these kooks? Actually, the baddie is the Chameleon, which I think is one of Dick Cheney’s aliases.

Nothing good can come from superheroes meddling in politics. Last year, DC Comics released a series of election-themed comics. Our in-house comic collector-slash-webmaster lent me his copies and, wow, were they bad. So my spidey senses are tingling with something less than anticipation about the Webslinger going to Washington. From the online previews, it looks like the episode’s highlight is Spidey doing a terrorist fist-jab with some black guy in a suit. Seriously, if Marvel’s going to suck up to the president, it could have at least found an artist who can draw a reasonable likeness of him. Or wait—maybe that’s really Cheney before he rips off his cheap Obama mask and reveals himself?

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

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