November 3, 2010

Blumenthal-McMahon: The GOP Dog That Didn’t Bark

Linda McMahon. | Flickr/<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/lindamcmahon/3910083672/">Linda McMahon for Senate</a> (<a href="http://www.creativecommons.org">Creative Commons</a>).

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The Republicans were supposed to make the Connecticut Senate race between popular attorney general Richard Blumenthal and former wrestling CEO Linda McMahon competitive. McMahon had the money: She spent $50 million on the race. She picked the right year: It’s a great cycle for Republicans. And she got lucky: Blumenthal ran into trouble over misstatements he made about his military record. But even all that wasn’t enough for McMahon to beat Blumenthal. The race was called just as the polls closed, and Blumenthal will finally get the promotion people have been predicting he’d get for decades.

So what went wrong? Connecticut is one of the few states where lots of voters still like President Barack Obama. Blumenthal ran a cautious campaign, and McMahon’s barrage of ads may have actually turned off some voters. By the end, McMahon’s approval ratings were upside-down. Voters just didn’t like her that much.

One real test of whether this is a Republican wave will be whether Blumenthal’s downballot allies—Dems like Chris Murphy and Jim Himes—hold onto their seats. If they lose, it wasn’t just Linda McMahon who was the problem for the GOP in Connecticut. If they lose, well, ex-Rep. Rob Simmons—who McMahon beat in the primary—will probably be saying “I told you so.”

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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