September 17, 2015

Ben Carson Probably Shouldn’t Have Said That Marines Aren’t Ready to Deploy

He probably just lost the military vote.

John Mccoy/Zuma

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During a discussion about the US military at the Republican debate on Wednesday night, Dr. Ben Carson said Marines were not ready to be deployed. He was likely referring to something he’s said before, which is that perhaps half of the Marines’ nondeployed units aren’t ready to be deployed. Whatever the fine points, his comment didn’t land well with people on Twitter:

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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 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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