October 19, 2012

Obama Continues to Bounce Back

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Polling guru Nate Silver tweets me a series of early birthday presents:

Obama had a strong day of polls in swing states today. He’s up a fair bit in our forecast, to 70.4% from 65.7%.

Also, the polls with the most recent field dates generally suggest more strength for Obama than those from earlier in the week.

National polls published in past 24 hours: Obama +3.2, Obama +3, Obama +3, Obama +1, Obama +0.6, Obama +0.5, TIE, Romney +7.

I don’t think there’s much question that Obama has started bouncing back from the slide that started in late September. The weird Gallup tracking poll is the only one that still has Romney ahead, but the bulk of the polls show Obama now leading both nationally and in the key swing states. For what it’s worth, my rough take has always been that Obama has about a two-thirds chance of winning, and I still think that. Nothing so far has really changed my mind.

In other news, Todd Akin continues to suck wind in Missouri. This is bad for my forecasting batting average, but I find that I can bear up surprisingly well under the strain.

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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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