September 11, 2013

Bloomberg is Dead! Long Live Bloomberg!


Billionaire Michael Bloomberg has been mayor of New York City for 12 years. As a Democrat-turned-Republican-turned-independent, he’s long gotten a lot of love from centrist pundits who believe that Americans are tired of partisan wrangling and are eager to unite behind a guy whose sole dedication is to Getting Things Done™. Yesterday, however, his hand-picked successor suffered a big primary loss and his hand-picked issue of gun control led to a recall of two legislators in Colorado. Dave Weigel pronounces this the death of Bloombergism:

The New York election was a repudiation of Mayor Bloomberg. The Colorado election is worse—a defeat for Bloomberg the Icon. For half a decade or more, a certain sort of liberal, usually well-off, has convinced himself that the country he dreams of is possible, if only Bloomberg wills it. Bloomberg seemed to believe this too; his guru Kevin Sheekey interpreted polls about how many voters said the country was “off track” and demanded a third-party candidate to right it. After a bad Acela ride in 2012, Thomas Friedman asked Bloomberg to run for president and “challenge, and maybe even improve, both major-party presidential candidates by speaking honestly about what is needed to restore the foundations of America’s global leadership before we implode.”

The people who believed that on Monday probably still believe it. A couple of election losses aside, in a few months Bloomberg will be a private citizen with billions to spend on his political causes. That’s enough time to rethink this theory that you can ignore all critics, drop money from a helicopter, and expect to be forever proven right.

I wish I were so optimistic, but in the minds of the self-professed post-partisan Beltway chatterers, I suspect that Bloombergism can never fail, it can only be failed. They seem to be endlessly unable to figure out that when people say they’re tired of partisan wrangling, what they mean is that they want the other guys to stop being so damn unreasonable. When you dig an inch below the surface, it’s actually a desire for more partisanship, not less.

My great grandfather started life running a small-town Republican newspaper. Then he switched to being a Democrat, and then finally to being an independent so he could harass both parties equally. But he still died broke. Maybe someday Americans will decide to do without their parties, but that day is not today.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE ON MOTHER JONES' FINANCES

We need to start being more upfront about how hard it is keeping a newsroom like Mother Jones afloat these days.

Because it is, and because we're fresh off finishing a fiscal year, on June 30, that came up a bit short of where we needed to be. And this next one simply has to be a year of growth—particularly for donations from online readers to help counter the brutal economics of journalism right now.

Straight up: We need this pitch, what you're reading right now, to start earning significantly more donations than normal. We need people who care enough about Mother Jones’ journalism to be reading a blurb like this to decide to pitch in and support it if you can right now.

Urgent, for sure. But it's not all doom and gloom!

Because over the challenging last year, and thanks to feedback from readers, we've started to see a better way to go about asking you to support our work: Level-headedly communicating the urgency of hitting our fundraising goals, being transparent about our finances, challenges, and opportunities, and explaining how being funded primarily by donations big and small, from ordinary (and extraordinary!) people like you, is the thing that lets us do the type of journalism you look to Mother Jones for—that is so very much needed right now.

And it's really been resonating with folks! Thankfully. Because corporations, powerful people with deep pockets, and market forces will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. Only people like you will.

There's more about our finances in "News Never Pays," or "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," and we'll have details about the year ahead for you soon. But we already know this: The fundraising for our next deadline, $350,000 by the time September 30 rolls around, has to start now, and it has to be stronger than normal so that we don't fall behind and risk coming up short again.

Please 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.

—Monika Bauerlein, CEO, and Brian Hiatt, Online Membership Director

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE ON MOTHER JONES' FINANCES

We need to start being more upfront about how hard it is keeping a newsroom like Mother Jones afloat these days.

Because it is, and because we're fresh off finishing a fiscal year, on June 30, that came up a bit short of where we needed to be. And this next one simply has to be a year of growth—particularly for donations from online readers to help counter the brutal economics of journalism right now.

Straight up: We need this pitch, what you're reading right now, to start earning significantly more donations than normal. We need people who care enough about Mother Jones’ journalism to be reading a blurb like this to decide to pitch in and support it if you can right now.

Urgent, for sure. But it's not all doom and gloom!

Because over the challenging last year, and thanks to feedback from readers, we've started to see a better way to go about asking you to support our work: Level-headedly communicating the urgency of hitting our fundraising goals, being transparent about our finances, challenges, and opportunities, and explaining how being funded primarily by donations big and small, from ordinary (and extraordinary!) people like you, is the thing that lets us do the type of journalism you look to Mother Jones for—that is so very much needed right now.

And it's really been resonating with folks! Thankfully. Because corporations, powerful people with deep pockets, and market forces will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. Only people like you will.

There's more about our finances in "News Never Pays," or "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," and we'll have details about the year ahead for you soon. But we already know this: The fundraising for our next deadline, $350,000 by the time September 30 rolls around, has to start now, and it has to be stronger than normal so that we don't fall behind and risk coming up short again.

Please 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.

—Monika Bauerlein, CEO, and Brian Hiatt, Online Membership Director

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate