October 20, 2015

A Weary Country Waits: Will Joe Run or Won’t He?

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Joe Biden speaks:

“I really respect the members up there and I still have a lot of Republican friends. I don’t think my chief enemy is the Republican Party. This is a matter of making things work,” Biden said Tuesday, during an event honoring former Vice President Walter Mondale.

….It was the second such remark Biden made in two days, as the vice president made similar comments at a climate change event on Monday. “I don’t consider Republicans enemies,” Biden said. “They’re friends.”

The tea leaves have been working overtime trying to makes sense of these comments. What does Joe mean? Is this a direct shot at Hillary Clinton, who said in the debate that she was proud of the fact that Republicans were her enemies? Is it just a random Biden gurgle? Or is he only trying to calm things down?

Nobody knows. But judging by the continuing media frenzy, everyone is taking it to mean that Biden is about to throw his hat in the ring. I’m not sure I can stand the excitement.

WE CAME UP SHORT.

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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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