Utterly Discredited, Media Circus Edition

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I can’t think of any topic I’d rather talk about less than Terry Schiavo. The whole ordeal was sick beyond belief and deeply offensive. But now that they’ve released the results of her autopsy, it’s important to go back and emphasize that the Republicans who engineered the whole fiasco—Bill Frist, Tom DeLay, Jeb Bush, others—were wholly, utterly wrong about everything. They were liars. Frauds. Slanderers. Here’s Andrew Sullivan:

In her final days, Terri Schiavo was blind and her brain was about half its expected size. She wasn’t in a PVS? Please. Bill Frist needs to acknowledge his reckless political opportunism at the time. The attempts of the fringe, theocon right to allege that her husband abused her have also been exposed as malicious falsehoods. Remember the lies that were told, the junk science that the theocons came up with, the endless slanders and misrepresentations? It’s rare that we get an objective resolution of a fiercely disputed matter. We have now. And it ain’t pretty.

Well, it’s a bit quaint for Sullivan to think that Frist is going to “acknowledge his reckless political opportunism,” but the rest is absolutely right. The party of junk science does not deserve to have its claims taken seriously by the media, not now, not ever.

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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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