December 10, 2008

So Where Does the Blago Situation Go From Here?

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Rod Blagojevich woke up today as the head of the Illinois government, fully vested with the ability to appoint someone to fill Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat. It’s unlikely, of course, that the Senate would allow a Blago-appointee to actually take office, but the fact remains that Illinois still has a crazy man in power. Worse, he’s a crazy man with a clear history of audacious actions and nothing to lose.

So what can be done to get the midwestern Tony Soprano out of power? Progress Illinois runs down the options. At current, it looks like Blago can resign, the General Assembly can impeach him, and the Supreme Court can use a little-known state judiciary rule to boot him from office. Click the link for a full explanation. Also note that the legislature in Illinois has made noises about passing a bill instituting a special election for the Senate seat, but such a bill would have to be signed by Blago himself.

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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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