February 7, 2020

Did Tom Steyer Just Make a Good Point?

Charles Krupa/AP

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Billionaire and philanthropist Tom Steyer—who is currently polling at 2 percent nationally—just delivered what may turn out to be the best line of Friday night’s Democratic presidential debate.

As the other candidates squabbled over health care, Steyer refocused the conversation by quoting the infamous phrase from Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign: “It’s the economy, stupid,” getting to the heart of the challenge of defeating an incumbent. 

“We’re gonna have to take Mr. Trump down on the economy, because if you listen to him, he’s crowing about it every single day,” Steyer said, “and he’s gonna beat us unless we can take him down on the economy, stupid.”

The problem, Steyer seemed to suggest, was not Democrats’ policies so much as their overall messaging.

“I have heard this debate so many darn times, and I love all these people, and they’re all right,” he said. “If we win, we can get the right thing, Bernie. I am with you. If we win, we can get the right thing, Pete and Amy. But we gotta win, or we are in deep trouble, and we keep not talking about the facts.”

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

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