March 21, 2007

“The Unit”: Nearly as Violent as “24”

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unit.jpgIt occurred to me last night while desperately trying to find something besides “The Unit” on TV: “24” has taken a lot of heat for the violent tactics of its agents, but no one is talking about “The Unit.” Why just last week, the black ops unit that gives the show its name rescued a young woman from a cult, and took her sister along to help. When they found the young woman in bed with the cult’s leader, the sister killed him in a fit of rage. The unit concealed her crime to protect their cover, even lying to the local police officer who investigated. My best guess as to why the show doesn’t get more attention is that it’s incredibly boring, and sexist to boot. (The show spends half its time focusing on the wives, who talk almost exclusively about how important their husband’s work is.)

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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.

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