December 15, 2007

Young Girl Goes on the Attack; Obama Stays Positive

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Fun interaction (paraphrased) between Barack Obama and a young attendee at a town hall event here in New Hampton, Iowa:

Young girl: “I just want to say that every time I see a commercial of Mitt Romney on TV I want to throw up.”

Barack Obama: “Haha. Okay. I feel you. What’s your question?”

Young girl: “I just want to say to anyone who is considering voting for Mitt Romney—”

Barack Obama: “Well, hold on, sweetie. I know you have an opinion on Mitt, but I want to use this forum for questions, not to dog Mitt Romney. Though he sometimes uses his town halls to dog me! So why don’t you ask a question.”

Young girl: “Uh, I guess I want to know your thoughts on Mitt Romney.”

Obama said that Romney is a man of accomplishment with great hair. He declined to engage Romney directly because, he said, he isn’t convinced Romney is going to be the Republican nominee. But, boy, Mitt Romney must have run over that little girl’s dog.

Update: Maybe that little girl is really, really good at getting the word out.

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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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