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CLINTONITES….Just a quick comment on a common meme: Why is Barack Obama surrounding himself with so many Clinton retreads? That’s not change we can believe in!

Sure, sure, but look: anybody who’s been active in liberal governance for more than eight years is likely to be a Clintonite. It was the only game in town during the 90s. And anybody who’s been active less than eight years probably doesn’t have the experience to get a top level position. So there’s really no way around this. There are some fresh faces around for Obama to tap, but for the most part, when you’re staffing highly visible and responsible positions, you want someone who has at least some experience to fall back on. And since Bill Clinton is the only Democrat to hold the presidency in the past 28 years, that means someone who served in the Clinton administration.

I suppose this doesn’t bother me as much as it does some people since I never expected Obama to be a huge left-wing break from Democratic tradition in the first place. He’s a little farther to the left than Clinton, but not a lot, and it’s only natural that he’d find a fair number of Clintonites who hold views similar to his own. What’s more, as his campaign showed, he’s obviously a guy who values experience and deep knowledge. He’ll do fine, Clintonites or not.

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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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