August 24, 2000

Dancehall deviants

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Rudy Giuliani’s war on fun continues! The New York City mayor’s latest odd bid to rid Gotham of sin is to dig up a Prohibition-era law banning nightclubs without cabaret licenses from letting their patrons to shake their thang, according to the VILLAGE VOICE.

Bar owner Jim Marshall was ticketed last year when a fire marshal spotted two girls dancing to a live band. “I actually knew the law,” Marshall says. “I just didn’t think it would be enforced at that level — a couple of girls shaking it while the band was playing.” If Marshall’s patrons insist on wiggling, he could be shut down for an entire weekend.

The Dance Liberation Front has scheduled the “Million Mambo March” in hopes of bringing attention to what they feel is a free-speech issue.

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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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