February 12, 2007

As Go the Dixie Chicks, So Goes the Country

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After being shunned by country music stations in retaliation for lead singer Natalie Maines’ critical remarks about fellow Texan George Bush before the invasion of Iraq, the Dixie Chicks scored a major victory at the Grammy awards ceremony tonight. The Texas trio walked away with best song and record of the year for the pointedly titled “Not Ready to Make Nice” and best album of the year for “Taking the Long Way.”

Just one more way for the country–or at least Hollywood–to tell Bush he’s wrong about Iraq. For her part, Maines was gracious and largely apolitical, but did praise the L.A. audience for “using their freedom of speech tonight with these awards.”

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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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