May 1, 2008

On Michigan/Florida, Kucinich to the Rescue?

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562_01_200x203.jpgDeep-pocketed Dennis Kucinish is a man with a plan…

Former Democratic presidential candidate Dennis J. Kucinich has proposed a plan to seat delegations from Florida and Michigan at the Democratic National Convention based on the results of a fresh round of polling in the two states…

The plan would base the distribution of delegates on polling conducted by three firms, one selected by each campaign and a third chosen by the other two companies. Delegates would be apportioned based on the composite findings of the three polls. None of the firms could have previously been employed by either campaign.

Democrats are at a point now where even an ad hoc plan like having polling substitute for actual voting sounds reasonable. But you know what would probably be a better solution? If Dennis Kucinich, who is a superdelegate, actually endorsed somebody and then got all the other superdelegates to endorse somebody, too. Because after one of the two candidates gets the requisite number of delegates for the nomination, he or she can seat the Michigan and Florida delegates in a way that doesn’t change the outcome of the race. And if that happened, oh, two months ago, that would be awesome.

Update: Another potential solution here.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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