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For years, Newt has presented himself as a moral watchdog over Congress. A collection of his quotes:

“I am amazed and appalled that a member of the House of Representatives Ethics Committee would be engaged in activities that if not illegal, are so clearly on the borderline of conflict of interest.” (1974)

“The Ethics Committee seems to be serving only its fellow Congressmen. They are keeping the investigation quiet and the public in the dark. [They have] a duty to lay the facts before us and prove the guilt or innocence of these men.” (1976)

“My wife Jackie, and I… both teach at our church’s Sunday school. These years have taught us the importance of setting an example that would help our young people believe in some old virtues like honesty, sincerity, and integrity.” (1976)

“I’m not saying we should all be saints, but people should expect their representatives to obey the laws they are passing.” (1979)

“The rules normally applied by the Ethics Committee to an investigation of a typical member are insufficient in an investigation of the Speaker of the House, a position which is third in the line of succession to the Presidency, and the second most powerful elected position in America.” (1988)

“It is vital that the Ethics Committee hire outside counsel and pursue these questions thoroughly. The trust of the public and the integrity of the House will accept no lower standard.” (1988)

“We must reestablish as the first principle of self-government that politics must be an inherently moral business. The first duty of our generation is to reestablish integrity and a bond of honesty in the political process.” (1990)

And since he himself has been under scrutiny?

“My defeated opponent, various embittered Democrats, various folks who idealogically disagree with me have each come up with spurious charges.” (1995)

“I am so sick of the way the game is played by the news media and the way the game is played by the Democrats in this city that it is, frankly, all I can do to stand in there….Frankly, it hurts….they are misusing the ethics system in a deliberate, vicious vindictive way and I think it is despicable, and I have just about had it. “(1995)

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

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Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

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