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What is wrong with these people? Atrios catches this marvelous bit of self-awareness on CNN:

MILES O’BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Also, there’s word the president could announce his Supreme Court nominee as early as today. Could that take some of the media heat off of the president’s top adviser Karl Rove?

Surprise, Miles! You are the media! It’s much like when, during the 2000 election campaign, the Times would fabricate stories about how Gore was untruthful and then publish news analysis pieces with phrases like “it is Mr. Gore who faces the most scrutiny as he tries not to say or do anything that will cement an image that he puffs up stories and is not to be trusted”—as if somehow this “scrutiny” appeared on its own and the Times was just reporting what was already out there. Or when the Washington Post published a long news analysis piece about wondering why the Downing Street Memos weren’t getting any major press coverage. It defies parody. If these folks want to analyze the media process, they can go work for Columbia Journalism Review; otherwise, report the goddamn stories.

UPDATE: Dana Milbank also seems curiously confused as to what, exactly, it is that he does all day:

[Roberts’ nomination] is going to dominate the news up until the court begins in Oct 1; that’s not to say the Karl Rove story won’t make its cameo appearance somewhat-of course it will and it’s likely to go on somewhat after this nomination ends, but this is clearly going to be the main game in town now.

Right, and it’s just a pity that one of the star political reporters for one of the most influential newspapers in the country can do nothing whatsoever about this sad state of affairs.

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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 canā€™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 wonā€™t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its futureā€”you.

And we need readers to show up for us big timeā€”again.

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.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

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