Virginia’s Anti-Gay-Troops Lawmaker Speaks (VIDEO)

Photo illustration by Adam Weinstein; Civil War by US National Guard/<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/thenationalguard/4101112058/sizes/z/in/photostream/">Flickr Commons</a>, flag by obeeah13/<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/28876831@N02/3536708963/sizes/m/in/photostream/">Flickr Commons</a>

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Yesterday, we brought you news of Virginia state Delegate Bob Marshall and his plan to keep gays out of the state’s National Guard, no matter what the Union federal government says about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Marshall declined to return a call to his cell phone by Mother Jones, but he was happy to expand on his beliefs for DC television station WUSA. Video’s below, but here are the money quotes (h/t Washington Post). Open mouth, insert foot. But not in a gay way!:

  • “If I needed a blood transfusion and the guy next to me had committed sodomy 14 times in the last month, I’d be worried.”
  • “It’s a distraction when I’m on the battlefield and have to concentrate on the enemy 600 yards away and I’m worried about this guy who’s got eyes on me.”

[NOTE: Marshall has never been on a battlefield. Though in his youth he did take combative positions on incest and staffing the military ranks. And in the interceding years, he’s become something of an expert on power lines.]

For his part, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell—who someday might like to be president of the entire United States, not just commander in chief of the Army of the Potomac—told listeners to his monthly radio show that he wasn’t supporting this particular Marshall plan:

We can’t have two different systems in the federal and National Guard…Whatever the final guidelines of the Department of Defense I would expect the National Guard bureau in Virginia to adhere to those rules so we would have one set of rules for the entire military.

There’s a new battle of Richmond brewing! And this time it feels as if, no matter who wins, the South is definitely losing.

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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.

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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