Dear Reader:
There's a funny secret to my success: my ineptitude, mechanically. I can't use a machine, or drive a car. So, what's the guy who can't even work his own tape recorder doing sending you an email? I'm writing because the internet's a new way to get at things, and it's important I get to you as soon as I can.
Over the last four weeks, readers like you have given over $4,500 to In These Times. That's a good, hopeful sign for democracy. Hope has always been the hallmark of dissent. The question is how to turn that hope into action.
If youve already made a contribution, thank you for taking action to support us. If you haven't given yet, there's still time.
I know how important this magazine is. ThatҒs why I give a gift every year and why Im asking you to do the same.
I was one of the original subscribers to In These Times. My old friend, Jim Weinstein, who founded the magazine, insisted that we remember the past in order to understand the present and prepare for the future. Contributors like Susan Douglas, who wrote to you last week, keep Jim's belief in the future of democracy alive in the pages of In These Times every month.
We need to keep this magazine around. You read the words of Bob McChesney about the toadies in Congress who managed to boot small publications, as well as the Founding Fathers, right in the face with their sly postal-rate hikes. Here's something about those postal hikes: they were written by Time Warner. See, the major media in our country thinks they've won, they think they can get away with anything at all. Just like the Robber Barons of the 19th Century.
In These Times is devoted to covering the stories of the non-celebrated celebrities. While the major media cranks out trivia and hype, In These Times publishes stories by writers like Silja Talvi, who you also heard from, about the little people languishing in places like California prisons. You read how her words urged hopeful people to act and free a wrongfully imprisoned woman. That's what I'm talking about!
The effect of the alternative press is seemingly minor, but it has a ripple-in-the-water effect. Activists have always battled the odds. It's like a legion of Davids, with all sorts of slingshots. It's not one slingshot that will do it. Nor will it happen at once. It's a long haul.
So if you haven't given yet, you still have a chance to do it. Join the community by giving a tax-deductible donation today. There are even some nifty thank you gifts for you to choose from, including a complementary one-year subscription to In These Times. Now is the time to act, and, thus, become what we were born to be: Thinking, active citizens of a democratic society. To those of you who have given, thank you. If you haven't given yet, do it today. Join me in making a gift to In These Times today and turn your hope for a better America into action.
In solidarity,
Studs Terkel
In These Times