I'm not kidding. There are only 12 months in a year, and Free Republic spends eight of them asking for money. Their current fund drive started on July 1. It's still going on today -- six and a half weeks later -- and they are 20% below their goal. Can you imagine if DU fund drives lasted for two months out of every three month quarter?

Here on DU, we have never held a fund drive that lasted longer than a week.

Even the one time when we didn't reach our goal, we ended the fund drive after a week. Because people don't come to DU for the fund drives -- you come for the discussion. And the discussions are much more satisfying when you don't have to watch the admins begging for money all the time. I wish we didn't have to hold fund drives at all. But we do.

I know that times are tough right now. If you don't have any money to spare, please do not donate to Democratic Underground. For your sake, I hope that the economy starts to get better soon.

But if you have a few extra bucks, we would really appreciate it if you could donate to DU. It only takes a minute, and you'll feel good about supporting this amazing community of progressives. Plus, if you donate at least $10, you'll get to post a sticky note GrovelBot's Big Board.

And you can take comfort knowing that a week from now, this fund drive will be history.

Thank you to everyone who has donated. And thank you for being part of this community.

David Allen
"Skinner"
DU Administrator