We’re right on the cusp of a big Drive milestone – $400,000, 80% of the way toward our goal of raising at least $500,000 in this year’s Annual TPM Journalism Fund Drive. Who can help us cross this threshold today? You can be that person by clicking right here and making a contribution in any amount. $3,017 to go! Thank you to everyone who has contributed so far!

Update: Now just $546 to go!

Thanks so much to everyone who came out to our event at Crystal Lake bar last night in collaboration with Marisa Kabas of The Handbasket! It was great to see some of you again, meet some local readers making it out to their first TPM event, and connect with readers who traveled just for this show. (Shout out to the lovely couple from Berkeley, California!)

It looks like we are going to get a big test of some cardinal (possibly outdated) assumptions about American politics. I’m thinking first about the Michigan Senate race (though we might have something similar in the Wisconsin governor’s race). Several recent polls show Abdul El-Sayed holding a consistent, substantial lead over Rep. Haley Stevens. The primary is on August 4. This has been presented as a prototypical Democratic establishment vs Bernie progressive/insurgent race. And in key respects it is.

El-Sayed has all the Bernie/progressive positions. He’s run a campaign that places a heavy emphasis on the Israel-Palestine issue. And he’s centered AIPAC in his campaign in a way that even for many longtime critics and haters of AIPAC (including myself here) has a distinct whiff of antisemitic conspiracy theories. To wit, yes, AIPAC sucks. They’re a blight. They are functionally a Republican operation these days. But they are not the secret hand guiding things in the background every time there’s a bad news story or reverse of fortune for some progressive candidate, which is basically the role they’re playing in El-Sayed’s campaign.