As we discussed in this website’s introduction, institutions of all sizes will play a leading role in,
- Blunting the damage that Trump and his allies inflict upon the United States and,
- Getting them out of power in upcoming elections.
One thing that we can do as individuals, then, is to supply those institutions with the donations and volunteers that they need in order to do their best work. Here we talk about how to find opportunities to donate while we talk about how to find opportunities to volunteer over on the Volunteering page (insert link).
We would also urge you to consider digital subscriptions to newspapers as an important form of donation – even if you rarely read the paper itself! After all, the American Press has always played a critical role in exposing the misdeeds of government and there will likely be plenty of those in a Trump Administration!
When you take a digital subscription to a newspaper, you are sending them money but costing them essentially nothing – they don’t have to print a newspaper and send it to you. All they have to do is arrange for you to have a login and a password. Adding a digital subscriber, then, is pretty much free money for them. And that’s exactly what they need to continue their work!
Now you may well be reluctant to subscribe to The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times given the decisions of their owners, Jeff Bezos and Patrick Soon-Shiong, to cancel their newspapers’ planned endorsements of Kamala Harris over Donald Trump. In fact, The Washington Post itself reports that over 250,000 people cancelled their digital subscriptions after Bezos’ disastrous decision.
On the other hand, however, both newspapers have done and will continue to do excellent work in holding our governments to account. The Washington Post, of course, does so on a national scale while The Los Angeles Times does so on a state and local scale. We think it is far better than you support both newspapers with your digital subscriptions and find other ways to signal your displeasure regarding their muzzling of the editorial writers.
Much of Jeff Bezos’ income, of course, comes from Amazon and cancelling your Amazon Prime subscription is an easy and likely more consequential way to say, “No! Bad Jeff!” than cancelling your subscription to The Post. Make sure he gets the message by following up with a postcard to,
Jeff Bezos
Amazon Headquarters
410 Terry Avenue N
Seattle, WA 98109If email is more your style, go with jeff@amazon.com.
Given the non-consumer facing businesses that Patrick Soon-Shiong is involved in, it’s a bit harder to remain subscribed to The Los Angeles Times and still inflict some measure of economic punishment. You might have to settle for just writing him directly at,
Patrick Soon-Shiong
The Los Angeles Times
2300 E. Imperial Highway
El Segundo, CA 90245After you do that, have a look at the pages we have about donations and subscriptions you can make to support your nation and people in this time of urgent need!