Second Anniversary and Call for Support

Dear Left Hook Readers,

This month marks the second anniversary of our publication. When we first initiated Left Hook in November 2003, we hoped to make a modest contribution to the American Left by creating a space that was sorely lacking: an independent, online presence for young leftists to express their ideas, network with one another, share experiences and gain confidence.

It is, of course, up to the reader to gauge to what extent we have succeeded. Looking over the past two years, however, we take some pride in the fact that hundreds of college and high school-aged youth have learned from each other and written inspiring pieces that have been read by hundreds of thousands of visitors - young, old, and everything in between.

We are equally glad to note that, despite the heavy pressures of jingoism, and paranoia - pressures which often come from the "left" as much as the right in America - Left Hook has maintain a principled leftist position since its inception, allowing us to continuously publicize and support key efforts on the ground such as the anti-war movement, which we have defended not only through analysis, but ground reports and interviews with Iraq war veterans and student anti-war activists.

However, our success is ultimately determined by you: our readers and supporters. Without your help, we cannot maintain the journal's quality, sponsor more contests, conduct enough interviews, or pay for more web space. We work hard to constantly improve - more updates, more original material, more youth content, better redesigns, a new blog, and so on - but what's needed to keep this unique endeavor going is your financial support.

We run donation drives just twice a year. Six months ago, we set a goal of $3,500. We barely made half that, but, undaunted, we kept plugging away, hoping to earn your support later on. We have no corporate sponsors, no business cronies, and, sadly, no rich Yale graduates here. Just two intensely overworked college students doing all the writing, editing, updating, outreach, and web work you have enjoyed at this space for two years.

Therefore, we kindly ask you to please support this important project by making a donation today.

We are setting the very modest goal of just $2,500 to keep us going this time around. Given all the work, time, and energy Left Hook requires, we cannot continue without meeting this goal by month's end. So, please contribute if you value what is produced here, and encourage friends to do the same.

As an additional incentive, we are offering a free gift to anyone making a contribution of $40 or more: the book Is There an Islamic Problem?, praised by Noam Chomsky as "informed by deep understanding of the cultural and economic history of Islamic and European societies, and of influential contemporary scholarship and debate;" the author is M. Shahid Alam, father of one of the editors, professor of economics at Northeastern University and - most praiseworthy from our point of view - a target of Bill O'Reilly's televised wrath on Fox News last year!

Thank you for supporting Left Hook - still the only online independent leftist youth journal in America.

Sincerely,
>The Editors
Derek Seidman and M. Junaid Alam

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If you found this piece useful, please keep us alive by making a donation to our second anniversary fund drive .

Praise for Left Hook:

"Left Hook has been providing refreshing, informative, independent reporting and analysis, with flair and insight. It's a very valuable contribution, much needed."

- Noam Chomsky, professor at MIT and author of Hegemony or Survival

"In a time when the left is still trying to struggle out of its post-90's malaise, the voices of both clarity and militancy must be cherished and nurtured. Especially when those are the voices of the young upon whom the world depends for the continuity of a politics of resistance to the devastating criminality of late imperialism. Left Hook is one of the most important of those youth voices, coming in loud and uncluttered by the hand-wringing individualism of liberal poseurs and life-style 'radicals.' Read it. Contribute to it. Distribute it. And support it."

-Stan Goff, former Master Sergeant in the US Special Forces, anti-war activist with Military Families Speak Out, and author of Full Spectrum Disorder: The Military in the New American Century

"I appreciate Left Hook for standing up against injustice."

-Tariq Khan, former Air Force munitions personel and student anti-war activist beaten and attacked at George Mason University on September 29, 2005

"Left Hook has been a tremendously important addition to the left in this country."

-Dave Zirin, regular sports commentator for Air America and XM Radio's 'On the Real' with Chuck D and Gia'na Garel.

"Left Hook is unique among progressive electronic journals, both because it is run by two amazing young men and because it provides incisive analyses which have no match. Editors Seidman and Alam cover a wider spectrum of issues and regions than do other journals - ranging from the Ivory Coast to Arafat to a critique of the Left's assumption that Kerry was the lesser of two evils. If you want to read a serious radical Left journal that pulls no punches in critiquing the capitalist establishment and does not sink into formulaic ideologies, this is the journal for you."

-Elaine Hagopian, Professor Emerita of Sociology, Simmons College, author of Civil Rights in Peril: The Targeting of Arabs and Muslims

"Left Hook represents a very exciting development for everyone struggling to understand our world and to create a better one. The fact that it has been up and running for a year is testament not just to the quality of the essays and interviews it publishes but also to the fact that there are many thousands of committed young radicals in the United States and around the world. A very hopeful sign indeed. I urge you to support Left Hook in whatever ways you can."

-Michael D. Yates, Associate Editor of Monthly Review magazine and author of Naming the System: Work in the Global Economy

"Left Hook is a new voice of dissent, radicalism and social transformation, and a vital one. Left Hook speaks for and with the new generation of activists, and needs to be heard by all. Send them money!"

-Paul Buhle, professor at Brown University, author of Encyclopedia of the American Left