‘We’re Going to Hang You’: Threats to Election Workers on the Rise
Plus: Lies, Damned Lies, and Politics
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BILL KRISTOL & ANDREW EGGER: The Delusions of the Donald
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KIM WEHLE: ‘We’re Going to Hang You’: Threats to Election Workers on the Rise
REGARDLESS OF WHETHER DONALD J. TRUMP is ever held accountable for January 6th—a prospect, always uncertain, made even more tenuous by the Supreme Court’s ruling creating immunity for presidential crimes—that dark day’s legacy endures within the worsening culture of political violence in America. With less than a month to go before the 2024 election, fear among election workers is palpable. Statistics show that threats to local election officials are surging, up 73 percent since the same time in 2022. Election officials are preparing with things like panic buttons, bulletproof glass, and sheriff’s deputies at every polling place, while election-worker turnover has reached historic highs.
ALGIS VALIUNAS: Ancient Yearnings, Modern Terrors
AMONG MAJOR LATIN AMERICAN WRITERS of the last century, Alejo Carpentier (1904–1980) is perhaps the least known to readers in the United States. Born in Switzerland (evidently anyway, according to his birth certificate, though he always claimed Cuban birth) to a French father and a Russian mother, he arrived in Havana at 4 or 5 years old, bounced over to Paris four years later, and returned to Cuba at 16. His leftist politics made trouble for him there, and for long stretches he found refuge in France and Venezuela. Following Fidel Castro’s Communist revolution in 1959, Carpentier returned to Cuba, where he spent a few years working in the state-owned publishing industry. In the mid-1960s, Castro sent him to France as a cultural attaché to the Cuban embassy, and he lived out his days in Paris.
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Bulwark Podcast with Tim Miller: Susan Rice and Mondaire Jones: The Dictator Hugger [YouTube]
The Next Level: Closing Argument: He's Insane! 🔐 [YouTube]
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BILL LUEDERS: Lies, Damned Lies, and Politics
BILL ADAIR BEGINS HIS BOOK ON LYING by admitting to telling a lie—actually, a big one. The occasion was a live interview on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal in 2012. A caller asked Adair, the creator and then-editor of the fact-checking organization PolitiFact, whether Republicans received more “False” ratings than Democrats, as it surely seemed.
“I can honestly say I do not keep score,” he responded, “and asking me that question is almost like asking an umpire who is out at home more, the Yankees or the Red Sox.”
TAMAR JACOBY: War-Weary Electorate Leaves Harris Little Room to Maneuver on Ukraine
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS ARE RARELY DECIDED on foreign policy, and this year will be no exception. But poll after poll shows a deepening, bipartisan fatigue with foreign entanglements.
The question we face, as important as who will be the next president, is will America slide into isolationism and a disastrous retreat from world affairs?
🚨OVERTIME🚨
Due to travel, today’s Overtime section is shorter than usual. We look forward to seeing some of you tomorrow in Philadelphia!
Watch… Vice President Harris’s speech in Washington Crossing, PA today. We’ll have more on this #CountryOverParty event on the site soon.
Nevada voters who switched parties in 2020… share thoughts on this year's race, with Sarah Longwell moderating! (PBS)
Trump turns up the crazy…. for free media in waning days of 2024 race (24Sight)
The ‘ABC Whistleblower’ Story Unsurprisingly Fell Apart… Those Who Promoted It Don’t Care. (Sarah Rumpf, Mediaite)
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