Tag: Ronald Brownstein

Written by Elaine Godfrey (@elainejgodfrey), Olivia Paschal (@oliviacpaschal), and Madeleine Carlisle (@maddiecarlisle2) Today in 5 Lines A federal judge in Florida ordered the state’s deadline to validate votes be extended until Saturday. Senate candidate Rick Scott’s campaign, whose race is in a recount, said it would appeal the decision. Democrat Jared Golden beat Republican Representative Bruce Poliquin in Maine’s 2nd District, flipping the seat and bringing the number of Democratic House pickups to 33, with seven races still undecided. The Trump administration has reportedly been looking for a way to remove a Turkish exile living in the United States in an effort to persuade Turkish President Recep Erdogan to ease pressure on the Saudi government, after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Facebook is scrambling to respond to Monday’s New York Times report that top Facebook executives had worked to minimize and “deflect blame” over the numerous scandals, including Russian election interference, that have plagued the company over the last two years. Hundreds of Central Americans traveling in a migrant caravan, many of whom are seeking asylum in the United States, have started to arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border. Today on The Atlantic An Oral History: Twenty years ago, the House impeached Bill Clinton. This is the story of what went down, from the very people involved. (David A. Graham and Cullen Murphy) Lessons Learned: Republicans should take away one thing from the midterm elections, writes Ronald Brownstein: As long as they stay loyal to Trump, their electoral prospects will be restricted. A Wave of Support: After last month’s massacre at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, hundreds of thousands of non-Jews turned out for Shabbat services worldwide.

Written by Elaine Godfrey (@elainejgodfrey) Today in 5 Lines Omarosa Manigault Newman, a former aide to President Trump, released a recording of Lara Trump offering her $15,000-a-month job after she was fired from the administration. In a blistering op-ed for The New York Times, former CIA Director John Brennan called Trump’s claims of no collusion “hogwash” and said Trump revoked his security clearance to scare “others who might dare to challenge him.” Jurors began their deliberations in the fraud trial of former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort. Trump criticized the “fake news media” as being “the opposition party” after hundreds of newspapers around the country published editorials condemning his attacks on the press. Today on The Atlantic Watch the Women: There’s one group of voters that could make or break the midterm elections for the Democrats: working-class white women. (Ronald Brownstein) ‘Why a Free Press Matters’: The free press is in an unprecedented state of crisis, write Dan Rather and Elliot Kirschner: “This is a test, not only for those of us who work in journalism, but also for the nation as a whole.” Where Is the Collusion? : As dull as Paul Manafort’s trial was, it “answered that question again and again.” (Natasha Bertrand) Aretha’s Revolution: The life of Aretha Franklin “bookended a grand arc of tumult, letdowns, progress, setbacks, terror, and hope in American history,” writes Vann R. Newkirk II. Snapshot What We’re Reading Don’t Believe It: The medical industry is running a propaganda campaign against universal health care, writes Ryan Cooper. Here’s why their arguments are “garbage.” (The Week) Bill Clinton, Not Richard Nixon: Many Republican strategists and activists are becoming increasingly convinced that if Democrats win the House and move to impeach President Trump, it’ll actually backfire on them. (Gabriel Sherman, Vanity Fair) Visualized Forecasting the Midterms: FiveThirtyEight predicts that Democrats have a 75 percent chance of winning control of the House in November. Here’s the state-by-state breakdown.

To some extent nostalgic narratives have been used in different ways, different forms, and at different times by parties of the Left and the Right for decades, if not centuries; but in recent years the emergence of nationalist populism in many countries has focused attention on the role of nostalgia as a motivating force. The research reveals three countries [Britain, France and Germany] with profoundly different histories, political cultures, and national psychologies, yet also bound together by a common affliction. Moreover, an omnipresent, menacing feeling of decline; that the very best of their culture and communities has been irreversibly lost, that the nation’s best days have passed, and that the very essence of what it means to be French, or German, or British is under threat. It’s not about going back but stopping a process of rapid socio-political change in which large sections of society really do feel left behind. As J. D. Taylor argues in his wonderful book, Island Story (2016), ‘Politics has never been a matter of reason, but of feeling’ and in this regard it is possible to suggest that populist politicians and their parties have in recent years possessed a far more sensitive emotional antennae than their mainstream counterparts. But what exactly does the Demos research tell us that we may not have known already? Critical citizens are very much aware of the progress that has been made in terms of standards of living, educational standards, etc., but feel that the trade-offs between these gains are not sufficiently off-set by the tangible losses they observe in terms of security, community, and cohesion. The link between ‘the precariat’ and nostalgia is understandable in the sense that the latter offers the former a vision of simpler, more stable times. Nostalgia provides a link to a ‘deep story’, to use Hochschild’s term, which is in itself a powerful form of emotional anchorage. Why does understanding nostalgia as a contemporary political or cultural force matter?

-Written by Elaine Godfrey (@elainejgodfrey) Today in 5 Lines On the first anniversary of the special counsel’s Russia probe, President Trump reiterated his claim that there was no collusion between his campaign and the Russians. Trump told reporters that he was referring to MS-13 gang members when he called some undocumented immigrants “animals” on Wednesday. The Senate confirmed Gina Haspel as CIA director. She’ll be the first woman to lead the agency. Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano erupted again, sending a plume of ash 30,000 feet into the sky. The explosion comes after two weeks of volcanic activity that has destroyed at least 26 homes on the Big Island. Authorities said one teacher and one student were killed, and more than 40 others were injured, in a school-bus crash in New Jersey. Today on The Atlantic DIY Education: Some black parents are turning to homeschooling to protect their kids from the systemic racism embedded in America’s public education system. (Melinda D. Anderson) It’s Too Late Now: “Throughout his career, Trump has coped with failure by brazenly misrepresenting failure as success,” writes David Frum. We can expect the administration to take a similar approach in its negotiations with North Korea.