Slate News

With less than two weeks to go until Election Day, maybe you’re feeling a little uneasy. Jim Newell says, despite Biden’s consistent lead in the polls, you should still totally be sweating it.

Guest: Jim Newell, Slate’s senior politics writer.

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Virginia Heffernan talks to Kathleen Kingsbury and Farah Stockman of the New York Times editorial board about the publication’s weekend op-ed package making a verdict against Trump; Stockman’s experiences embedded with the Trump-voting working class for four years and how Democrats fail to reach them; and the importance of seniority on the job.

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Winning November’s presidential election will likely mean turning out a whole host of people who have never voted before. In our new series, First-Timers, we speak with voters from around the country and across the political spectrum to ask them what’s bringing them to the ballot box for the first time.

Guest: Dewayne Comer, a formerly incarcerated first-time voter from Syracuse, New York.

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A spike in COVID cases this fall led to new restrictions in several parts of New York. Many of these locations were home to Orthodox Jewish communities which were hard hit early on in the pandemic.

Feeling singled out by these new rules, Orthodox communities across the city rebelled and began protesting by burning masks and flouting social distancing guidelines. That anger has given rise to a new political figure whose openly squaring off with the mayor, the governor, and the media.

Guest: Jacob Kornbluh, national reporter at Jewish Insider.

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Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Ilyse Hogue, the president of NARAL Pro-Choice America and the author of The Lie that Binds to discuss the Senate Judiciary Committee’s confirmation hearings for Judge Amy Coney Barrett and what her nomination to the Supreme Court means for reproductive rights. 

In our Slate Plus segment, Dahlia is joined by Professor Pamela Karlan of Stanford Law School to discuss all the other questions that went unanswered at the hearings.

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Podcast production by Sara Burningham.

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Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Anna Szymanski talk tax evasion at Vista Investment Group, the issues with company performance reviews and auction theory. 

In the Slate Plus segment: What news is wake-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night news?

Email: [email protected]

Podcast production by Jessamine Molli.

Twitter: @felixsalmon, @Three_Guineas, @EmilyRPeck

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Emily, John and David discuss Barrett’s confirmation hearings; the First Amendment and disinformation; and the latest election machinations.

Here are some references from this week’s show:

Emily Bazelon for the New York Times: “The Problem of Free Speech in an Age of Disinformation”

On Liberty by John Stuart Mill 

The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt 

These Truths: A History of the United States by Jill Lepore

The New York Times interactive: “How To Vote”

“Better Know A Ballot: Stephen Colbert's State-By-State Guide To Voting In The 2020 Election”

Here are this week’s cocktail chatters: 

Emily: Angela Morris for Texas Lawyer: “Chief Justice's Election Bid Puts Spotlight on Texas' Mandatory Judicial Retirement”; Shtisel 

John: “Learning in War-Time” by C. S. Lewis; Antonia Cundy for the Financial Times: “What Would a City Designed by Women Look Like?”; McDonald & Dodds

David: Dan Goodspeed’s data visualization of COVID cases state-by-state by date; Fighting With My Family; Ted Lasso

Listener chatter from Kevin O'Donnell @kevinodIRL: Patrick Blanchfield for The New Republic “The Town That Went Feral”

Slate Plus members get a bonus segment on the Gabfest each week, and access to special bonus episodes throughout the year. Sign up now to listen and support our show.

For this week’s Slate Plus bonus segment, Emily, David, and John discuss their voting plans.

You can tweet suggestions, links, and questions to @SlateGabfest. Tweet us your cocktail chatter using #cocktailchatter. (Messages may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

The email address for the Political Gabfest is [email protected]. (Email may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Podcast production by Jocelyn Frank.

Research and show notes by Bridgette Dunlap.

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Two years ago, Mark Zuckerberg held up Holocaust denial as an example of the type of speech that would be protected on Facebook. The company wouldn’t take down content simply because it was incorrect. This week, Facebook reversed that stance. Is this decision the first step toward a new way of policing speech on the social network?

Guest: Evelyn Douek, Lecturer at Harvard Law School and affiliate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society

Host

Lizzie O’Leary

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Two years ago, Mark Zuckerberg held up Holocaust denial as an example of the type of speech that would be protected on Facebook. The company wouldn’t take down content simply because it was incorrect. This week, Facebook reversed that stance. Is this decision the first step toward a new way of policing speech on the social network?

Guest: Evelyn Douek, Lecturer at Harvard Law School and affiliate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society

Host

Lizzie O’Leary

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Virginia Heffernan talks to Trumpcast favorite, Fordham Law professor Jed Shugerman, about the big picture behind Amy Coney Barrett, ways we can disestablish the Senate, and the concept of originalism when interpreting the U.S. Constitution.

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