The special election for George Santos’s vacated U.S. House seat has attracted tons of spending and a lot of attention—all to hold the position for less than a year. Who’s running, and what can this vote tell us about what to expect in November? 

Guest: Mark Chiusano, writer, journalist, and author of The Fabulist: The Lying, Hustling, Grifting, Stealing, and Very American Legend of George Santos.

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The Fight for George Santos’s Seat

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Daniel Perry was sentenced to 25 years in prison for murdering Garrett Foster at a Black Lives Matter protest in 2020, but Texas Governor Greg Abbott just pardoned Perry and restored his rights, including the right to own and carry a gun. 

Guest: Christopher Hooks, contributing editor at Texas Monthly.

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Is Killing a Protester Still a Crime?

Though their influence on voters seems to be between negligible and nonexistent, presidential debates are still important. And even if their past performances were sometimes hard to watch, it’s good for democracy that Trump and Biden will meet on stage this election cycle. But these debates will be a little different this time…

Guest: Alan Schroeder, Professor Emeritus at the Northeastern University School of Journalism with a focus on presidential elections, author of Presidential Debates: Risky Business on the Campaign Trail.

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What Are Presidential Debates For?

In theory, crowdfunding sites offer an opportunity for anyone to give to any cause, including, say, strangers facing huge medical bills. In practice, crowdfunding suffers from many of the same inequities that led to someone needing to crowdfund to begin with.

Guest: Nora Kenworthy, author of Crowded Out: The True Costs of Crowdfunding Healthcare, associate professor at the University of Washington, Bothell.

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TBD | The Dark Side of GoFundMe

The 2021 subreddit-coordinated effort to raise the price of Gamestop stock was, in some ways, a proof of concept: the little guy can get into the market and make some noise. Because even though that “meme stock” rose and fell, the idea of the meme stock went has changed the way our stock market works.

Guest: Alex Kirshner, contributing writer for Slate.

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TBD | Too Stonks Too Furious

When Miss USA abdicated her throne, people noticed that the first letters of each sentence of her resignation letter spell out “I am silenced.” Shortly thereafter, Miss Teen USA stepped down with a letter that opens with a quote from Nietzsche. 

What’s going on at the Miss USA organization? Has the idea of a national pageant outlived its usefulness?

Guest: Constance Grady, senior Culture correspondent for Vox. 

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The Fight for George Santos’s Seat

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