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For this week’s Slate Plus bonus segment, David previews an interview with Stephen Colbert from Plotz’s forthcoming short-run podcast series. Slate Plus members get an ad-free version of this podcast with bonus segments. Visit slate.com/gabfestplus and try it free for two weeks.

On this week’s Slate Political Gabfest, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss recent Secret Service blunders, speculation about another Mitt Romney candidacy, and the close Senate race in Kansas.

Here are some of the links and references mentioned during this week's show:

• In the past several weeks, a number of disturbing revelations about Secret Service blunders have forced the department’s director to resign.
• September’s revelations aren’t the only scandals to embarrass the agency during President Obama’s tenure.
• Obama has received exponentially more death threats than previous presidents.
• The Secret Service saw cuts following sequestration, but last year the agency got more money than it requested in its budget proposal.
• A recent CNN poll found that if the 2012 presidential election were held today, Mitt Romney would beat Obama.
• John wrote about Romney’s surge in popularity and why it won’t last if he joins the 2016 GOP field.
• Before it became an agency within the Department of Homeland Security, the Secret Service operated under the Treasury Department with little oversight.
• Mark Leibovich’s recent profile of Romney showed the former presidential candidate’s struggle to reconcile his post-campaign popularity with the criticism and scrutiny he faced during his run.
• Prior to President Reagan’s electoral victory in 1980, many voters and analysts viewed him as an imperfect candidate who couldn’t win.
• According to several recent polls, Kansas independent Greg Orman has a slight lead over incumbent Republican Sen. Pat Roberts.
• Sen. Angus King, one of the Senate’s two independents, has not endorsed Orman.

Emily chatters about Lena Dunham’s new book Not That Kind of Girl.

John chatters about how campaign managers deal with rich donors who have bad ideas.

David chatters about League of Kitchens.

The credits were done in the style of a shady mechanic.

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The email address for the Political Gabfest is gabfest@slate.com. (Email may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Podcast production by Mike Vuolo. Links compiled by Maxwell Tani.