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For this week’s Slate Plus bonus segment, the hosts discuss Wisconsin politics and infrastructure with Alder Maurice Cheeks of Madison. Join Slate Plus! Members get bonus segments, exclusive member-only podcasts, and more. Sign up for a free trial today at www.slate.com/gabfestplus.
On this week’s Slate Political Gabfest, Emily Bazelon, David Plotz, and John Dickerson discuss peak Trump versus percolating Kasich, the arrest and subsequent suicide of Sandra Bland, and the fate of the Guantánamo Bay detention center.
Here are some of the links and references mentioned during this week’s show:
- After the “trumping” (courtesy of David) of John McCain (“I like people that weren’t captured.”), Lindsey Graham (by giving out his cellphone number), Anderson Cooper, and Rupert Murdoch (along with many others) have we finally reached peak Trump? (Might he elect for a third-party run if we have?)
- Will Trump’s trumping continue to help him hurt Ted Cruz and surge in the polls (as well as garner even more love from the punditry)? And is Donald Trump the world’s greatest troll (check out the Trump insult and compliment generators)?
- Ohio Gov. John Kasich announced his entry into the 2016 GOP primary. Does Kasich have a chance to win, or will he remain overshadowed by the GOP field?
- John explores how Trump overshadowed Kasich’s announcement and argues that Donald Trump’s lack of modesty makes him an unlikely president.
- #BlackLivesMatter activists interrupted the annual Netroots Nation conference. How did Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders (and, later, Hillary Clinton) respond (and was it enough)?
- Why have Democratic candidates struggled to grasp Black Lives Matter? Jamelle Bouie argues that an effective and broad-based left candidate must have answers for such a powerful constituency.
- Read more of Slate’s coverage of the 2016 campaign.
- A routine traffic stop ended with Sandra Bland—who was driving through Waller County, Texas, en route to a new job—dead in her jail cell from what the medical examiner ruled a suicide.
- Was the traffic stop lawful, what was Sandra Bland’s mental state, did the Texas jail fail Sandra Bland even if it’s telling the truth about her death, and have we been ignoring police violence against black women?
- President Obama is finalizing a plan to fulfill his 2008 campaign promise to close the detention center at Guantánamo Bay. Will he be able to overcome Republican opposition, or is any plan likely to fail?
- What happens if the President can’t close Gitmo and, in light of our re-established diplomatic relations with Cuba, will the U.S. have to give back the “illegally occupied territory of Guantánamo”?
- Read more of Slate’s coverage of News and Politics.
- We look forward to seeing many of you at our Live Political Gabfest on July 29 at the historic Sixth & I!
Emily chatters about Tablet Magazine’s latest Vox Tablet podcast about the man who rescued (or stole) French Jewish history (based on historian Lisa Leff’s novel The Archive Thief).
John chatters about the sad case of President James A. Garfield and his latest episode of Whistlestop.
David chatters about the documentary Harvard Beats Yale 29–29 and NBC’s American Ninja Warrior.
Topic ideas for next week? You can tweet suggestions, links, and questions to @SlateGabfest (#heygabfest). (Tweets may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)
Podcast production by Mike Vuolo. Links compiled by Tarik Barrett.
