Last week in Georgia’s 14th congressional district runoff, a Republican candidate who believes in the dangerous and baseless QAnon conspiracy theory came out on top. Marjorie Taylor Greene is now a shoo-in to win a seat in Congress. How did her candidacy get this far? And what does it mean for the Republican party?

Guest: Greg Bluestein, political reporter at the Atlanta Journal Constitution

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Having the Democratic National Convention in Wisconsin was supposed to be a way for the Democrats to atone for 2016. Hillary Clinton was the first presidential candidate from either party to not campaign in the state since Richard Nixon in 1972.

Wisconsin flipped from blue to red in the last presidential election as rural voters voiced their disaffection with the Democratic Party and supported Donald Trump for president. Now, four years later, the Democrats are hoping they can use Trump’s record in office to win them back.

Guest: Dan Kaufman is Contributing Writer at The New Yorker and author of The Fall of Wisconsin

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One day last month, Samuel Chu woke up to the news that the Chinese government wanted him in jail. Chu doesn’t think he’s in danger -- he’s a U.S. citizen, living in Los Angeles. So how did he wind up on the wrong side of Chinese authorities? Simple: He’s lobbying Congress to support democracy in Hong Kong. 

Guest: Samuel Chu, founder of the Hong Kong Democracy Council. 

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In the early days of internet search engines, Google set itself apart by providing a simple service. A list of links, inviting you to explore the websites that best matched your query. It was a portal to the rest of the internet. But over the last two decades, that mission has changed.

Does Google search still take you to the best result for your query? Or does it point users back to its own suite of products?

Guest:

Adrianne Jeffries, investigative journalist at The Markup.

 

Host

Celeste Headlee

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Kamala Harris is having an historic moment. What does it mean?

Guest: Jason Johnson, political science professor at Morgan State University. 

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The pandemic moves quickly. The scientific consensus changes slowly. Did we waste time waiting for data when we could have adopted low-cost safety measures? 

Guest: New York Times reporter Apoorva Mandavilli. 

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The U.S. Census Bureau has faced setback after setback. And, this year, who makes it into the official population count is going to be a lot more complicated. 

Guest: Hansi Lo Wang covers the 2020 Census for NPR. 

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This year, the election runs through the Post Office. And we have reasons to be concerned. 

Guest: Jordan Weissmann, Slate’s senior business and economics correspondent. 

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Over the past five months, city blocks have been slipping away. Bars are closed; restaurants are half-empty; retail is shuttered. As the country returns to varying states of lockdown, how long can these blocks hold on?

 

This week: how one commercial strip on Chicago’s South Side is weathering the pandemic. 

 

Guests:

Nedra Sims Fears, executive director of the Greater Chatham Initiative

Brian d'Antignac, The Woodshop

Jaidah Wilson-Turnbow, Frances Cocktail Lounge

Zoie Reams, Brown Sugar Bakery

 

 

Host

Henry Grabar

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