Background Briefing: October 22, 2020

On By gram

 

If Biden Gets Under His Skin, Will Trump Have a Meltdown in Tonight’s Debate?

We begin with a discussion ahead of tonight’s final presidential debate and assess whether Trump’s sense of grievance will overcome the advice of his handlers who want him to be upbeat and even jocular in order to win over suburban women. Dr. Allen Frances, a Professor Emeritus and former Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at Duke University and author of Twilight of American Sanity: A Psychiatrist Analyzes the Age of Trump, joins us to discuss the possibility that although his microphone will be muted while Biden speaks, Trump will nevertheless try to dominate and talk over him. And since Trump may still be on steroids and appears lately to be feeling the stress of facing a humiliating loss, if Biden gets under his skin like Obama did yesterday, Trump might just have a meltdown on live TV which would be a fitting epilogue for this creature of television who is either on TV or watching it.

 

Why Did the Supreme Court Uphold Voter Suppression in Alabama?

Then with the Supreme Court ruling that Alabama can stop drive-thru voting in what appears to be fragrant voter suppression, we speak with Joshua Douglas, a Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky about his article at CNN “Courts are supposed to protect the right to vote. Why aren’t they?” With the Supreme Court’s five conservatives exhibiting what seems to be naked partisanship, we speculate about what will happen to voting rights if a sixth right wing Republican partisan is seated by the Republican Senate.

 

America’s History of Treason Confirms Trump is a Traitor

Then finally we speak with David Rothkopf, the host of the “Deep State Radio” podcast and a former senior official in the Clinton Administration who was editor of Foreign Policy Magazine about his new book, out next week, Traitor:  A History of American Betrayal from Benedict Arnold to Donald Trump. He joins us to discuss how in summoning the history of American treachery, he has confirmed that Donald J. Trump is guilty of treason.