Good—well, wait; is it a good morning?

Between the Virginia governor’s race and the latest news from Capitol Hill, we’re not so sure. Let’s explore.

Terry McAuliffe and Glen Youngkin are neck and neck, as you’re reading. There’s been a lot of early voting, in a 45-day period that’s the longest in the state’s history (a measure passed by Democrats after they took control of both houses of the state legislature; elections matter). It is said to favor McAuliffe heavily. But Election Day voting always favors Republicans about as heavily. Eyes are focused on Loudoun County, outside Washington, D.C., as a particular bellwether. McAuliffe will win it. Joe Biden hammered Donald Trump there, by 25 points. Steve Kornacki thinks if it’s under 15 or so, McAuliffe could be in real trouble.

But if Youngkin wins, the fallout will be about a lot more than partisan politics. The man is actually going around whipping up his crowds by promising to ban something that does not exist (the teaching of critical race theory in public schools). He is intentionally creating race-based division. In a state with Virginia’s history. He is sick. And if he wins, this poison will be replicated by Republicans everywhere.

On Capitol Hill, Punchbowl News (subscription) reports Tuesday morning that the House is trying to move full steam ahead to vote on both major bills this week, after Joe Manchin’s press conference yesterday. Manchin’s statement was, well, extraordinary: This is happening on my terms, he said, or it ain’t happening at all. Um, when was he elected president? I somehow missed that. He got reelected in 2018 with 290,000 votes. The actual president got 81 million. And the 81-million guy has no leverage over the 290,000 guy. That’s our system.

The two matters are, of course, related. If the Democrats had passed these bills with minimal sturm und drang in September or October—a $1.1 trillion infrastructure bill and, say, a $2.3 trillion budget bill—McAuliffe would be running mostly on that, and I have little doubt he’d be ahead. That that didn’t happen is almost entirely the fault of two people. Ron Brownstein has a typically sharp piece on that up at CNN.com today. 

In somewhat more encouraging news, the Supreme Court’s oral arguments on the Texas abortion law seemed to indicate that the court will allow abortion providers to challenge the law. Remember, in September, the court issued a “shadow docket” 
5–4 ruling that the law could go into effect. The surprise players here were Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, who asked questions indicating to courtroom observers that they were open to a challenge.

And of course there’s Glasgow. Tuesday’s headlines are about Biden seeking to place heavy regulations on methane. This would be a regulation; no Congress required. Sounds reasonably promising. From the Times: “According to the [Environmental Protection Agency], the regulation, once finalized, will reduce 41 million tons of methane emissions from 2023 to 2035, the equivalent of 920 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. That is more than the amount of carbon dioxide emitted from all U.S. passenger cars and commercial aircraft in 2019, the agency said.”

Today at NewRepublic.com, we have Daniel Strauss’s table-setter on Virginia, with a holy-shit quote from Cornell Belcher; Grace Segers on the state of play on Capitol Hill and why you need to start thinking about what we call the Congressional Budget Office score; Matt Ford on those Supreme Court arguments; and from the November print issue, Laura Field on the pro-MAGA intellectual class (yep, they exist). 

OK, that’s enough for now,

Michael Tomasky, editor

Yesterday’s world geography question: What is the most arid region in the world, where the average rainfall is less than one inch per year and the soil has been compared to that of Mars?

 

Answer: The Atacama Desert in northern Chile and southern Peru. 

 

Yesterday’s wonky stuff you should kinda know question: Within $10,000, what is the 2021 cap on Social Security taxes—that is, Social Security taxes are taken out of people’s pay up to what dollar amount? And by the way, what percentage does the government take out of your pay to finance Social Security? 

Answers: $142,800, and 6.2 percent.

Today’s political history question: Since we’re talking about Virginia and schools and race—in 1959, two court orders demanded that Prince Edward County, Virginia, integrate its schools. How did the county respond?

Today’s U.S. geography question: Of the three cities of Detroit, Milwaukee, and Boston, which is the northernmost?