Happy November!

So, Jen Psaki has tested positive for Covid-19. She’s the highest-ranking White House official to have contracted the disease. She last saw the president on Tuesday, reports say. Outdoors. Six feet apart. Wearing masks.

Speaking of Covid: The Washington Post reports today that the pandemic is “winding down.” New cases are below 75,000 a day, which still sounds like a lot to me, but the Post says that’s less than half the figure from the summer. Maybe there’s hope on the horizon, especially with younger kids about to get vaccinated.

Academic freedom watch: The New York Times reported over the weekend that three University of Florida professors have been barred from testifying in a lawsuit on behalf of voting rights and against the position of Governor Ron DeSantis. A spokeswoman for the university: “The university did not deny the First Amendment rights or academic freedom” of the professors. “Rather, the university denied requests of these full-time employees to undertake outside paid work that is adverse to the university’s interests as a state of Florida institution.” Right. War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.

Michael Flynn is back in the news and trending on Twitter. Salon reports that a GOP Senate candidate in Pennsylvania, Everett Stern, held a press conference Saturday to announce that Flynn approached him earlier this year to ask that Stern’s business, a private intelligence firm, collect dirt on two Keystone State Republicans to pressure them into supporting Trumpy election “audits.” ’Cuz Trump really won. War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.

Oh, Congress. Nancy Pelosi wanted the House to vote on both Biden bills Tuesday, but now, naturally, that’s not happening. The main holdup appears to be prescription drugs, which is actually good news in the sense that price negotiation was once dead, killed by three members in hock to the Pharma lobby; now it’s back on the table, although the question is in what form and how tough will it be. Punchbowl News and PoliticoHuddle, the morning wires still seem to expect votes this week.

And then there’s Glasgow. The Post accentuates the positive. The Times has a more dour take. A senior administration official coins an interesting neologism in this on-background sentence: “Our allies believe that we have to lock in progress as much as possible while there is a president who is a deeply committed transatlanticist in office.”

And finally there’s Virginia. FiveThirtyEight has Glenn Youngkin ahead of Terry McAuliffe by 0.6 percent. But two polls from late last week that the site rates A+ have McAuliffe up, one by four points. One can only hope that Youngkin may have peaked a week early and that Black voters have been paying attention to this Toni Morrison madness and are motivated to vote.

Op-ed of the day: Jane Coaston in the Times on how passionately she hates Michigan State. She had a miserable Saturday.

Today at NewRepublic.com, start with my own explanation of why Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema behave the way they do. Then check out Osita Nwanevu’s essay on “popularism.” And go to Molly Osberg’s report on the consequences of taking paid family leave out of the budget bill.

Get ready to vote if you live in Virginia,

Michael Tomasky, editor

Friday’s politics question was in honor of Biden’s visit to the Vatican: On September 12, 1960, candidate John Kennedy directly confronted the whispering campaign that he would be controlled by the pope if he were elected president. In a stirring speech upholding the separation of church and state, JFK declared, “Contrary to common newspaper usage, I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party’s candidate for president who happens also to be a Catholic.”

The question: Where and to what group did Kennedy deliver that famous speech?

Answer: The Greater Houston Ministerial Conference, a conservative group of Protestant ministers.

And Friday’s culture question: In 1956, a now-famous play made its American debut at the Coconut Grove Playhouse in Florida. The show was billed as “the laugh sensation of two continents.”

 

Answer: That rib-tickling comedy Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett. 

 

Today’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?

Today’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 percent does the government take out of your pay to finance Social Security?