Robert Reich, AlterNet

With less than 40 days until Election Day, how can it be that Trump has taken a small lead in Arizona and Georgia — two swing states he lost to Biden in 2020? How can he be narrowly leading Harris in the swing state of North Carolina? How can he now be essentially tied with her in the other key swing states of Michigan and Wisconsin?

More generally, how can Trump have chiseled away Harris’s advantage from early August? How is it possible that more voters appear to view Trump favorably now than they did several months ago when he was in the race against Biden?

How can Trump — the sleaziest person ever to run for president, who has already been convicted on 34 felony charges and impeached twice, whose failures of character and leadership were experienced directly by the American public during his four years at the helm — be running neck-and-neck with a young, talented, intelligent person with a commendable record of public service? ...

Joe Biden didn’t just pass the torch to another generation. He passed it from white MAGA men to America’s future.

Consider that women now compose a remarkable 60 percent of college undergraduates. And that by 2050, it’s estimated that America will consist mostly of minorities — 30 percent more Black people than today, 60 percent more Latinos, and twice the number of Asian Americans.

The power shift has already started....

At the first rally of his 2024 election campaign on March 25 in Waco, Texas — exactly 30 years after a deadly siege between law enforcement and the Branch Davidians resulted in the deaths of more than 80 members of that religious cult and four federal agents — Trump opened with a choir of men imprisoned for their role in the January 6 insurrection singing “Justice for All.”

Their singing was interspersed with the national anthem and with Trump’s reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, his hand on his heart. Behind, projected on big screens, was footage from the Capitol riot.

Trump then repeated his bogus claim that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged.” He praised the rioters of January 6. He raged against the prosecutors overseeing multiple investigations into his conduct as “absolute human scum.” He told the crowd that “the thugs and criminals who are corrupting our justice system will be defeated, discredited and totally disgraced.”...

The 2024 election is 280 days away. How can we survive until then? How can we help America survive beyond it?

Many of you tell me or write in the comments section of this letter that you’re already filled with outrage. I am, too.

Trump is still not locked up, although he incited an attack on the U.S. Capitol more than three years ago, which resulted in several deaths and could have cost the lives of many more, including members of Congress....

The $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News — which starts Monday, with jury selection tomorrow — has uncovered a trove of damning text messages and emails showing that Fox News hosts like Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham knowingly lied to their viewers about false claims of voter fraud during the 2020 presidential election.

A few weeks ago, Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis ruled that the evidence made it “CRYSTAL clear that none of the statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true,” and that the statements from Fox News that are challenged by Dominion constitute defamation “per se.”

Yesterday, Judge Davis said he was imposing a sanction on Fox News and would very likely start an investigation into whether Fox’s legal team had deliberately withheld evidence, scolding the lawyers for not being “straightforward” with him. The rebuke came after lawyers for Dominion revealed a number of instances in which Fox’s lawyers had not turned over evidence in a timely manner. The judge also said he would likely appoint a special master to investigate Fox’s handling of discovery of documents and the question of whether Fox had inappropriately withheld details about Rupert Murdoch’s role as a corporate officer of Fox News....