Emily, John and David discuss the stimulus bill, racial inequities in vaccine distribution, the return to in-person learning, and Majorie Taylor Greene’s GOP.

Here are some notes and references from this week’s show:

Ezra Klein for the New York Times: “The Senate Has Become a Dadaist Nightmare”

Uché Blackstock and Oni Blackstock for the Washington Post: “White Americans Are Being Vaccinated at Higher Rates Than Black Americans. Such Inequity Cannot Stand.”

Shreya Kangovi and Uché Blackstock for the Washington Post: “Community Health Workers Are Essential in This Crisis. We Need More of Them.”

Thomas B. Edsall for the New York Times: “The QAnon Delusion Has Not Loosened Its Grip”

David Blight’s Open Yale Course: “HIST 119: The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877”

Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World, by Liaquat Ahamed 

Monica Potts for The New York Times: “In the Land of Self-Defeat”


Here are this week’s cocktail chatters: 

Emily: Moe Tkacik for Slate: “The Lousy Tippers of the Trump Administration”

John: Vala Afshar’s tweet of a clip from DisruptTV, Episode 91.  

David: Stefanos Chen for the New York Times: “The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks”

Listener chatter from Phillip Cleveland @pwcleveland: a Twitter thread by Mark R. Miller
@4T9NER about a meaningful family photograph

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For this week’s Slate Plus bonus segment, listener Norman Townsend asks John, Emily, and David to discuss David’s new startup, CityCast.

You can tweet suggestions, links, and questions to @SlateGabfest. Tweet us your cocktail chatter using #cocktailchatter. (Messages may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

The email address for the Political Gabfest is gabfest@slate.com. (Email may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Podcast production by Jocelyn Frank.
Research and show notes by Bridgette Dunlap.
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