Hypocrisy, Spinelessness, and the Triumph of Donald Trump
He said Republican politicians would be easy to break. He was right.
October 2024
In This Issue
The insurrectionists next door, Trump's triumph over the GOP, Kash Patel, Mike Lee's conversion, and Joe Rogan's Austin. Plus how abortion bans affect doctors, the end of judicial independence, Yuval Noah Harari vs. AI, Rachel Kushner's swerve, Leonard Cohen, the dangers of extreme fishing, and more.
Features
The Insurrectionists Next Door
Ashli Babbitt’s mother and the wife of a notorious January 6 rioter are at the center of a new mythology on the right. They are also my neighbors.
Why Mike Lee Folded
In 2016, he tried to stop Trump from becoming president. By 2020, he was trying to help Trump overturn the election. Now he could become Trump’s attorney general.
The Man Who Will Do Anything for Trump
Why Kash Patel is exactly the kind of person who would serve in a second Trump administration
‘That’s Something That You Won’t Recover From as a Doctor’
In Idaho and other states, draconian laws are forcing physicians to ignore their training and put patients’ lives at risk.
How Joe Rogan Remade Austin
The podcaster and comedian has turned the city into a haven for manosphere influencers, just-asking-questions tech bros, and other “free thinkers” who happen to all think alike.
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Peter Fisher for The Atlantic Inside the Dangerous, Secretive World of Extreme Fishing
Why I swim out into rough seas 80 nights a year to hunt for striped bass
Dispatches
Illustration by Tyler Comrie. Sources: Official White House Photograph by Shealah Craighead; DNY59 / Getty. The Judges Who Serve at Trump’s Pleasure
The Founders abhorred a judiciary more loyal to the Crown than to the rule of law. But now the independent system they designed is under threat.
Laura León for The Atlantic To Understand Mississippi, I Went to Spain
The forces that would shape my home state’s violent history were set in motion by a 480-year-old map made by a Spanish explorer.
Culture & Critics
Illustration by Liz Hart. Sources: Mike Coppola / Getty; Kevin Mazur / Getty. Men on Trips Eating Food
Why TV is full of late-career Hollywood guys at restaurants
Illustration by Sarah Mazzetti Rachel Kushner’s Surprising Swerve
She and her narrators have always relied on swagger—but not this time.
Illustration by Petra Péterffy. Source: Nicolas Maeterlinck / Belga Photo / Alamy. Yuval Noah Harari’s Apocalyptic Vision
His warning of AI’s dangers is alarming, but does it help us avoid them?
Guy Le Querrec / Magnum The Anti–Rock Star
Leonard Cohen’s battle against shameless male egoism
Departments
The Atlantic The Commons: Phoenix Isn’t Doomed to Evaporate Into the Blistering Sun
Readers respond to our July/August 2024 cover story and more.
The Atlantic
Poetry
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