1. In 1971, Richard Nixon got a call from Ronald Reagan, complaining about African delegates at the UN. "To see those, those monkeys from those African countries—damn them, they’re still uncomfortable wearing shoes!” theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
2. The racist remarks were excised from the recording’s initial release in 2000. The historian @TimNaftali requested that these tapes be rereviewed, and the Nixon Library has now released them. We publish them for the first time here: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
3. Nixon laughed, and then began repeating Reagan’s complaint to aides. “He saw these, these, uh, these cannibals on television last night, and he says, ‘Christ, they weren’t even wearing shoes, and here the United States is going to submit its fate to that.'"
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My colleague @sophieGG is a treasure—and today, in naming her a finalist for criticism, the Pulitzer board made that official. pulitzer.org/finalists/soph…
Also a Pulitzer finalist? This @julian_aguon story, edited by the incredibly gifted Lenika Cruz, that the jury called "both heartbreaking and hopeful.” theatlantic.com/culture/archiv…
1. Some recent stories that might be helpful in contextualizing tonight’s news 🧵
In December, Mary Zeigler listened to the oral arguments, and wrote that "the Court is poised to reverse Roe outright.” theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
3. Last week, Zeigler and Rachel Rebouché took a detailed look at the legal landscape that Roe will leave behind—where pressures might induce some states to reverse their current course: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
1. Saddened to learn of the death of Aaron Feuerstein. In 1995, when the textile mill he owned burned down, he said, “I’m not throwing 3,000 people out of work two weeks before Christmas.” apnews.com/article/busine…
2. That’s the moment that made him famous. But in the years that followed, he made another courageous choice: Keeping the mill open, instead of following the industry overseas. That cost him his company and much of his fortune.
3. Feuerstein pointed out that Lawrence's textile industry had grown fat on wartime contracts, but was putting the interests of shareholders ahead of workers, or the country. "I considered it immoral and unethical,” he said. He also blamed government policies.
1. Eric Adams has often told the story of his beating at the hands of NYPD cops in recent years. It’s powerful, and an experience to which too many New Yorkers of color can relate.
2. In 2014, he wrote in a NYT op-ed, "I didn’t want any more children to go through what I endured, so I sought to make change from the inside by joining the police department.”
3. In 2021, he wrote in the WSJ, "It was a traumatic experience and the reason I became a police officer. I wanted to change the New York City Police Department from the inside."
1. Back in 1999, @TheJuanWilliams interviewed a newly promoted police lieutenant for a magazine profile that never ran. Last month, he went back to talk to Eric Adams again. A lot of surprising stuff in here: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
2. One part that caught my eye? Eric Adams’s oft-told story of how he became a police officer. The basic contours are the same, but the details different—and much more revealing, and human: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
3. Or then-Lieutenant Adams encountering a woman jumping out of a Chevette in 1999, and giving this precise definition of the political bloc that would, 20 years later, catapult him to victory: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
1. Fascinated by this @kaiserfamfound poll which asked people who’d earlier indicated they didn’t intend to get vaccinated, but that a conversation helped change their mind, what that person said to them.
2. There are positive messages: "We can go out eating, shopping, and having a vacation after get vaccinated.”
There are obvious ones: "You should get vaccinated because you can get sick with COVID-19."
3. Sometimes, it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it: "It had to do with a dramatically more urgent tone than that of his predecessor.”
Or helping people envision the downside: “If I got sick I would die in the hospital alone, without family near by."