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It’s a Birthday Boys Weekender as Jared Yates Sexton and Nick Hauselman go from sugar highs to authoritarian lows, unpacking reports that Trump world is gaming out the Insurrection Act, the normalization of troops on American streets, and why the guardrails failed from Cheney’s unitary executive to the Supreme Court’s immunity blessing. They break down Gov. JB Pritzker’s blunt talk about Trump’s cognitive decline, the Senate’s oversight-as-reality-TV spectacle starring Pam Bondi, and the long arc of American strongman temptations from Adams to Nixon. Plus a quick detour into PTA’s latest thriller, spooky-season horror logic, and Nick’s looming travel apocalypse.

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