Issue November 9, 2018 - The Week Magazine (2024)

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Main storiesEditor’s letterWhen the white nationalist accused of killing 11 people in a Pittsburgh synagogue last week arrived at an emergency room with several bullet wounds, he shouted, “I want to kill all the Jews!” The doctor and the nurse waiting to treat Robert Bowers at Allegheny General Hospital were Jewish; the hospital’s president, Dr. Jeffrey Cohen, belongs to the Tree of Life congregation Bowers attacked. They tended to Bowers as they would any patient. “We’re here to take care of sick people,” Cohen said. “You do what you think is right.” Cohen made a point of talking to Bowers, to see what kind of person could turn an AR-15 on grandfathers and grandmothers and two disabled men. He saw not a monster, but “a very lost guy” who’d listened to the…3 min

Main storiesSynagogue slaughter, mail bombs stun the U.S.What happenedThe nation this week mourned the victims of the deadliest attack on the Jewish community in American history, with many questioning whether a toxic political environment had made the massacre more likely. Eleven worshipers were killed and six others wounded when a gunman armed with a legally purchased AR-15–style assault rifle stormed into Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue shouting, “Kill all Jews.” The 46-year-old gunman, Robert Bowers, had a history of making virulently anti-Semitic online posts. Bowers complained online that President Trump was being controlled by “globalists” and Jewish interests, and that a caravan of Central American migrants headed to the United States was funded by Jews. “I can’t sit by and watch my people get slaughtered,” Bowers wrote shortly before the killings. “Screw your optics, I’m going in.”The…5 min

Main storiesTrump, Democrats in final midterms pushWhat happenedPresident Trump embarked on a whirlwind eight-state campaign tour this week, in a last-minute drive to keep the House and Senate in Republican hands in the Nov. 6 midterm elections. As The Week went to press, polling site FiveThirtyEight.com gave Republicans an 85 percent chance of holding the Senate. It also gave the Democrats an 85 percent chance of winning at least the 23 seats they need to regain control of the House of Representatives. “It’s going to be a great night for America,” said House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi. Early turnout surged in several key states. In Florida, more than 3 million people had cast ballots a week before the vote, a state record. Early voting was also up in Texas, where lines at polling stations snaked around…3 min

Main storiesIt wasn’t all badAfter a gunman murdered 11 people at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, the director of a local mosque was determined that the victims’ families wouldn’t shoulder the funeral costs alone. Wasi Mohamed contacted two U.S. Muslim nonprofits, MPower Change and CelebrateMercy, and arranged an online fundraiser. The fundraiser quickly shattered its $25,000 target, bringing in more than $214,000. “Whatever the community needs, we’ll be there for them,” Mohamed said. “If it’s guarding the synagogue, if it’s walking to the grocery store, we’ll be there to support them.”A rare and valuable copy of a Dec. 28, 1774, newspaper urging its readers to “Unite or Die” against British rule has been found in a pile of donations at a New Jersey Goodwill center. The framed page from the Pennsylvania Journal and Weekly…1 min

Controversy of the weekPolitical violence: How a domestic terrorist became radicalizedFor two long years, the man now sitting in the Oval Office has demonized his opponents and divided the nation, said John Avlon in CNN.com, and “now we are starting to reap the seeds he has sown.” FBI agents investigating the recent mail-bomb campaign to two former Democratic presidents, two former CIA directors, and other critics of President Trump last week arrested Cesar Sayoc, 56, of Florida. A MAGA-hat wearing Trump superfan, Sayoc plastered his van with images of Trump and his favorite rhetorical targets—including Hillary Clinton, George Soros, and CNN—superimposed with red crosshairs. Right-wing conspiracy nuts, including popular radio host Rush Limbaugh, had been suggesting that the bombs would turn out to be “a false flag attack,” sent by liberals to smear Trump supporters, said Rick Wilson in TheDailyBeast.com.…3 min

Controversy of the weekGood week/bad weekGood week for:Second thoughts, after rapper Kanye West announced he was “distancing myself from politics” because he realized “I’ve been used to spread messages I don’t believe in.” West recently made an Oval Office appearance to express his love for President Trump.Happy endings, with the recovery of a 10-foot-tall model of the human colon that had been stolen from the University of Kansas. In a tweet hashtagged #stolencolon, police said that “officers found the giant, inflatable, pilfered intestine in a vacant house.”Coaching, after HBO hired an “intimacy coordinator,” to make actors feel more comfortable while filming sex scenes.Bad week for:Playing host to 6,000 U.S. troops, after Americans who were deployed to Iceland for a NATO training exercise almost drained Reykjavik, the capital city, of beer. “We had to send people…1 min

Issue November 9, 2018 - The Week Magazine (2024)

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