Pushkin.

It's hard to read the news these days without asking yourself, how did we get here?

Fiasco is a history podcast for the co-creators of Slow Burn.

In our first season, Bush v. Gore, we examine an unmistakable turning point in American politics, the 2000 election, which resulted in a high-stakes stalemate, ended with one of the most controversial rulings in Supreme Court history. So if you're trying to make sense at the present moment, check out Fiasco, Bush v. Gore. Listen on theHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

From Pushkin Industries, this is deep background, the show where we explore the stories behind the stories in the news.

I'm Noah Feldman.

There's been a lot going on with the U.S. Postal Service.

In May, a new Postmaster general came into office, a businessman named Louis DeJoy, who

is a big donor to the Trump campaign.

After taking office, DeJoy instituted several cost-cutting measures, like eliminating overtime

pay for some workers, shortening

post office hours, and other proposals that the post office said had long been under consideration.

These changes and others led to concerns that the post office would not be equipped to handle

an election in the middle of a pandemic because many more people than usual would be

voting by mail. Many observers thought these changes were politically motivated, since Democrats

might be more likely to vote by mail than Republicans. Now DeJoy says these changes and others

will be suspended until after the election. Here to help us make sense of all of this,

how worried we should be in what really has been going on, is Elaine K. Mark. She's the director

of the Center for Effective Public Management at the Brookings Institution. She's been studying

the post office for years. She worked in Bill Clinton's White House on the reinventing government initiative, and for many years has been a participant in democratic politics.

We spoke on Monday morning.

Elaine, thank you so much for joining us.

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