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Slate News

Our Aging Congress Is a Problem

Slate News

Slate Podcasts

News, News Commentary, Politics

4.56K Ratings

🗓️ 6 September 2023

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The problem with a Congress that is statistically so much older than the country it represents is systemic and—like almost everything in Washington—much of the issue can be traced back to money in politics.


Guest: Walt Hickey, Deputy editor for data and analysis for Insider who worked on their “Red, White, and Gray” reporting project.


If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on What Next. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to help support our work.


Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Madeline Ducharme, Anna Phillips, Paige Osburn, and Rob Gunther.


Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

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1:05.9

So Mallory, how do you feel about the word gerontocracy?

1:09.7

Oh man, how do I feel about the word gerontocracy? It's a loaded question and it's a third rail.

1:16.4

Mallory McMorrow, you can call her Senator McMorrow, is the majority whip in the Michigan

1:21.6

State Senate. She's a Democrat. The reality is that our Congress and our federal officials

1:30.0

on average are significantly older than most of the population.

1:36.4

I called Senator McMorrow up because as far as I can tell, she is one of the few politicians

1:41.0

who wants to talk publicly about that scary tape that came out last week of Mitch McConnell.

1:47.1

The one where he gets a question about his reelection and then just seems to freeze.

1:51.8

This is the second time this summer that McConnell has had an incident like this.

1:55.8

The Capitol doctor says McConnell's fine. McConnell's office has said he was simply lightheaded,

2:01.1

but not everyone is satisfied with these answers.

...

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