Hello and welcome to the Slate Political Gab Fest for Friday, September 16th, 2011.

I am David Plotz, the editor of Slate.

I'm here in Slate's cramped and moist and hot Washington studio with Slate.

You're like the weatherman. What is wrong with the studio with slate political correspondent.

What is wrong with the studio?

There is air conditioning there.

We can't run the air conditioning during the show, which makes a lot of noise.

And so unless we ice the show, we ice the room before we start, it just heats up and heats up.

And this time we've started with it already heated.

So by the end of it, Bill Smee is going to be in his skivies.

And I don't even know what John Dickerson is going to be doing.

So it's going to be awful.

You hear in the distance in a place that is cool and dry, Emily Bazelon, Slate Senior Editor.

Hello, Emily.

Hello.

We're going to do three topics this week.

And the first topic is going to be the debate, which John was at, the GOP debate.

You were at it.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I was there in Tampa at the Fairgrounds. In Tampa, Florida, which is where all Republican things take place these days, Tampa, Florida.

And the next topic after that is going to be the... which is where all Republican things take place these days, Tampa, Florida.

And the next topic after that is going to be the interesting congressional debacle for the Democrats in New York and its connection to what's happening with U.S. policy towards Israel. And Nevada.

...