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Hello and welcome to the edition podcast. The Spectator's weekly look at some of the most

intriguing and important issues within our pages each week.

With the writers behind them. I'm Cindy Yu.

This week, the presidential candidates in America gave a rather undignified display.

So is it a sneak peek of things to come in November?

Also on a podcast, should we be defending

wokeness?

And at the very end, are male-only spaces

like the Garrick Club immoral?

First up, anyone who saw the presidential debate earlier this week would have known that American politics is not in a healthy state right now.

Matt Purple, a senior editor at the American Conservative, writes our cover piece this week and paints the worst-case scenario if come November,

both sides claim victory. Matt joins me now, together with Karen Robinson, host of the primarily 2020 podcast. So Matt, you start your piece with a damning verdict on that debate from

earlier this week, but you say that in one way it was useful. Can you elaborate on that?

Yeah, well, I mean,

that wasn't a debate. It was like a thermonuclear accident. It was just horrible from start to finish. And, you know, a disgrace for American democracy so far as we're concerned. But that level of

contention, that level of partisanship has really been the case here in America for a long time.

And we've been roiled by riots this year after George Floyd's death.

We've had, you know, white supremacists clashing with left-wing black masks in the streets.

Portland, Oregon is still aflame.

...