No Q&A Today; Harris Shows Leaders Matter; US-Russia Prisoner Exchange

Democratic promise and authoritarian gangsterism

Welcome back to Lucid, and hello to all new subscribers. A reminder that there is no Q&A today. Since it is the first week of the month, we will gather on Sunday, August 4, 8-9pmET. Paying subscribers will receive a link to register at 5pmET that day.

Our guests will be the co-founders of the Seneca Project. Tara Setmayer is a political commentator and CEO; Michelle Kinney is a creative director, photojournalist and CCO. “Galvanize Women, Save Democracy” is their slogan, and here is their inspiring launch video, “A Time for Choosing.”

We will talk about the incredible response to VP Harris, womens’ roles in pushing freedoms forward and resisting autocracy, and much more. If you’d like to join these informative conversations, you can sign up as a paying subscriber or upgrade to paid here:

If you know someone who might benefit in these months from Lucid and our Q&As, you can give a gift subscription:

For readers of German, here is an essay I wrote for Der Spiegel about the assassination attempt on Donald Trump.

___________

Do leaders matter? The surge of enthusiasm for Vice President Kamala Harris as prospective Democratic candidate should leave no doubt on the impact leaders can have on engagement with campaigns (measured in donations, mobilization on behalf of the entire Democratic ticket), and, more generally, enthusiasm and optimism about what politics can achieve.

Strongmen is a study of what destructive personalities do at critical junctures of history, when they recognize an opportunity to mobilize people around insecurity, resentment, hatred, and fear.

But what about the crucial moments of history when a constructive leader comes forth to elicit solidarity, and in affirming the dignity of each one of us, sparks an outpouring of collective positive energies?

That is what is happening in the United States today. I will be writing much more about our situation in the next weeks and months, including in relation to successful anti-authoritarian campaigns around the world, but we have a real opportunity to make history. It is incredibly exciting.

___________

What an enormous relief to know that Evan Gershkovich, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Paul Whelan, Ilya Yashin, Alexandra Skochilenko, and other prisoners of the Kremlin are now free.

Knowing the boundless sadism of authoritarians, I had felt such dread with every display of the bodies of these captives, who, like Alexei Navalny before them, became unwilling performers in a spectacle meant to show the world how the Kremlin had total control of them and was slowly killing them.

State violence is literally inscribed on the bodies in such situations through lost hair, lost weight, and terrible pallor. Every time Navalny, Kara-Murza, and Gershkovich were shown to us behind glass or bars, it was Putin telling us: these are my bodies, and I will show you my power through their decline.

Now they are free, and we can rejoice in that and imagine the joy of their loved ones. Yet I also think about these words of Russian democracy defender Garry Kasparov. He warned that “exchanging regime murderers & spies for innocent hostages & political prisoners promotes Russia's production of both.”

The only way to end this gangsterism is to create the conditions for the gangster’s failure at home and abroad. And so we return to the stakes of the U.S. election and the importance of building on the energy and enthusiasm and sense of possibility right now to create change in America that can strengthen democracy globally.

Remember: Your vote is your voice, and your voice can make history.