When I was younger and faster, I competed in 400- and 800-meter track events. Too long to run as a sprint, but not long enough for the kind of strategy milers and marathoners use, these distances baffled me; I could never figure out how to pace myself. Switching to longer distances gave me an attainable goal—to reach the finish line running.

Kamala Harris will get no such participation award. Like Biden before her, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee has one job between now and November: defeating Donald Trump. As many of us argued over the past few weeks, Biden was no longer up to the task. Is Harris?

As one will notice in Joan Walsh’s interview with the current VP—our August cover story—Harris seems admirably poised and even to be enjoying herself. In the works for months, Walsh and Harris had their final conversation just days before Biden’s debate debacle.

Equally compelling in this issue are Ethan Iverson’s impressions of the Rolling Stones, Rania Abuzeid’s profile of Palestinian filmmaker Mohammad Bakri, Daniel Judt’s call for the revival of worker education, Nawal Arjini’s reflections on the novels of Hari Kunzru, and Bruce Robbins’s essay on history, atrocity, and complicity.

You’ll also find in our August issue Gabriel Furshong’s chronicle of a crucial Montana senate race, John Nichols on Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, and Elie Mystal on Ketanji Brown Jackson’s emerging jurisprudence—plus a bouquet of reviews and dispatches from Alabama, France, New York, and Texas. Plenty to fuel your mind as we sprint toward Election Day. On to the DNC!

-D.D. Guttenplan

Editor, The Nation