The Daily

Joseph R. Biden Jr. picked Senator Kamala Harris of California as his running mate, making her the first Black woman and the first Asian American woman to run for vice president on a major party ticket. Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times, shares his thoughts on the decision. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily 

Background reading: 

• Joe Biden selected Kamala Harris as his vice-presidential running mate on Tuesday. She will be the first is the first Black woman and the first person of Indian descent to be nominated for the office by a major party.
• The selection of Ms. Harris was conventional by some political standards, and groundbreaking in others. Democrats hope that having her on the ticket will attract moderates and Black voters in swing states.
• Here’s what you should know about the California senator and her stances on key policy issues. 

Yesterday on “The Daily,” the New York Times reporter Jonah Bromwich explained how the idea of cancel culture has emerged as a political and cultural force in 2020. In the second of two parts, he returns with a case study. 

Guest: Jonah Engel Bromwich, who writes for the Styles section of The New York Times, spoke with Zeeshan Aleem about his experience of cancel culture. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily 

Background reading: 

• Here’s the first episode in this two-part series exploring cancel culture’s origins and political power.
• There’s an emerging class of people canceled for bad, conservative or offensive opinions. Cancellation is bringing many of them together.
• For teenagers, cancellation on social media is not a new phenomenon. Here are some of their own experiences with being canceled.

In the first of two parts, the New York Times reporter Jonah Bromwich explains the origins of cancel culture and why it’s a 2020 election story worth paying attention to. 

Guest: Jonah Engel Bromwich, who writes for the Styles section of The New York Times

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily 

Background reading: 

• What does it mean to be canceled? It can take only one thing — and sometimes, nothing — for fans to dump a celebrity.
• Many figures in the public eye — including Kanye West and J.K. Rowling — have fretted about being, or claimed to have been, canceled. When an open letter published by Harper’s and signed by 153 prominent artists warned against an “intolerant climate” engulfing the culture, the reaction was swift.
• The prevalence of “call-out culture” is something former President Barack Obama has challenged. 

John Aldridge fell overboard in the middle of the night, 40 miles from shore, and the Coast Guard was looking in the wrong place. This is a story about isolation — and our struggle to close the space between us.

This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.

This is the article read in this episode, written by Paul Tough.

It’s been four years since the 2016 election laid bare the powerful role that social media companies have come to play in shaping political discourse and beliefs in America.

Since then, there have been growing calls to address the spread of polarization and misinformation promoted on such platforms.

While Facebook has been slower to acknowledge a need for change, Twitter has embraced the challenge, acknowledging that the company made mistakes in the past. But with three months to go until the 2020 election, these changes have been incremental, and Twitter itself is more popular than ever.

Today, Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s C.E.O., discusses the platform’s flaws, its polarizing potential — and his vision for the future.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily 

Background reading: 

• A 17-year-old in Florida was recently responsible for one of the worst hacking attacks in Twitter’s history — successfully breaching the accounts of some of the world’s most famous people, including Barack Obama, Kanye West and Elon Musk. But did the teenager do the country a favor?
• Twitter is in hot water with the government for sharing with advertisers phone numbers given to the company for personal security purposes