vox--2020-10-22--The vicious cycle of never-ending laundry

Hating laundry is not rational , but I do .
Laundry has never been easier ; to give a serviceable performance requires minimal labor and even less skill .
We have not only washers now but dryers , soaps that whiten whites and brighten brights , wardrobes of machine-washable clothes .
According to the Census Bureau ’ s 2020 American Housing Survey , more than 85 percent of Americans can do it without leaving the house .
Yet despite all of technology ’ s best efforts , the problem still exists .
There is always more laundry .
“ Laundry @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the promises of capitalism ” This is not for lack of trying .
We have been doing what is recognizable as modern laundry — using soap and water to make what was dirty clean — for 200 years now .
We have outsourced it and insourced it and mechanized it and developed apps for it , but while we have made it easier , we have not made it less .
Like so many basic functions of life maintenance — eating , showering , cleaning , sleeping — laundry has yet to be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ makes laundry special is that it has also not improved .
Laundry defies the rules of lifestyle innovation and the promises of capitalism .
In the years after World War II , automatic washing machines and accompanying in-home dryers became suburban household staples , and laundry now looks more or less as it did then .
It has not been elevated to the status of a wholesome “ hobby ” ( cooking ) , nor has it been successfully captured by the wellness market ( washing your face ) .
Laundry is instead @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are in a multi-decade stalemate , the only option is to change ourselves .
It wasn ’ t always like this .
There was a time before laundry , although it was less romantic than one might hope .
Until the 19th century , most outerwear , made from wool , leather , or felt , couldn ’ t be washed , and while linen underlayers could , they often weren ’ t , explains Suellen Hoy in her history of cleanliness .
It wasn ’ t until cotton became the fabric of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was so easy to clean — that American women entered the era of perpetual washing .
“ This development was no doubt viewed as an improvement by many people , ” writes technology historian Ruth Schwartz Cowan in her landmark analysis More Work for Mother — one imagines it certainly improved how many people smelled — but it also introduced the nation ’ s women to yet another chore .
Nineteenth-century laundry was performed and dreaded weekly .
Historian Susan Strasser points to the diaries of one Nevada woman who , in 1867 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which women all dread ” and “ the great domestic dread of the household.
” The descriptions of this process defy nostalgia : Sort the clothes , and soak them overnight in separate tubs .
In the morning , drain that water , and then pour “ hot suds ” over the “ finest clothes.
” Rub each item against a washboard .
Wring out each item , and “ rub soap on the most soiled spots , then cover them with water in the boiler on the stove and ‘ boil them @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Wring .
Rinse with bluing ( a trace of blue dye to restore whites to optimal whiteness ) .
Wring .
Dip items in need of starching in starch , and wring again .
Hang dry .
Start again .
Generally , this would take place on Monday , conveniently freeing up Tuesday for intensive ironing .
Presumably , at least one 19th-century contrarian must have enjoyed this process — there is always one — but it was mostly loathed and whenever possible avoided .
“ From all available evidence — how-to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s households , diaries , ” Strasser observes , “ it appears that women jettisoned laundry , their most hated task , whenever they had any discretionary money at all.
” To know how a society feels about a task , you only have to look at who gets the honor of performing it .
In the South , enslaved and then free Black women .
In the North , often young , unmarried immigrants .
Whenever possible , it was delegated to laundresses , or outsourced to commercial laundries , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the majority of American households had at least some of their washing done by someone else .
There is an alternative version of history where laundry left the home and stayed out — most of us don ’ t mill our own flour , for example , or churn our butter , or bake our bread , and when we need or want new clothing , we buy it at the store .
But commercial laundries peaked in the 1920s .
Then laundry came crawling back , thanks to the rise of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the electric washer was that it did the hard labor of scrubbing for you , although you ’ d still have to fill it , empty it , and wring out the wet wash .
The promise of the automatic washing machine , which first hit the market in the late 1930s , was that it did everything .
But rather than cut down on laundry , that ease created more .
“ Modern labor-saving devices eliminated drudgery , not labor , ” argues Cowan , noting that as laundry has gotten easier @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gone up .
Because it is more manageable , you ’ re expected to do it all the time .
“ You are doing much more laundry than your grandmother did.
” “ I always think about the change that came with the advent of electricity , ” says Jessamyn Neuhaus , a history professor at SUNY Plattsburgh and the author of Housework and Housewives in Modern American Advertising : Married to the Mop .
“ Electricity could ease the burden of women keeping house , but also when they turned on those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were like , ‘ Shit , my house is so dirty.
’ ” So it is with laundry : It is so easy now to turn a dial and toss in a capful of detergent that what excuse is there for stains ?
“ When they turned on those electric lights , a lot of people were like , ‘ Shit , my house is so dirty ’ ” As any number of advertisements will confirm , the answer is : none .
There is no excuse , only danger , and for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , detergent brands have been busy warning potential customers about the perils of being inadequately clean .
Advertisers did not invent these anxieties — they only seized upon them — but the result is real-time documentation of America ’ s social fears .
Early laundry ads make it very clear that laundry is the responsibility of the housewife , Neuhaus writes , and there are so many ways for her to fail .
For example : hiring help .
“ Table linen can be hopelessly ruined by an incompetent laundress , ” warned @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
A 1918 ad for Lux suds urged women : “ Don ’ t hate the laundress !
She has no grudge against your filmy things .
She doesn ’ t want to ruin them .
She ’ s simply keeping on washing them in the only way she knows.
” Laundry , the ads suggest , is too intimate to be outsourced , never mind the many years it had been .
No one cares like you do .
Good help is hard to find .
And there were racist health concerns @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had attacked competing Chinese laundries for being , as one scholar puts it , “ filthy places where various diseases were likely rampant , ” some late-19th-century publicity campaigns suggested that laundry should not cross racial lines , says Emily Westkaemper , a professor at James Madison University focused on US women ’ s history .
It was a convenient anxiety .
In post-Civil War Atlanta , for example , where Black women often took on washing work as an alternative to domestic servitude , “ there would be publicity campaigns : If @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the home , and these predominantly minority women are doing it , there are these supposed ‘ health risks ’ that might result in exposure to disease.
” It was , Westkaemper points out , a concerted effort to deny African American women jobs that would give them autonomy , cloaked in the language of public health .
The more possible laundry was , the more it became necessary .
Proper washing could fend off germs , protecting families from the contaminants of the outside world , but increasingly , at least @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was coming from within .
“ She has ‘ IT ’ — but not what you think , ” sighs a 1933 Lux ad , explaining that , despite her natural beauty , “ she ” never gets a second dance and will likely die alone , on account of body odor .
It was an act of love , the ads said , and specifically an act of maternal love .
“ My mommy does laundry one , two , three , four , a million times a week !
” proclaims @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mother ’ s allegiance to Rinso Blue .
The archetype persists .
“ The image of Mom taking care of her family still seems to be working , ” Neuhaus says .
“ As a culture , we ’ ve kind of settled on that as our impossible-to-obtain ideal.
” Other vestiges of nuclear-era housework have been elevated to new and extremely photogenic heights .
The reclaimed , not-your-grandma ’ s domesticity of the mid- to late aughts has been replaced by a steady stream of aspirational content about women organizing closets .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ is that we never successfully figured out how to lose it in the first place .
Domestic projects can become quaint hobbies only once they ’ re optional .
Knitting is fun because you rarely have to do it .
Many , if not most , home gardeners could alternatively buy basil at the grocery store .
But in the case of laundry , there are no alternatives .
Laundry is forever .
“ The fact is , ” Neuhaus says , “ we do have to wash our clothes.
” In the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ two options : You can either overhaul the experience and remove the drudge , or you can rebrand it as an act of personal indulgence .
In the first category : TaskRabbit ( the drudge of chores ) ; Instacart ( the drudge of buying groceries ) ; Seamless ( the drudge of ordering takeout by speaking to another person ) ; Blue Apron ( the drudge of kitchen measurements ) ; Billie ( the drudge of remembering to buy and replace razors ) .
The second category is harder to define .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ color .
It is everything at the Container Store .
It is Dyson vacuum cleaners , status dish soaps , and artisanal brooms .
It is a never-ending roster of products that promise to transform the oppressive mundanity of personal maintenance into a minor luxury .
It is the difference between washing your face and practicing a “ skin care routine.
” In the face of drudgery , you can either overhaul the experience or you can rebrand it as an act of personal indulgence In 2013 , a laundry startup called Washio @ @ @ @ @ @ @ proposition being that doing laundry is unpleasant , and wouldn ’ t it be nice to press some buttons on your phone to summon someone who could do it for you ?
Washio was not alone in its assessment : In major cities across the country , other VC-funded laundry startups — FlyCleaners , Brinkmat , Cleanly , and Rinse — were racing to dominate the techno-laundry market , like Uber but for dirty clothes .
“ When people in a privileged society look deep within themselves to find what is missing , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Washio , “ a streamlined clothes-cleaning experience comes up a lot.
” You might think this means that we could find it , but like reliable printers or consistently responsive Siri , it remains forever out of reach .
Washio failed .
Then FlyCleaners laid off its staff .
Cleanly merged with a boutique dry cleaner to “ vertically integrate ” but seems to be having some trouble lately keeping track of people ’ s clothes .
The tenuous promise of laundry robots is yet unrealized .
Laundry remains remarkably undisrupted .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the misery of washing — it would arguably be more efficient — but in the United States , in practice , sending out our laundry simply isn ’ t something we do .
( There are , of course , exceptions : the very wealthy , city dwellers devoted to their drop-off wash-and-folds . )
For the most part , though , we are , in this one case , a DIY society .
If slick on-demand services can not make laundry frictionless , then there is only one move left : to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ basic laundry process may not have changed much since the mass introduction of the automatic washer , but that doesn ’ t mean you can ’ t elevate the Laundry Experience .
“ The laundry room , once the dull afterthought of the home , has gone upstairs and upscale , ” declared the Chicago Tribune in 2003 .
In fact , the pinnacle of laundry spaces were not “ rooms ” at all : “ These days , think laundry ‘ center ’ or ‘ family studio , ’ the term Whirlpool @ @ @ @ @ @ @ includes a ‘ sink spa , ’ ‘ ironing station , ’ ‘ drying cabinet ’ and Personal Valet ‘ clothes vitalizing ’ system , ” urged the Tribune .
“ Think fine , custom-built cabinetry to hold the laundry soap .
Wait !
Don ’ t think laundry soap at all : You ’ ll be wanting ‘ Spa Treatment ’ laundry detergents with aromatherapy scents , and don ’ t forget the $ 17.50 fabric softener from Williams-Sonoma or the $ 10 linen spray from Caldrea.
” According to Caldrea ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was discovering that , with the right pear-blossom-agave-scented products , laid out on gleaming granite countertops , the tedium of laundry could take on certain “ meditative ” qualities .
What it offers goes beyond cleanliness : Luxury laundry wants to be a retreat from the chaos of the world .
Perhaps the biggest name in high-end laundry is the Laundress , which sells 85 hyper-specific cleaning products , packaged with understated , old-moneyed elegance .
When , last year , the company was acquired by Unilever , co-founders Lindsey Boyd and Gwen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their success .
“ We turn everyday chores into a luxurious experience , ” Boyd told Forbes .
“ Our fundamental premise was that you don ’ t need to send your clothes to the dry cleaners , ” Whiting explained in Fast Company .
“ We focused on creating different formulas for different types of fabric , which was different from many detergents that have a one-size-fits-all approach.
” To maximize your laundering experience , you needed to spend more time on laundry , not less .
The Laundress has an eco-friendly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a specialized delicates detergent , yes , but also a sport detergent , a denim wash , a wool and cashmere shampoo , a stain solution , a fabric conditioner , a bleach alternative , and an “ aprés laundry cream ” ( for hands ) .
In one obvious sense , the luxification of laundry — elevated by becoming more time-consuming and expensive — is a sinister exercise in excess .
“ It ’ s all about how much money you have to spend on yourself and on your consumer goods , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But there is also something perversely radical — craven , perhaps , but also radical — about a $ 20 bottle of highly specialized detergent .
It suggests that laundry , archetypical women ’ s work , underpaid and undervalued , is in fact a worthwhile way to spend your time .
I like this idea , in theory , and in practice , $ 20 is a lot and I still hate laundry .
Here is my laundry experience : I gather my clothes and sort them .
I put them in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the laundromat , where I put the contents in high-powered machines .
I add an unscented eco-detergent pod .
I push buttons .
I wait .
I like to use this opportunity to stare blankly at my phone .
Laundry requires so little , and I despise it so much .
It is possible I might feel differently if I had my own in-home washer , as most Americans do , but then again , there is strong evidence I might not .
“ It ’ s time-consuming , unceasing , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ go wrong , ” wrote professional Clean Person Jolie Kerr at the New York Times .
Lifehacker called it “ the world ’ s most boring chore.
” On Etsy , craft platform and societal mirror , there is a whole cottage industry of anti-laundry merch in bridesmaid font : “ Laundry Sucks , ” reads one sign , presumably meant for a laundry room .
“ Fluff , Fold , Fuck This.
” It is difficult to find reputable data on people ’ s least favorite chores , but according to a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ liners , ” Americans rank it somewhere above “ organizing the garage ” but below “ pitching empty shampoo bottles.
” “ There ’ s no creative element to it whatsoever , ” says Kate Haulman , an associate history professor at American University who studies gender history , affirming my feelings .
It ’ s “ invisible , until it ’ s not done , ” at which point it becomes a moral failing .
In the game of laundry , you can only lose .
Laundry requires so little , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ interest of fair representation , we have to acknowledge that laundry enthusiasts do exist and walk among us .
Moreover , it is possible that in some sense , they are right .
“ Everyone , no matter how rich or poor or domestically uninclined , can not only benefit from acquiring laundry skills and learning about fabrics but will also find considerable satisfaction in doing so , ” writes Cheryl Mendelson in her staggeringly exhaustive treatise on the many nuances of laundering , 400 pages , titled , accurately , Laundry .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ to be developed , rather than an ordeal to be tolerated with as little thought as possible , “ helps to reawaken us to the part of the world that we experience most intimately.
” “ I am not exaggerating when I say that I love taking care of my clothes , ” says Elizabeth Cline , whose most recent book , The Conscious Closet , positions thoughtful laundering as one tenet of an ethical wardrobe .
“ I love figuring out how to remove a challenging stain .
It ’ s satisfying @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s satisfying to understand fibers and clothing enough to be able to keep them going.
” Treating laundry as an experience best forgotten immediately , like childbirth , is in her view to rob ourselves of “ all of these incredibly gratifying points of connection to our clothes.
” Neither she nor Mendelson is arguing that we should be spending more time on laundry .
We are spending so much time already !
What they are instead prescribing is a fundamental shift in attitude : To embrace laundry requires finding pleasure in maintenance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ keeping things exactly as they were .
I understand .
I agree .
It has yet to help .
“ Fluff , Fold , Fuck This , ” I think , again .
No matter what you do to laundry , some basic truths remain .
“ You ’ re still carting it around , ” says Haulman .
“ You still have to fold it .
It retains , I think , that vibe of drudgery.
” Even the act of laundering creates laundry , if you wear clothes while you ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ single moment when all possible laundry is done .
The problem with modern laundry is not that it is taxing , physically , but that it is hopeless , existentially .
It is a constant losing battle , you and your gross body versus the steady march of decay .
You wear clothes , and then you wash them , and in the absolute best-case scenario , you manage to erase the evidence that you were ever there .
It will work until it doesn ’ t .
Eventually , through time or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Someday , somewhere , you will do your final load .
But the laundry will continue .
It always does .
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Hating laundry is not rational, but I do. Laundry has never been easier; to give a serviceable performance requires minimal labor and even less skill. We have not only washers now but dryers, soaps that whiten whites and brighten brights, wardrobes of machine-washable clothes. According to the Census Bureau’s 2020 American Housing Survey, more than 85 percent of Americans can do it without leaving the house. Yet despite all of technology’s best efforts, the problem still exists. There is always more laundry.
“Laundry defies the rules of lifestyle innovation and the promises of capitalism”
This is not for lack of trying. We have been doing what is recognizable as modern laundry — using soap and water to make what was dirty clean — for 200 years now. We have outsourced it and insourced it and mechanized it and developed apps for it, but while we have made it easier, we have not made it less. Like so many basic functions of life maintenance — eating, showering, cleaning, sleeping — laundry has yet to be hacked out of existence. But what makes laundry special is that it has also not improved.
Laundry defies the rules of lifestyle innovation and the promises of capitalism. In the years after World War II, automatic washing machines and accompanying in-home dryers became suburban household staples, and laundry now looks more or less as it did then. It has not been elevated to the status of a wholesome “hobby” (cooking), nor has it been successfully captured by the wellness market (washing your face). Laundry is instead an intractable condition. And if we are in a multi-decade stalemate, the only option is to change ourselves.
It wasn’t always like this. There was a time before laundry, although it was less romantic than one might hope. Until the 19th century, most outerwear, made from wool, leather, or felt, couldn’t be washed, and while linen underlayers could, they often weren’t, explains Suellen Hoy in her history of cleanliness. It wasn’t until cotton became the fabric of our lives — in part because it was so easy to clean — that American women entered the era of perpetual washing.
“This development was no doubt viewed as an improvement by many people,” writes technology historian Ruth Schwartz Cowan in her landmark analysis More Work for Mother — one imagines it certainly improved how many people smelled — but it also introduced the nation’s women to yet another chore. Nineteenth-century laundry was performed and dreaded weekly. Historian Susan Strasser points to the diaries of one Nevada woman who, in 1867, called laundering “the Herculean task which women all dread” and “the great domestic dread of the household.”
The descriptions of this process defy nostalgia: Sort the clothes, and soak them overnight in separate tubs. In the morning, drain that water, and then pour “hot suds” over the “finest clothes.” Rub each item against a washboard. Wring out each item, and “rub soap on the most soiled spots, then cover them with water in the boiler on the stove and ‘boil them up.’” Repeat with plain water. Wring. Rinse with bluing (a trace of blue dye to restore whites to optimal whiteness). Wring. Dip items in need of starching in starch, and wring again. Hang dry. Start again. Generally, this would take place on Monday, conveniently freeing up Tuesday for intensive ironing.
Presumably, at least one 19th-century contrarian must have enjoyed this process — there is always one — but it was mostly loathed and whenever possible avoided. “From all available evidence — how-to manuals, budget studies of poor people’s households, diaries,” Strasser observes, “it appears that women jettisoned laundry, their most hated task, whenever they had any discretionary money at all.”
To know how a society feels about a task, you only have to look at who gets the honor of performing it. In the South, enslaved and then free Black women. In the North, often young, unmarried immigrants. Whenever possible, it was delegated to laundresses, or outsourced to commercial laundries, and by the end of the century, the majority of American households had at least some of their washing done by someone else.
There is an alternative version of history where laundry left the home and stayed out — most of us don’t mill our own flour, for example, or churn our butter, or bake our bread, and when we need or want new clothing, we buy it at the store. But commercial laundries peaked in the 1920s. Then laundry came crawling back, thanks to the rise of the electric washing machine. The promise of the electric washer was that it did the hard labor of scrubbing for you, although you’d still have to fill it, empty it, and wring out the wet wash.
The promise of the automatic washing machine, which first hit the market in the late 1930s, was that it did everything. But rather than cut down on laundry, that ease created more. “Modern labor-saving devices eliminated drudgery, not labor,” argues Cowan, noting that as laundry has gotten easier, our standards for cleanliness have only gone up. Because it is more manageable, you’re expected to do it all the time. “You are doing much more laundry than your grandmother did.”
“I always think about the change that came with the advent of electricity,” says Jessamyn Neuhaus, a history professor at SUNY Plattsburgh and the author of Housework and Housewives in Modern American Advertising: Married to the Mop. “Electricity could ease the burden of women keeping house, but also when they turned on those electric lights, a lot of people were like, ‘Shit, my house is so dirty.’” So it is with laundry: It is so easy now to turn a dial and toss in a capful of detergent that what excuse is there for stains?
“When they turned on those electric lights, a lot of people were like, ‘Shit, my house is so dirty’”
As any number of advertisements will confirm, the answer is: none. There is no excuse, only danger, and for the better part of the past century, detergent brands have been busy warning potential customers about the perils of being inadequately clean. Advertisers did not invent these anxieties — they only seized upon them — but the result is real-time documentation of America’s social fears.
Early laundry ads make it very clear that laundry is the responsibility of the housewife, Neuhaus writes, and there are so many ways for her to fail. For example: hiring help. “Table linen can be hopelessly ruined by an incompetent laundress,” warned a Borax ad from the late 1800s. A 1918 ad for Lux suds urged women: “Don’t hate the laundress! She has no grudge against your filmy things. She doesn’t want to ruin them. She’s simply keeping on washing them in the only way she knows.” Laundry, the ads suggest, is too intimate to be outsourced, never mind the many years it had been. No one cares like you do. Good help is hard to find.
And there were racist health concerns. Just as white commercial laundry owners had attacked competing Chinese laundries for being, as one scholar puts it, “filthy places where various diseases were likely rampant,” some late-19th-century publicity campaigns suggested that laundry should not cross racial lines, says Emily Westkaemper, a professor at James Madison University focused on US women’s history.
It was a convenient anxiety. In post-Civil War Atlanta, for example, where Black women often took on washing work as an alternative to domestic servitude, “there would be publicity campaigns: If you’re sending your laundry out of the home, and these predominantly minority women are doing it, there are these supposed ‘health risks’ that might result in exposure to disease.” It was, Westkaemper points out, a concerted effort to deny African American women jobs that would give them autonomy, cloaked in the language of public health.
The more possible laundry was, the more it became necessary. Proper washing could fend off germs, protecting families from the contaminants of the outside world, but increasingly, at least based on the advertising, the threat was coming from within. “She has ‘IT’ — but not what you think,” sighs a 1933 Lux ad, explaining that, despite her natural beauty, “she” never gets a second dance and will likely die alone, on account of body odor. It was an act of love, the ads said, and specifically an act of maternal love. “My mommy does laundry one, two, three, four, a million times a week!” proclaims a 1958 commercial child, explaining her mother’s allegiance to Rinso Blue. The archetype persists. “The image of Mom taking care of her family still seems to be working,” Neuhaus says. “As a culture, we’ve kind of settled on that as our impossible-to-obtain ideal.”
Other vestiges of nuclear-era housework have been elevated to new and extremely photogenic heights. The reclaimed, not-your-grandma’s domesticity of the mid- to late aughts has been replaced by a steady stream of aspirational content about women organizing closets. The trouble with laundry, though, is that we never successfully figured out how to lose it in the first place. Domestic projects can become quaint hobbies only once they’re optional. Knitting is fun because you rarely have to do it. Many, if not most, home gardeners could alternatively buy basil at the grocery store. But in the case of laundry, there are no alternatives. Laundry is forever. “The fact is,” Neuhaus says, “we do have to wash our clothes.”
In the face of drudgery, there are generally two options: You can either overhaul the experience and remove the drudge, or you can rebrand it as an act of personal indulgence. In the first category: TaskRabbit (the drudge of chores); Instacart (the drudge of buying groceries); Seamless (the drudge of ordering takeout by speaking to another person); Blue Apron (the drudge of kitchen measurements); Billie (the drudge of remembering to buy and replace razors).
The second category is harder to define. It is organizing all your books by color. It is everything at the Container Store. It is Dyson vacuum cleaners, status dish soaps, and artisanal brooms. It is a never-ending roster of products that promise to transform the oppressive mundanity of personal maintenance into a minor luxury. It is the difference between washing your face and practicing a “skin care routine.”
In the face of drudgery, you can either overhaul the experience or you can rebrand it as an act of personal indulgence
In 2013, a laundry startup called Washio launched in San Francisco, the value proposition being that doing laundry is unpleasant, and wouldn’t it be nice to press some buttons on your phone to summon someone who could do it for you? Washio was not alone in its assessment: In major cities across the country, other VC-funded laundry startups — FlyCleaners, Brinkmat, Cleanly, and Rinse — were racing to dominate the techno-laundry market, like Uber but for dirty clothes. “When people in a privileged society look deep within themselves to find what is missing,” quipped Jessica Pressler in her profile of Washio, “a streamlined clothes-cleaning experience comes up a lot.” You might think this means that we could find it, but like reliable printers or consistently responsive Siri, it remains forever out of reach.
Washio failed. Then FlyCleaners laid off its staff. Cleanly merged with a boutique dry cleaner to “vertically integrate” but seems to be having some trouble lately keeping track of people’s clothes. The tenuous promise of laundry robots is yet unrealized. Laundry remains remarkably undisrupted.
Certainly, it is possible to outsource the misery of washing — it would arguably be more efficient — but in the United States, in practice, sending out our laundry simply isn’t something we do. (There are, of course, exceptions: the very wealthy, city dwellers devoted to their drop-off wash-and-folds.) For the most part, though, we are, in this one case, a DIY society.
If slick on-demand services cannot make laundry frictionless, then there is only one move left: to turn that friction into pleasure. The basic laundry process may not have changed much since the mass introduction of the automatic washer, but that doesn’t mean you can’t elevate the Laundry Experience. “The laundry room, once the dull afterthought of the home, has gone upstairs and upscale,” declared the Chicago Tribune in 2003. In fact, the pinnacle of laundry spaces were not “rooms” at all: “These days, think laundry ‘center’ or ‘family studio,’ the term Whirlpool favors for its clothes-care system, which includes a ‘sink spa,’ ‘ironing station,’ ‘drying cabinet’ and Personal Valet ‘clothes vitalizing’ system,” urged the Tribune. “Think fine, custom-built cabinetry to hold the laundry soap. Wait! Don’t think laundry soap at all: You’ll be wanting ‘Spa Treatment’ laundry detergents with aromatherapy scents, and don’t forget the $17.50 fabric softener from Williams-Sonoma or the $10 linen spray from Caldrea.”
According to Caldrea’s founder, a very stressed-out generation was discovering that, with the right pear-blossom-agave-scented products, laid out on gleaming granite countertops, the tedium of laundry could take on certain “meditative” qualities. What it offers goes beyond cleanliness: Luxury laundry wants to be a retreat from the chaos of the world.
Perhaps the biggest name in high-end laundry is the Laundress, which sells 85 hyper-specific cleaning products, packaged with understated, old-moneyed elegance. When, last year, the company was acquired by Unilever, co-founders Lindsey Boyd and Gwen Whiting were clear about the reason for their success. “We turn everyday chores into a luxurious experience,” Boyd told Forbes. “Our fundamental premise was that you don’t need to send your clothes to the dry cleaners,” Whiting explained in Fast Company. “We focused on creating different formulas for different types of fabric, which was different from many detergents that have a one-size-fits-all approach.” To maximize your laundering experience, you needed to spend more time on laundry, not less.
The Laundress has an eco-friendly product for every situation: There is a specialized delicates detergent, yes, but also a sport detergent, a denim wash, a wool and cashmere shampoo, a stain solution, a fabric conditioner, a bleach alternative, and an “aprés laundry cream” (for hands).
In one obvious sense, the luxification of laundry — elevated by becoming more time-consuming and expensive — is a sinister exercise in excess. “It’s all about how much money you have to spend on yourself and on your consumer goods,” Neuhaus notes, quite reasonably. But there is also something perversely radical — craven, perhaps, but also radical — about a $20 bottle of highly specialized detergent. It suggests that laundry, archetypical women’s work, underpaid and undervalued, is in fact a worthwhile way to spend your time.
I like this idea, in theory, and in practice, $20 is a lot and I still hate laundry. Here is my laundry experience: I gather my clothes and sort them. I put them in a bag. I take the bag to the laundromat, where I put the contents in high-powered machines. I add an unscented eco-detergent pod. I push buttons. I wait. I like to use this opportunity to stare blankly at my phone. Laundry requires so little, and I despise it so much. It is possible I might feel differently if I had my own in-home washer, as most Americans do, but then again, there is strong evidence I might not.
“It’s time-consuming, unceasing, and there is so very much that can go wrong,” wrote professional Clean Person Jolie Kerr at the New York Times. Lifehacker called it “the world’s most boring chore.” On Etsy, craft platform and societal mirror, there is a whole cottage industry of anti-laundry merch in bridesmaid font: “Laundry Sucks,” reads one sign, presumably meant for a laundry room. “Fluff, Fold, Fuck This.”
It is difficult to find reputable data on people’s least favorite chores, but according to a survey from a company selling “shelf liners,” Americans rank it somewhere above “organizing the garage” but below “pitching empty shampoo bottles.” “There’s no creative element to it whatsoever,” says Kate Haulman, an associate history professor at American University who studies gender history, affirming my feelings. It’s “invisible, until it’s not done,” at which point it becomes a moral failing. In the game of laundry, you can only lose.
Laundry requires so little, and I despise it so much
In the interest of fair representation, we have to acknowledge that laundry enthusiasts do exist and walk among us. Moreover, it is possible that in some sense, they are right. “Everyone, no matter how rich or poor or domestically uninclined, can not only benefit from acquiring laundry skills and learning about fabrics but will also find considerable satisfaction in doing so,” writes Cheryl Mendelson in her staggeringly exhaustive treatise on the many nuances of laundering, 400 pages, titled, accurately, Laundry. To invest in laundering as a skill to be developed, rather than an ordeal to be tolerated with as little thought as possible, “helps to reawaken us to the part of the world that we experience most intimately.”
“I am not exaggerating when I say that I love taking care of my clothes,” says Elizabeth Cline, whose most recent book, The Conscious Closet, positions thoughtful laundering as one tenet of an ethical wardrobe. “I love figuring out how to remove a challenging stain. It’s satisfying to have that knowledge. It’s satisfying to understand fibers and clothing enough to be able to keep them going.” Treating laundry as an experience best forgotten immediately, like childbirth, is in her view to rob ourselves of “all of these incredibly gratifying points of connection to our clothes.”
Neither she nor Mendelson is arguing that we should be spending more time on laundry. We are spending so much time already! What they are instead prescribing is a fundamental shift in attitude: To embrace laundry requires finding pleasure in maintenance, to revel in the joy of keeping things exactly as they were.
I understand. I agree. It has yet to help. “Fluff, Fold, Fuck This,” I think, again. No matter what you do to laundry, some basic truths remain. “You’re still carting it around,” says Haulman. “You still have to fold it. It retains, I think, that vibe of drudgery.” Even the act of laundering creates laundry, if you wear clothes while you’re doing it. There is no single moment when all possible laundry is done.
The problem with modern laundry is not that it is taxing, physically, but that it is hopeless, existentially. It is a constant losing battle, you and your gross body versus the steady march of decay. You wear clothes, and then you wash them, and in the absolute best-case scenario, you manage to erase the evidence that you were ever there. It will work until it doesn’t. Eventually, through time or user error, the fabrics will disintegrate. Someday, somewhere, you will do your final load. But the laundry will continue. It always does.


vox--2020-10-22--How South Carolina became one of 2020’s most unexpected Senate battlegrounds

South Carolina is the Senate battleground that no one saw coming .
In a state where no Democrat has won a Senate seat for more than two decades , former South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Jaime Harrison has fielded an incredibly strong challenge to incumbent Sen. Lindsey Graham , a high-profile Trump ally .
Although early polling had Harrison lagging Graham by as much as 17 percentage points in February , some recent surveys show the two lawmakers with an even split in support .
The support he ’ s gotten has surprised many — including Harrison himself .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” he told Vox .
“ I got into this race because I knew I had a shot , but not in my wildest dreams did I imagine a campaign growing like this campaign has grown.
” Longtime South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn ( D-SC ) , whom Harrison previously worked for as a congressional staffer , has echoed this sentiment .
“ Not a single soul alive believed when he announced for the Senate that he would be sitting here 30 days out , 48-48 , ” Clyburn said in an early @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a staggering amount of money , and positioning himself as a moderate with close ties to the state , Harrison has been able to garner strong support from Democrats and independents , as well as a sliver of moderate Republicans .
And now Graham faces one of the closest races of his political career .
Graham has acknowledged this by making appeals for donations during several Fox News appearances , and campaign spokesperson T.W .
Arrighi seemed to project a mixture of optimism and realism in a statement to Vox : “ Make @ @ @ @ @ @ @ us on track for a victory in November , but Senator Graham is fighting for every vote as he never takes anything for granted.
” Overall , the contest between Harrison and Graham could hinge on voters who split their ticket between the presidential and Senate races .
President Donald Trump is still expected to win in South Carolina — even if it ’ s by much narrower margins than he did in 2016 , when he was ahead by 15 points .
This means some Trump voters would likely need to defect @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democrats or a third-party candidate — for Harrison to edge out the longtime Republican lawmaker .
That scenario , Winthrop University pollster Scott Huffmon says , is “ Harrison ’ s narrow path on a Nepalese cliff.
” Harrison ’ s strength as a candidate and his ties with national Democrats ( he ’ s an associate chair of the Democratic National Committee ) are among the factors that have helped him launch a robust campaign that ’ s attracted millions in donations from both inside and outside the state .
As of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ million compared to Graham ’ s $ 58 million , and that advantage has translated to a huge presence on television and in digital advertising .
Harrison ’ s massive fundraising haul has been critical in establishing him as a formidable challenger in part because it has allowed him to quickly go from being less well-known to having wide name recognition across the state .
“ Jaime Harrison has done what no Democratic candidate has successfully been able to do , and that is raise enough money to take the fight to Lindsey @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” says Anton Gunn , a strategist and former state political director for President Barack Obama ’ s 2008 campaign .
Harrison tells Vox this support has been driven by grassroots energy .
“ We have gotten thousands of volunteers , I think we ’ re on [ 14,000 ] or 15,000 people who signed up to volunteer for our campaign .
We ’ ve gotten well over a million contributions , ” he said .
As the Guardian reported , both Harrison ’ s and Graham ’ s campaigns have seen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from out of state .
Experts also note that Harrison began putting out advertising early in the year — months before Graham began mounting a comparable effort on the air — enabling him to introduce himself to voters by focusing on his background , family , and values .
Throughout his campaign , Harrison ’ s messaging has emphasized his ties to South Carolina and policies that relate to the state , like rural broadband access , rather than his partisan affiliation or opposition to Trump .
A native South Carolinian who grew @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Harrison frequently talks about his personal connection to the state .
He ’ s also taken more moderate positions broadly , shying away from support for Medicare-for-all and the Green New Deal and noting that he wouldn ’ t back eliminating the filibuster , for now .
“ It ’ s about opening a Pandora ’ s box , and the question is , there may be short-term political gains , but are we comfortable with long term repercussions for that ?
” he said .
As the focus on health care @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has instead emphasized the need for Medicaid expansion .
Graham , meanwhile , has continued to oppose the Affordable Care Act and has said he would prefer a system that involved block grants to states , which he says would give South Carolina more flexibility .
Because of the effects of the coronavirus , health care is a top issue for many voters .
“ The Trump administration ’ s failure to address Covid-19 early and emphatically weighs on the minds of far too many South Carolinians.
” said Democratic strategist Lauren Harper @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for the Lindsey Must Go super PAC .
“ That failure has exacerbated the need for quality and affordable health care here in our state.
” Broadly , in his messaging , Graham has characterized Harrison as being tied to the “ far left , ” while emphasizing his own commitment to what he has referred to as “ law and order.
” The senator has made it clear that he opposes criminal justice reforms like defunding the police ( which Harrison has also said he ’ s against ) .
And Graham @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strong connections to the state but has brought South Carolina federal funding for projects like the development of the Port of Charleston .
Harrison has been able to counter Graham ’ s campaign rhetoric so successfully , according to Furman University political science professor Danielle Vinson , because his ideological positioning and personal story make him an “ ideal Democratic candidate for South Carolina.
” “ He ’ s not too far left ; he knows the state really well having been the South Carolina Democratic Party chair , ” Vinson says .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ independents , moderate Republicans , and ticket splitters Because of the political stance he ’ s taken , Harrison has been able to connect with Democrats as well as a strong segment of independents and a small group of moderate Republicans who are likely turning away from President Donald Trump .
To win , he ’ ll need massive turnout from Democratic base voters — including the Black voters who comprise 60 percent of the Democratic electorate in South Carolina .
“ We have to have the turnout that we had in 2008 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , 65.2 percent of Black voters nationally turned out , compared to 59.6 percent in 2016 , according to the Pew Research Center .
Per a September Quinnipiac poll of the state , Harrison has the backing of 97 percent of Democrats , 54 percent of independents , and 5 percent of Republicans .
Gunn estimates that the state usually falls 55-45 in favor of Republicans , so securing GOP voters — especially moderate Republican women who may be moving away from both Trump and Graham — is vital for Harrison .
Concerns @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the pandemic , as well as his rhetoric , are among the factors turning these voters toward Democratic candidates .
Cook Political Report ’ s Jessica Taylor has noted , too , that Democratic candidates for federal office have historically capped out at 48 percent of the vote in South Carolina , meaning eking out even an improvement of a few percentage points among swing voters could secure the race for Harrison .
There are some other trends in the state that could raise that 48 percent cap Democrats have struggled to surpass @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an influx of new residents who have moved from other left-leaning places .
“ New folks from other parts of the country that tend to be a little more blue are moving to South Carolina , ” says College of Charleston political science professor Gibbs Knotts .
“ That ’ s been something that Democrats have been able to tap into.
” In addition to garnering the support of all these groups , Harrison will also have to convince some Republicans who are still aligned with Trump to break with Graham and split @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how Graham ’ s weakness with conservative voters will affect the race One of the biggest variables in the race is the bloc of conservative voters who support Trump but still aren ’ t that excited about Graham .
Graham — like Republicans in some of the other contested races — is feeling the pressure from both wings of the GOP .
On the conservative side , there are voters who think he still doesn ’ t back Trump enough , despite his staunch defenses of the president ’ s controversial Supreme Court @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh ’ s confirmation hearings in 2018 , and more recently in the hearings for nominee Amy Coney Barrett .
Graham , before Trump ’ s election , had been viewed as a more moderate figure in the Senate who aligned himself closely with Sen. John McCain ( R-AZ ) , which many conservatives in the state weren ’ t happy about .
“ Five years ago , certain elements of the Republican Party were burning him in effigy because of his affiliation with McCain , ” says @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s also an adviser for the Lincoln Project .
There ’ s a question of whether these conservative voters ’ concerns with Graham are still so strong that they ’ ll split their ticket : If they do , experts think a small fraction could vote for third-party for Constitution Party candidate Bill Bledsoe , though they ’ re less likely to cross over to Democrats .
“ I don ’ t think there will be a lot of people who will vote for Trump and not Graham , ” says Felkel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ former Tea Party members — now Trump enthusiasts — who might choose to vote third party , but I don ’ t think there will be a lot of them.
” Concerned that support for him would lead to Harrison winning the election , Bledsoe dropped out of the race in early October and endorsed Graham , saying , “ President Trump has asked that conservatives stand together and reelect Lindsey Graham in order to help make America great again , and I agree.
” But because his exit came so late , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the ballot .
Harrison , hoping to take advantage of this fact , has recently put out advertising aimed at swaying this segment of conservative voters in favor of Bledsoe , including digital ads arguing that he is “ too conservative ” for South Carolina .
Given how close the Senate race has shaped up to be , any narrow gains made from this strategy could potentially be decisive .
Graham has tried to avoid this scenario himself by shoring up his conservative bona fides , and proving his closeness to Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the advancement of Barrett ’ s nomination , which is a top priority for the president and many Republican voters .
And , in fact , Arrighi , Graham ’ s spokesperson , highlighted Graham ’ s push to seat Barrett as one of his key achievements , saying , “ Senator Graham is fighting for South Carolina , helping families and businesses get through the pandemic , and working to ensure a conservative Supreme Court with Judge Amy Coney Barrett as the newest member.
” Barrett ’ s confirmation process , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republican majority plays in the Senate .
If Republicans were to keep their majority , they ’ d be able to obstruct Democratic bills in a potential Biden administration , and continue advancing judges in a Trump administration .
This could be a reason that some conservative voters ultimately back Graham , even if they don ’ t fully agree with his record .
With just a few weeks to go , this race is poised to be close to the very end .
“ I think it ’ s going to be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ It ’ s not going to be a blowout either way.
” Will you help keep Vox free for all ?
The United States is in the middle of one of the most consequential presidential elections of our lifetimes .
It ’ s essential that all Americans are able to access clear , concise information on what the outcome of the election could mean for their lives , and the lives of their families and communities .
That is our mission at Vox .
But our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work .
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South Carolina is the Senate battleground that no one saw coming.
In a state where no Democrat has won a Senate seat for more than two decades, former South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Jaime Harrison has fielded an incredibly strong challenge to incumbent Sen. Lindsey Graham, a high-profile Trump ally. Although early polling had Harrison lagging Graham by as much as 17 percentage points in February, some recent surveys show the two lawmakers with an even split in support.
The support he’s gotten has surprised many — including Harrison himself.
“I’m amazed by it,” he told Vox. “I got into this race because I knew I had a shot, but not in my wildest dreams did I imagine a campaign growing like this campaign has grown.”
Longtime South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), whom Harrison previously worked for as a congressional staffer, has echoed this sentiment. “Not a single soul alive believed when he announced for the Senate that he would be sitting here 30 days out, 48-48,” Clyburn said in an early October interview with Politico.
By raising a staggering amount of money, and positioning himself as a moderate with close ties to the state, Harrison has been able to garner strong support from Democrats and independents, as well as a sliver of moderate Republicans. And now Graham faces one of the closest races of his political career.
Graham has acknowledged this by making appeals for donations during several Fox News appearances, and campaign spokesperson T.W. Arrighi seemed to project a mixture of optimism and realism in a statement to Vox: “Make no mistake — our internal polling has us on track for a victory in November, but Senator Graham is fighting for every vote as he never takes anything for granted.”
Overall, the contest between Harrison and Graham could hinge on voters who split their ticket between the presidential and Senate races. President Donald Trump is still expected to win in South Carolina — even if it’s by much narrower margins than he did in 2016, when he was ahead by 15 points. This means some Trump voters would likely need to defect from Graham — in favor of either Democrats or a third-party candidate — for Harrison to edge out the longtime Republican lawmaker.
That scenario, Winthrop University pollster Scott Huffmon says, is “Harrison’s narrow path on a Nepalese cliff.”
How Harrison closed a double-digit polling gap, briefly explained
Harrison’s strength as a candidate and his ties with national Democrats (he’s an associate chair of the Democratic National Committee) are among the factors that have helped him launch a robust campaign that’s attracted millions in donations from both inside and outside the state. As of September, Harrison had raised $85 million compared to Graham’s $58 million, and that advantage has translated to a huge presence on television and in digital advertising.
Harrison’s massive fundraising haul has been critical in establishing him as a formidable challenger in part because it has allowed him to quickly go from being less well-known to having wide name recognition across the state.
“Jaime Harrison has done what no Democratic candidate has successfully been able to do, and that is raise enough money to take the fight to Lindsey Graham in every part of South Carolina,” says Anton Gunn, a strategist and former state political director for President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign.
Harrison tells Vox this support has been driven by grassroots energy. “We have gotten thousands of volunteers, I think we’re on [14,000] or 15,000 people who signed up to volunteer for our campaign. We’ve gotten well over a million contributions,” he said. As the Guardian reported, both Harrison’s and Graham’s campaigns have seen a high proportion of their contributions coming from out of state.
Experts also note that Harrison began putting out advertising early in the year — months before Graham began mounting a comparable effort on the air — enabling him to introduce himself to voters by focusing on his background, family, and values. Throughout his campaign, Harrison’s messaging has emphasized his ties to South Carolina and policies that relate to the state, like rural broadband access, rather than his partisan affiliation or opposition to Trump. A native South Carolinian who grew up in Orangeburg with a single mother, Harrison frequently talks about his personal connection to the state.
He’s also taken more moderate positions broadly, shying away from support for Medicare-for-all and the Green New Deal and noting that he wouldn’t back eliminating the filibuster, for now. “It’s about opening a Pandora’s box, and the question is, there may be short-term political gains, but are we comfortable with long term repercussions for that?” he said.
As the focus on health care has grown during the pandemic, Harrison has instead emphasized the need for Medicaid expansion. Graham, meanwhile, has continued to oppose the Affordable Care Act and has said he would prefer a system that involved block grants to states, which he says would give South Carolina more flexibility.
Because of the effects of the coronavirus, health care is a top issue for many voters. “The Trump administration’s failure to address Covid-19 early and emphatically weighs on the minds of far too many South Carolinians.” said Democratic strategist Lauren Harper, who’s also the spokesperson for the Lindsey Must Go super PAC. “That failure has exacerbated the need for quality and affordable health care here in our state.”
Broadly, in his messaging, Graham has characterized Harrison as being tied to the “far left,” while emphasizing his own commitment to what he has referred to as “law and order.” The senator has made it clear that he opposes criminal justice reforms like defunding the police (which Harrison has also said he’s against). And Graham has argued that he not only has strong connections to the state but has brought South Carolina federal funding for projects like the development of the Port of Charleston.
Harrison has been able to counter Graham’s campaign rhetoric so successfully, according to Furman University political science professor Danielle Vinson, because his ideological positioning and personal story make him an “ideal Democratic candidate for South Carolina.”
“He’s not too far left; he knows the state really well having been the South Carolina Democratic Party chair,” Vinson says.
The coalition of voters Harrison needs include independents, moderate Republicans, and ticket splitters
Because of the political stance he’s taken, Harrison has been able to connect with Democrats as well as a strong segment of independents and a small group of moderate Republicans who are likely turning away from President Donald Trump. To win, he’ll need massive turnout from Democratic base voters — including the Black voters who comprise 60 percent of the Democratic electorate in South Carolina.
“We have to have the turnout that we had in 2008,” said Gunn. That year, 65.2 percent of Black voters nationally turned out, compared to 59.6 percent in 2016, according to the Pew Research Center.
Per a September Quinnipiac poll of the state, Harrison has the backing of 97 percent of Democrats, 54 percent of independents, and 5 percent of Republicans. Gunn estimates that the state usually falls 55-45 in favor of Republicans, so securing GOP voters — especially moderate Republican women who may be moving away from both Trump and Graham — is vital for Harrison. Concerns about the president’s handling of the pandemic, as well as his rhetoric, are among the factors turning these voters toward Democratic candidates.
Cook Political Report’s Jessica Taylor has noted, too, that Democratic candidates for federal office have historically capped out at 48 percent of the vote in South Carolina, meaning eking out even an improvement of a few percentage points among swing voters could secure the race for Harrison.
There are some other trends in the state that could raise that 48 percent cap Democrats have struggled to surpass in the past. Among them is an influx of new residents who have moved from other left-leaning places. “New folks from other parts of the country that tend to be a little more blue are moving to South Carolina,” says College of Charleston political science professor Gibbs Knotts. “That’s been something that Democrats have been able to tap into.”
In addition to garnering the support of all these groups, Harrison will also have to convince some Republicans who are still aligned with Trump to break with Graham and split their ticket.
It’s unclear how Graham’s weakness with conservative voters will affect the race
One of the biggest variables in the race is the bloc of conservative voters who support Trump but still aren’t that excited about Graham.
Graham — like Republicans in some of the other contested races — is feeling the pressure from both wings of the GOP. On the conservative side, there are voters who think he still doesn’t back Trump enough, despite his staunch defenses of the president’s controversial Supreme Court nominees: first during a fiery moment in Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings in 2018, and more recently in the hearings for nominee Amy Coney Barrett.
Graham, before Trump’s election, had been viewed as a more moderate figure in the Senate who aligned himself closely with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), which many conservatives in the state weren’t happy about. “Five years ago, certain elements of the Republican Party were burning him in effigy because of his affiliation with McCain,” says Chip Felkel, a Republican strategist who’s also an adviser for the Lincoln Project.
There’s a question of whether these conservative voters’ concerns with Graham are still so strong that they’ll split their ticket: If they do, experts think a small fraction could vote for third-party for Constitution Party candidate Bill Bledsoe, though they’re less likely to cross over to Democrats.
“I don’t think there will be a lot of people who will vote for Trump and not Graham,” says Felkel. “I think there are some former Tea Party members — now Trump enthusiasts — who might choose to vote third party, but I don’t think there will be a lot of them.”
Concerned that support for him would lead to Harrison winning the election, Bledsoe dropped out of the race in early October and endorsed Graham, saying, “President Trump has asked that conservatives stand together and reelect Lindsey Graham in order to help make America great again, and I agree.”
But because his exit came so late, Bledsoe’s name will still appear on the ballot. Harrison, hoping to take advantage of this fact, has recently put out advertising aimed at swaying this segment of conservative voters in favor of Bledsoe, including digital ads arguing that he is “too conservative” for South Carolina. Given how close the Senate race has shaped up to be, any narrow gains made from this strategy could potentially be decisive.
Graham has tried to avoid this scenario himself by shoring up his conservative bona fides, and proving his closeness to Trump — most recently playing a prominent role in the advancement of Barrett’s nomination, which is a top priority for the president and many Republican voters.
And, in fact, Arrighi, Graham’s spokesperson, highlighted Graham’s push to seat Barrett as one of his key achievements, saying, “Senator Graham is fighting for South Carolina, helping families and businesses get through the pandemic, and working to ensure a conservative Supreme Court with Judge Amy Coney Barrett as the newest member.”
Barrett’s confirmation process, too, has highlighted the role a Republican majority plays in the Senate. If Republicans were to keep their majority, they’d be able to obstruct Democratic bills in a potential Biden administration, and continue advancing judges in a Trump administration. This could be a reason that some conservative voters ultimately back Graham, even if they don’t fully agree with his record.
With just a few weeks to go, this race is poised to be close to the very end. “I think it’s going to be razor-thin margins,” said Gunn. “It’s not going to be a blowout either way.”


vox--2020-10-22--Al Gross is hoping to ride Alaska’s independent streak to the Senate

Alaska hasn ’ t voted for a Democratic candidate for president since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964 , and hasn ’ t elected a Democratic governor since 1998 .
But the state also has a fierce independent streak and sometimes bucks the red trend .
Independent candidate Al Gross is hoping the state does so once again in the Alaska Senate race this year .
In a typical election year , Republican incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan would be breathing easy .
And if he looks at certain indicators — like the Cook Political Report , which rates the race Lean @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But a strong challenger , coupled with a historically difficult year for Republican incumbents and closer-than-expected polling , has drawn the attention of political observers from across the country to the state ’ s Senate race .
More than 55 percent of the state ’ s electorate are registered unaffiliated with either party , the highest percentage of any state in the country .
And Gross , who rejects parts of the Democratic Party agenda despite being endorsed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee , is hoping to tap into Alaska ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ When Alaskans register as unaffiliated , they ’ re signaling that they ’ re not bought and paid for by either political party , ” Forrest Nabors , chair and associate professor of political science at the University of Alaska Anchorage , told Vox .
“ Republicans do outnumber Democrats , but [ the parties are ] fighting over a minor share of the registered electorate.
” After losing the Republican primary for Senate in 2010 , Lisa Murkowski mounted a write-in campaign in the general election and successfully defended her seat .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ first Democrat to win a statewide race since 1998 when he won in 2008 .
Polling in the state is notoriously difficult , but what few polls there are have shown that Sullivan could be in trouble in this year ’ s race .
He previously defeated Begich by just 3 percent in 2014 , a Republican wave election , and recent polls show this year ’ s race could be fairly close as well .
A Harstad Strategic Research poll of 602 likely voters in the state at the end of September @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lead , 46 to 45 percent .
More recently , a New York Times-Siena College poll found Gross trailing by about 8 percentage points .
And recent events are only making the race tighter , local Democratic operatives told Vox .
As Republicans in the Senate are poised to rush through a fiercely anti-abortion Supreme Court justice , they said it has created an opening for Gross among Alaska ’ s pro-abortion-rights and pro-oil libertarian-minded residents .
Sullivan , who did not support Obama Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland in an election year @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s a Republican nominee , Amy Coney Barrett , up for confirmation to the Court .
In turn , Gross raised over $ 3 million in the hours after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’ s death .
But the Supreme Court isn ’ t the only issue at play in Alaska this year .
The pandemic has seriously harmed the Alaskan economy Some local concerns , like a scandal over a seemingly too-speedy approval for a gold and copper mine that could ruin the state ’ s largest salmon run , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the race .
But Sullivan , whose campaign declined a request for comment , is facing a lot of Covid-related questions .
While Alaska has largely avoided the massive coronavirus outbreaks seen in other states , thanks in part to its rural landscape and low population density , the pandemic has still kneecapped the state ’ s economy .
Tourism in the state is way down — there were 13,800 fewer leisure and tourism jobs in the state in June compared to the same month last year — because of travel restrictions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at the moment .
Overall , according to state government statistics , the increase in unemployment from last June has spelled a loss of 37,700 jobs .
The state ’ s oil and fishing industries also rely heavily on seasonal workers from out of state , which has also brought on a second wave of Covid-19 infections .
“ Our fisheries would not function if we did not have non-resident residents coming here to work for the summer , ” said Nabors .
“ In some of these fish processing facilities , people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could imagine that [ the virus ] would spread very easily.
” The pandemic has only exacerbated an ongoing health care problem in the state and Gross , a medical doctor , has made the issue central to his campaign against Sullivan , who has voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act on several occasions .
“ Issues such as climate change , our crumbling infrastructure , and a lack of access to affordable healthcare are devastating our state and making it harder and harder for Alaskan families , ” Gross told Vox @ @ @ @ @ @ @ being left behind in Washington because of partisan politicians like Dan Sullivan who put the needs of the special interests first.
” Will you help keep Vox free for all ?
The United States is in the middle of one of the most consequential presidential elections of our lifetimes .
It ’ s essential that all Americans are able to access clear , concise information on what the outcome of the election could mean for their lives , and the lives of their families and communities .
That is our mission at Vox @ @ @ @ @ @ @ journalism takes resources .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work .
If you have already contributed , thank you .
If you haven ’ t , please consider helping everyone understand this presidential election : Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Alaska hasn’t voted for a Democratic candidate for president since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964, and hasn’t elected a Democratic governor since 1998. But the state also has a fierce independent streak and sometimes bucks the red trend. Independent candidate Al Gross is hoping the state does so once again in the Alaska Senate race this year.
In a typical election year, Republican incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan would be breathing easy. And if he looks at certain indicators — like the Cook Political Report, which rates the race Lean Republican — he might still be. But a strong challenger, coupled with a historically difficult year for Republican incumbents and closer-than-expected polling, has drawn the attention of political observers from across the country to the state’s Senate race.
More than 55 percent of the state’s electorate are registered unaffiliated with either party, the highest percentage of any state in the country. And Gross, who rejects parts of the Democratic Party agenda despite being endorsed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, is hoping to tap into Alaska’s independent spirit to unseat Sullivan.
“When Alaskans register as unaffiliated, they’re signaling that they’re not bought and paid for by either political party,” Forrest Nabors, chair and associate professor of political science at the University of Alaska Anchorage, told Vox. “Republicans do outnumber Democrats, but [the parties are] fighting over a minor share of the registered electorate.”
In short, there’s precedent for Gross’s approach.
After losing the Republican primary for Senate in 2010, Lisa Murkowski mounted a write-in campaign in the general election and successfully defended her seat. Similarly, Democrat Mark Begich became the first Democrat to win a statewide race since 1998 when he won in 2008.
Polling in the state is notoriously difficult, but what few polls there are have shown that Sullivan could be in trouble in this year’s race. He previously defeated Begich by just 3 percent in 2014, a Republican wave election, and recent polls show this year’s race could be fairly close as well. A Harstad Strategic Research poll of 602 likely voters in the state at the end of September showed Sullivan with a narrow 1 percent lead, 46 to 45 percent. More recently, a New York Times-Siena College poll found Gross trailing by about 8 percentage points.
Monica and I just finished a beautiful walk today to discuss tonight’s town hall. Alaska is truly a beautiful state and we KNOW that we will get through this, together.
We’ll talk to you soon, Alaska! pic.twitter.com/lqvouR75Np — Dr. Al Gross (@DrAlGrossAK) March 29, 2020
And recent events are only making the race tighter, local Democratic operatives told Vox. As Republicans in the Senate are poised to rush through a fiercely anti-abortion Supreme Court justice, they said it has created an opening for Gross among Alaska’s pro-abortion-rights and pro-oil libertarian-minded residents.
Sullivan, who did not support Obama Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland in an election year, has flipped his position now that it’s a Republican nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, up for confirmation to the Court.
In turn, Gross raised over $3 million in the hours after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death. But the Supreme Court isn’t the only issue at play in Alaska this year.
The pandemic has seriously harmed the Alaskan economy
Some local concerns, like a scandal over a seemingly too-speedy approval for a gold and copper mine that could ruin the state’s largest salmon run, and resources for tribal communities are important to the race. But Sullivan, whose campaign declined a request for comment, is facing a lot of Covid-related questions.
While Alaska has largely avoided the massive coronavirus outbreaks seen in other states, thanks in part to its rural landscape and low population density, the pandemic has still kneecapped the state’s economy.
Tourism in the state is way down — there were 13,800 fewer leisure and tourism jobs in the state in June compared to the same month last year — because of travel restrictions and the viral risk involved with travel at the moment. Overall, according to state government statistics, the increase in unemployment from last June has spelled a loss of 37,700 jobs.
The state’s oil and fishing industries also rely heavily on seasonal workers from out of state, which has also brought on a second wave of Covid-19 infections.
“Our fisheries would not function if we did not have non-resident residents coming here to work for the summer,” said Nabors. “In some of these fish processing facilities, people work cheek to jowl, and you could imagine that [the virus] would spread very easily.”
The pandemic has only exacerbated an ongoing health care problem in the state and Gross, a medical doctor, has made the issue central to his campaign against Sullivan, who has voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act on several occasions.
“Issues such as climate change, our crumbling infrastructure, and a lack of access to affordable healthcare are devastating our state and making it harder and harder for Alaskan families,” Gross told Vox in a statement. “Alaskans are being left behind in Washington because of partisan politicians like Dan Sullivan who put the needs of the special interests first.”