America’s modern day tribalism will be on full display as voters line up to cast their ballots on a day that looks like it could be marked by massive midterm turnout numbers. The votes will be about candidates, issues, and doctrines. But it will mostly be about us. In Politico Magazine, Michael Grunwald on how everything became a culture war (and why that’s something to worry about). “These days, even climate change, infrastructure policy and other domestic issues normally associated with wonky panels at Washington think tanks have been repackaged into cultural-resentment fodder.”

+ How tribal have our politics become? People are campaigning against their own family members who are running for office. “Ahead of the midterm elections, a shocking number of political figures’ family members have taken the severe step of publicly rebuking their kin. Most notably, in September, six siblings of Representative Paul Gosar … renounced their brother in a television ad for his opponent.” (And I thought it was bad when one of my sisters once skipped an edition of NextDraft…)

+ In a distinctly 2018 irony, as Americans become more tribal, we’re making it increasingly difficult for members of actual tribes to vote.

+ The modern culture wars prove everything new is old. Especially racism and antisemitism as a political strategy. WaPo: Republicans attack Jewish candidates across the U.S. with an age-old caricature: Fistfuls of cash. This is why, yesterday, I didn’t tell you what to vote for, but I did tell you what to vote against.

+ “At least in the immediate aftermath of 2016, we still asked conventional questions, like, Will Trump attempt to heal the divisions of the Presidential race and reach out to those who didn’t vote for him? No matter the outcome, no one will ask that question this year.” The New Yorker: The Dark Certainty of the 2018 Midterms.