Vox Sentences: A historically weird presidential election

What was that Republican debate?; Brazil's ex-president implicated in its increasingly huge corruption scandal; and a very strange piece of legally-moot evidence.

Vox Sentences is written by Dylan Matthews and Dara Lind.

TOP NEWS

Seriously, what the hell?

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

• Even by the standards of the 2016 Republican presidential campaign, last night's debate was train-wreck theater.

  [Vox / Dylan Matthews]

• Before last night, no leading presidential candidate had ever taken it upon himself to assert that he has a large penis. There is a first time for everything.

  [Playboy / Lucy Steigerwald]

• Arguably, the substantive parts of the debate were even weirder. Trump (not for the first time) appeared to contradict his own immigration platform, saying he'd "evolved" to believe highly-skilled immigrants are good for America (and causing immigration restrictionists to freak out).

  [Kausfiles / Mickey Kaus]

• He also reiterated that he would force members of the armed forces to kill the families of terrorists (which would be a war crime), only to issue a statement this afternoon promising to uphold international law.

  [WSJ / Damian Paletta]

• In other words, the critiques of Trump's character leveled by Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich seemed on point. But then, all three of them promised to vote for him (if he's the nominee) anyway.

  [BuzzFeed News / Katherine Miller]

• No wonder three-quarters of Americans agree that this election has been weirder than elections of the past.

  [Huffington Post / Ariel Edwards-Levy]

Brazil's ever-widening corruption scandal

Mario Tama/Getty Images

• Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was detained for questioning by Brazilian police after a raid on his home this morning, the latest development in a years-long corruption inquiry.

  [The Guardian / Jonathan Watts]

• The specific allegations against Lula are that he gave preferential treatment to construction contractors who had worked on his home and the homes of family members.

  [NYT / Simon Romero]

• But this is just part of an inquiry that started in 2014, focusing on public officials improperly taking money from state-owned oil company Petrobras, and has since become much, much bigger — more than 70 politicians, lobbyists and businesspeople had been charged as of the end of 2015 in the inquiry now known as Lava Jato (Car Wash).

  [The Guardian / Jonathan Watts]

• Initially, the scandal was buoyed by frustration with Brazil's governing elite after the big spending of the 2014 World Cup. Between that and the serious slowdown of Brazil's economy, it looked very bad for Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff (who is in Lula's party).

  [The Guardian]

• But while Rousseff is facing impeachment proceedings (for something not related to the Lava Jato inquiry), those efforts appear to be losing momentum.

  [Reuters / Annthony Boadle]

• The good news for Rousseff: Her biggest enemy, the speaker of the House, will now face trial on corruption charges in the Petrobras scandal (thanks to a Supreme Court ruling Thursday).

  [AP / Stan Lehmann]

• The bad news for Rousseff: There are reports a senator in her party is about to cut a plea deal to testify she tried to stack the judiciary to protect herself from the Petrobras scandal.

  [NYT / Simon Romero]

A legally-blunted knife

Ethan Miller/Getty Images

• Los Angeles police are reportedly testing a knife that was found on the property of OJ Simpson, which could hypothetically have been used in the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman.

  [TMZ]

• Quick reminder: Simpson was acquitted of the murders, and the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy prohibits him from being tried again.

• The knife was reportedly recovered years ago by an officer. But the officer only turned it in last month, because he "had been apparently looking to have the knife engraved with the Nicole Brown Simpson case number and framed."

  [CBS LA]

• It's not surprising that when they did get the knife, TMZ was the first to know. Their gossip empire rests heavily on good connections with Southern California law enforcement sources.

  [BuzzFeed News / Anne Helen Petersen]

• Arielle Duhaime-Ross of the Verge explains how forensics experts will test the knife, and why it will be so tricky to get evidence from it at this point.

  [The Verge / Arielle Duhaime-Ross]

• But the matter might be moot anyway. Some sources report that the knife is just a typical utility knife that a gardener might use — not the sort of knife used in the Brown/Goldman killings.

  [NBC News / Andrew Blankstein]

MISCELLANEOUS

It's somehow not illegal to put a handgun on a drone and fly it around. Connecticut's trying to change that. [Slate / Justin Peters]

• Donald Trump does better in counties with higher white death rates.

  [Washington Post / Jeff Guo]

• What it's like to read with dyslexia, in one interactive.

  [Victor Widell]

• Texas's super-restrictive abortion law has created a new occupation: the abortion travel agent.

  [CNN / Jessica Ravitz]

• Can't focus on your writing? Then try The Most Dangerous Writing App, which automatically deletes your work if you stop typing for more than five seconds.

  [Kill Screen / Caty McCarthy]

VERBATIM

"In a new HuffPost/YouGov poll, 76 percent of Americans, including the overwhelming majority of both parties, said that this election is weirder than past elections." [Huffington Post / Ariel Edwards-Levy]

• "Every American president has had a penis. The possession of a generative member is, in fact, the one trait they all share."

  [New Republic / Jeet Heer]

• "Simmons replied, denying the accusations and claiming that he had run an 'intel op’ to expose the link that he suspected between Clizbe and M. (This was apparently a reference to their interactions on Facebook.)"

  [NYT Mag / Alex French]

• "Imagine a friend told you that she hoped to meet 'an actor, director, or producer involved with the new Star Wars movie.' You would know immediately that she wanted to meet an actor from the Star Wars cast—not an actor in, for example, the latest Zoolander."

  [Supreme Court / Elena Kagan]

• "There isn’t even a Fecal Studies Laboratory at Poop University. Poop University is of course real, but it’s a liberal arts school with no science department."

  [McSweeney's / Keaton Patti]

WATCH THIS

How seapunk went from meme to mainstream [YouTube / Estelle Caswell, Carlos Waters]

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