To mark National Voter Education Week, The Fulcrum is kicking off a series of articles to help people navigate the shifting laws that govern elections.
With the midterm primary season concluded, all eyes have shifted to the upcoming general election. While Nov. 8 is Election Day, in reality voting begins earlier in many states and there’s some work to be done in order to make sure your ballot counts. That’s because every state has been tweaking its election laws over the past few years, with some making it easier to vote and others putting new restrictions in place.
To help you navigate the new rules, The Fulcrum has compiled an overview of typical steps to take as voters get ready for Election Day. Rules and regulations may vary from state to state, and we will get into those details in future articles.
This may seem obvious, but the first step in getting prepped to vote would be registering to vote (or double-checking your registration status). Although National Voters Registration Day was Sept. 20, individuals can still register online and in person, depending on where they live. After registering, it's best to check the status of your registration.
When checking their registration status, voters can also review where they are registered, check their party preference, and determine the status of their vote-by-mail or provisional ballot. This becomes a useful tool with long gaps between election dates and people experiencing lifecycle events.
The next step would be to figure out where and how you will be voting – whether at a polling place on Election Day, through in-person early voting, or by submitting an absentee ballot (depending on your state’s rules). Picking a voting method early takes some of the stress off of the process.
Most states will allow in-person early voting during a designated period, but, again, it varies from state to state. Additionally, some states may require voters to submit an absentee ballot to be eligible for early voting. This information is easily accessible on the state or local office website.
Like early voting, absentee voting (or voting by mail) provides more flexibility to those who are unable to physically vote at their local polling place. This demographic includes college students studying out of their home states, those dealing with injury, illness or disabilities, military personnel deployed out of state, or individuals who are traveling or on a business trip. States set strict deadlines for absentee voting, both to request and to return a ballot.
Remember that in many jurisdictions, it’s not just candidates on the ballot. Voters need to study up on both the people seeking office and the state and local initiatives that can impact government spending, services and even democracy itself. Mis- and disinformation run rampant in election season, so be sure to check your sources.
Future articles will go into great detail on these and other steps in the voting process.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.