Usually when I write the introduction to the weekly politics newsletter, I concentrate on a theme or particular incident or issue that’s shown up in the week’s coverage.

This week, though, our coverage ranged across many different topics, and they couldn’t be raked easily into a pile. Yet there is a unifying aspect to all these stories: They take you behind the headlines and provide context and background to help you understand current events better.

So, as Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny became ill and was sent to the hospital ward of the remote penal colony where he is imprisoned, we gave you a story by University of Dayton human rights law scholar Shelley Inglis that looked at whether imprisonment of opposition leaders helps an autocrat stay in power – or whether it ignites popular rage that topples a leader.

Women’s studies scholar Trysh Travis from the University of Florida looked at the alleged Atlanta shooter’s explanation for his rampage and how that fits into the ways Americans think about compulsive behaviors – considering them the results of temptation and treating them as diseases.

And even though most daily reporters dropped the story after the November 2020 election, we followed up on probably the most bitterly fought issue of that election: absentee ballots. Election law expert Richard Pildes performed a post-election audit, looking at – after all the drama of absentee deadlines – how many voters were actually affected. My late mother’s version of the answer would be simply “bupkes.” Pildes is a little more precise, and says very few were, and “nowhere near close to the number of votes that could have changed the outcome of any significant race.”