Julia Ioffe finds that a campaign reporter's life is a dog-eat-dog world:
After the longest, most sustained campaign on record, political reporters are running on little more than the scant sustenance of yet another slice of pizza. Some are running out of energy; others are running out of ideas. "The one conversation I keep having with reporters is, 'What the hell do we write about? What are the interesting stories left to cover in this election?'" says The New Yorker's Ryan Lizza (who used to be a senior editor for TNR). "There are a lot of people scratching their heads trying to find a new angle at the end."
Others, like soldiers who have served one tour too many, are slowly losing touch with the world outside the candidate's orbit. Bai, who is married to a Fox producer, has seen the strains of life on the road. "You lose contact with the outside world," says Bai. "You call your spouse at home and talk about the trail and the person at home just doesn't get it or care, because it's the same story over and over again. It's murder on relationships." Every four years, Bai says, there's at least one divorce or break-up. "It's just not a normal human experience."