In the wake of the first and only debate between Democratic US Senator Ed Markey and Republican challenger Kevin O’Connor, Peter Kadzis flashes back to the Kennedy-Romney race and sizes up the trajectory of the Mass. Republican Party in the quarter century hence. (He and Adam Reilly also take stock of O’Connor’s candidacy and political future.) Then it’s on to a Kadzis convo with presidential historian Ted Widmer, whose new book — Lincoln On The Verge: Thirteen Days To Washington — offers an instructive portrait of the nation in another moment of crisis.