Hans Noel joins us this week to share ten insights into how politics, campaigns, and political parties work. Is there such a thing as “the will of the people?” Why do political parties act the way they do? We also discuss Duverger’s Law, campaign finance, presidential elections, special interests, and grassroots movements. Show Notes and Further Reading “ Ten Things Political Scientists Know that You Don’t ” in Volume 8, Issue 3 of The Forum . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more info...
Sep 22, 2017•56 min
William J. Watkins, Jr. joins us for a discussion on the Articles of Confederation and the ideas of the Anti-Federalists. Were the Articles of Confederation a failure? How did the country work under them and how is the US Constitution different? What can we learn from the Anti-Federalists? Watkins is a research fellow at the Independent Institute . Show Notes and Further Reading Watkins’s book is Crossroads for Liberty: Recovering the Anti-Federalist Values of America’s First Constitution (2016)...
Sep 15, 2017•47 min
Ryan M. Yonk joins us this week for a discussion about how we think about ecology and the environment. We talk about various environmental regulations including the Clean Air Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Endangered Species Act. What counts as a “natural balance” in ecology? Is the ideal environment one with no human impact at all? What is “political entrepreneurship” and how do environmentalists use it to push for their policy goals? Show Notes and Further Reading Yonk is ...
Sep 08, 2017•53 min
Grant Babcock joins us this week to talk about an essay he wrote in defense of natural rights-based libertarianism. What are natural rights? Are they intuitive? Is radicalism in defense of rights-based approaches to libertarianism effective? Is it necessary? Show Notes and Further Reading This episode of Free Thoughts was inspired by Grant Babcock’s “ The Robustness of Natural Rights Libertarianism: A Reply to Lindsey ,” which he wrote in response to Brink Lindsey’s essay “ The Poverty of Natura...
Sep 01, 2017•57 min
Christopher Freiman joins us to talk about his Arguments for Liberty chapter on utilitarianism. What’s the utilitarian argument for libertarianism? What is utilitarianism? How does utilitarianism interact with rights-based approaches to morality? What are the rhetorical virtues of utilitarianism? Show Notes and Further Reading You can read Freiman’s Arguments for Liberty chapter in full here: “ A Utilitarian Case for Libertarianism ” Arguments for Liberty is available here as a free .pdf and in ...
Aug 25, 2017•46 min
Our producer, Tess Terrible, interviews Aaron and Trevor for Free Thoughts’s 200th episode. How did Free Thoughts get started, and what have we learned along the way? Show Notes and Further Reading We’d like to thank Russ Roberts and his EconTalk podcast for providing some of the inspiration for this show, as well as all of our listeners. We hope you’ve enjoyed the show so far and look forward to another 200 episodes! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Aug 18, 2017•45 min
John Glaser joins us to talk about a policy shift that would save money and make the United States safer: closing some or all of America’s 800 overseas military bases. Where are these bases concentrated? Why does the military think they’re necessary? Would the world be a more dangerous place if the US wasn’t a global hegemon? Show Notes and Further Reading If you’re interested in this topic we encourage you to read Glaser’s policy analysis, “ Withdrawing from Overseas Bases: Why a Forward-Deploy...
Aug 11, 2017•51 min
Bill Emmott joins us this week to talk about his new book, The Fate of the West: The Battle to Save the World’s Most Successful Political Idea (2017). Is the West in decline and if so, can we do anything about it? Is more inequality part of what’s causing this decline? Why aren’t Western economies aren’t as dynamic as they used to be? Show Notes and Further Reading Trevor mentions these previous Free Thoughts episodes about free speech on college campuses: “Campus Freedom” with Robby Soave “Camp...
Aug 04, 2017•46 min
Sam Bowman joins us this week to talk about political trends in the United Kingdom and in Europe more broadly. What’s a neoliberal, and how is that different from American libertarianism? What kinds of reforms are needed in European politics? Is there a connection between Brexit and Donald Trump’s election? What does a Trump presidency mean for the U.K.? Show Notes and Further Reading Here’s the Adam Smith Institute’s website . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Jul 28, 2017•48 min
William Irwin joins us for a discussion about the novel Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk and the movie it inspired. Are consumer choices authentic choices? Where does Tyler Durden go wrong in his thinking? Show Notes and Further Reading Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club (1996) is a novel that’s well-worth reading if you haven’t yet. Here’s a link to the David Fincher movie (1999) starring Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, and Helena Bonham Carter. Here’s William Irwin’s essay, “ Fight Club , Self-definition, an...
Jul 21, 2017•50 min
Emily Ekins has identified five different types of voters that elected Donald J. Trump the 45th President of the United States. Do these groups represent a big shift in American politics? In this episode we also discuss polling methodology and analysis. How reliable are public opinion polls and voter surveys? Show Notes and Further Reading Here is the Democracy Fund Voter Study Group Ekins participated in . And here is her report on “ The Five Types of Trump Voters .” Ekins also mentions FiveThi...
Jul 14, 2017•45 min
Kevin Vallier joins us to talk about his Arguments for Liberty chapter on the ethical system of John Rawls. Does Rawls have value for libertarians? Show Notes and Further Reading You can read Vallier’s Arguments for Liberty chapter in full here: “ A Rawlsian Case for Libertarianism ” Arguments for Liberty is available here as a free .pdf and in Kindle and e-Book formats . It’s also available in paperback on Amazon . This lecture on distributive justice in our guide to political philosophy is a g...
Jul 07, 2017•56 min
Deirdre McCloskey has a few suggestions that she hopes will make libertarians more humane and empathetic. What sort of rhetorical tactics should libertarians use? In this episode, we also talk about the “slow socialism” of the New Left, inequality, whether an affluent liberal society sows the seeds of its own demise, and McCloskey’s personal ideological journey from “Joan Baez-style” Marxism to liberalism. Show Notes and Further Reading The essay that inspired this episode, “Manifesto for a New ...
Jun 30, 2017•52 min
Jason Brennan and Peter Jaworski think that anything you’re allowed to do for free, you should be able to do for money. That means things like buying and selling kidneys, children, sex, grades; even waiting in line. Are they right? What should you be able to buy and sell? What does it mean to pay someone for something? Show Notes and Further Reading Brennan and Jaworski’s book is Markets without Limits: Moral Virtues and Commercial Interests (2015). Markets without Limits is partially a response...
Jun 23, 2017•1 hr 9 min
Shon Hopwood joins us this week to tell about his journey from bank robber to federal prisoner to U.S. Supreme Court practitioner and Georgetown law professor. What’s it like in federal prison? How did Hopwood become a jailhouse lawyer? If people do in fact “age out” of criminal activity, then what should our prison system look like? Show Notes and Further Reading Hopwood’s book is Law Man: My Story of Robbing Banks, Winning Supreme Court Cases, and Finding Redemption (2012). Here’s the New York...
Jun 16, 2017•46 min
Robert Luddy joins us this week to talk about his ventures as the founder of several successful private schools in and around Raleigh, North Carolina. Could private education supplant public schooling? Show Notes and Further Reading Thales Academy , Franklin Academy , St. Thomas More Academy Here’s a short video from Reason.tv’s Jim Epstein featuring Luddy and his work . Other Free Thoughts episodes on education and school choice: “Why Schools Haven’t Changed in Hundereds of Years” with Kevin Cu...
Jun 09, 2017•47 min
Jacob T. Levy says that the collapse of trust in institutional norms is what’s responsible for a new era of Trump-style authoritarian, “closed-society” populist politics here in America and around the globe. What explains the Trump phenomenon? How did we get President Trump? Just an electoral appetite for “shaking things up,” or is it something deeper? How does Trump think? How does he make decisions? Show Notes and Further Reading Our other episode with Levy on his book “Rationalism, Pluralism,...
Jun 02, 2017•49 min
Andrei Illarionov joins us this week to tell us about growing up and studying economics in the Soviet Union, and about the years he spent as an economic policy advisor to Vladimir Putin. What inspired Illarionov to study economics? What was life in the Soviet Union like? What was it like studying economics in a Communist regime? How did prices work in the USSR? How did he first meet Vladimir Putin, and what does Putin want for Russia? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
May 26, 2017•1 hr 17 min
Julian Sanchez joins us this week for a discussion about online privacy in the era of mass data collection. When we’re online, what kind of data are we creating, and who’s watching us? We talk about data mining, ad blockers, the internet of things, developer keys, passwords and fingerprint security, encrypted messaging apps, and more. Further Reading Other Free Thoughts episodes about online privacy: “Deconstructing the Surveillance State “with Julian Sanchez “The CIA Listens to Free Thoughts “w...
May 19, 2017•1 hr 3 min
John Pfaff joins us this week to talk about the United States’s unusually high rate of incarceration. How many Americans are in prison or in jail? What did they do to get there? If we have roughly the same crime rate as we did in 1970, but have five times as many people in prison as we did then, what are those extra people in prison for? Show Notes and Further Reading Pfaff’s book is Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration—and How to Achieve Real Reform (2017). Other books mentioned in ...
May 12, 2017•1 hr 6 min
Tyler Cowen joins us this week to talk about the slowing pace of innovation and growth in the United States over the past few decades. Has American society become too complacent? What would a more dynamic society look like? Show Notes and Further Reading Cowen’s book on the subject is The Complacent Class: The Self-Defeating Quest for the American Dream (2017). Cowen refers to this study by Enrico Moretti and Chang-Tai Hsieh called “Why Do Cities Matter?,” which claims that “Lowering regulatory ...
May 05, 2017•49 min
Elizabeth Nolan Brown joins us this week for a discussion about sex work. What’s the difference between sex trafficking and prostitution? How much sex trafficking is going on in the United States? Show Notes and Further Reading Much of Brown’s work at Reason focuses on sex work, here’s a reverse-chronological list of all the articles she’s written there . We talked in detail about Brown’s September 2016 Reason cover story, “ The Truth About the Biggest U.S. Sex Trafficking Story of the Year .” H...
Apr 28, 2017•46 min
Andrew Turner joins us to talk about his experience being stationed at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in 2009 and 2010. What is working at Guantanamo Bay like? Who are the detainees? How did they end up there? Are we ever going to be able to close the facilities there? Show Notes and Further Reading Here’s the Vice News article by Jason Leopold that Turner was interviewed in, “ Guantanamo’s Untold Trauma ,” and the accompanying Vice News Tonight video . Turner’s Reddit AMA . Hosted on Acast. ...
Apr 21, 2017•51 min
Emma Ashford joins us this week to discuss the rise of the Islamic State. How is ISIS different from Al Qaeda and other terror groups? Does it pose an existential threat to the Western world? Where did the Islamic State come from? What do they believe? Is America responsible for ISIS’s rise to power? What’s their end game? How will Trump “deal with” ISIS, and how is that different from Obama’s policies? Show Notes and Further Reading Ashford mentions the work of Dr. Daveed Gartenstein-Ross on un...
Apr 14, 2017•48 min
Yuval Levin joins us to talk about political nostalgia and American individualism. Why do the political right and left both seem to be stuck yearning for the 1950s and early 60s? Why do baby boomers have such an outsized influence on American culture and politics? Did government work better in the 1950s and 60s? How has the country changed in the last half-century? Show Notes and Further Reading Levin’s most recent book is The Fractured Republic: Renewing America’s Social Contract in the Age of ...
Apr 07, 2017•48 min
Peter T. Leeson joins us this week to discuss rational choice theory as it applies to self-governance. What happens in the absence of government? We discuss the difference between government and governance, what it means to be stateless, and how anarchy is perceived in the world today. Show Notes and Further Reading Leeson’s book on this topic is Anarchy Unbound: Why Self-Governance Works Better Than You Think (2014). Leeson cites Ludwig von Mises’s Human Action: A Treatise on Economics (1949) a...
Mar 31, 2017•48 min
Patrick G. Eddington joins us this week to tell us about the history of the Central Intelligence Agency, how the CIA operates, and what the new Wikileaks revelations mean for our privacy online. What does the CIA do, and how does it go about that? How close to reality does Hollywood get when portraying the CIA? What’s the difference between the CIA, the FBI, and the NSA? What have these new revelations told us about what the CIA is doing? Correction: Eddington states that the Privacy and Civil L...
Mar 25, 2017•59 min
Aaron and Trevor have a discussion about the political authority of the state. Should one obey the government? Is there a compelling reason to? Why does it matter? Show Notes and Further Reading Listeners interested in this topic should check out our episode of Free Thoughts with Michael Huemer on this topic , and this Guide lecture with Jason Brennan . Aaron mentions Socrates’ actions in Plato’s Crito , here is our Free Thoughts episode on that dialogue . Trevor talks about his lecture “ The St...
Mar 17, 2017•1 hr 1 min
Peter Goettler joins us this week to talk about his role at the Cato Institute, Cato’s history of 40 years of advancing liberty, and what’s next for public policy organizations more generally and for Cato specifically. What is a think tank, and what does it do? What does Cato do and how is it different? What’s the difference between being oriented towards politics and being oriented towards ideas and principles? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Mar 10, 2017•51 min
Peter Van Doren joins us this week to talk about health care economics. We talk about risk aversion, risk neutrality, expected value statements, guaranteed renewable care, the ACA as a health care redistribution program, and health-status insurance. How much should we spend on health care, and how would we know the answer to that question? Show Notes and Further Reading Van Doren mentions “ The Market for Lemons ,” (1970) a fascinating concept and paper by George Akerlof. Mark Pauly’s 2003 paper...
Mar 03, 2017•1 hr
