Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was arrested at the Ecuadorian embassy in London last Thursday. The media and political sources who despise him are doing their best to make his activities sound nefarious and disreputable. But when Assange's activity is described correctly and precisely, it suddenly appears no different from what any journalist does, in terms of protecting his source's anonymity. Cassandra Fairbanks of The Gateway Pundit joins me for some background.

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Show notes for Ep. 1385

Antony Sammeroff joins me to discuss Andrew Yang's recent appearance with Ben Shapiro, and how Shapiro might have pushed back a bit more against Yang's proposal of a universal basic income.

Show notes for Ep. 1384

Today's episode covers a wide array of foundational libertarian topics: positive vs. negative rights, Locke vs. Hobbes, constitutional interpretation, slavery and the U.S. Constitution, subsidiarity, the social contract, and a lot more. It comes from my recent appearance on the Western Canon Podcast.

Show notes for Ep. 1383

All right, not quite *everything* else... but on: Trump, Russiagate, the media, Barry Goldwater, meeting Rothbard, being Mises' editor, becoming an anarcho-capitalist, and more.

Show notes for Ep. 1382

I felt uneasy after my recent episode with Michael Malice on the meaning of political left and right, and now I know why: I've been wrong about a major piece of the puzzle. The brilliant Paul Gottfried joins me to walk through the issue: is there really a "left-right spectrum"? What do the terms mean? Has there been a "right" in America? Is "fascism" really resurgent? What books does he recommend? Plenty of provocative stuff here, including Gottfried's contention that politics is not "downstream of culture," but rather that it's the other way around: to a considerable extent, culture flows from politics.

Show notes for Ep. 1381

Mark Pulliam returns to the show to discuss the problem of faux originalism in constitutional interpretation, emanating these days from certain libertarian and conservative think tanks. It's easy to be fooled by these arguments. What these arguments promote in the long run is not liberty but centralization and rule by judges.

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Show notes for Ep. 1380

Andy Ngo of Quillette.com joins me to discuss recent hate crime hoaxes, particularly in left-liberal Portland, as well as dissident journalism in general and his own philosophical evolution after observing the progressive left up close again and again.

Show notes for Ep. 1379

The word "socialism" is thrown around constantly these days, usually in favorable contexts. But what in fact is socialism? Hitler wasn't a socialist, socialists insist, who then turn around and say Sweden is socialist, even though no true socialist thinks so. Can we pause a minute to figure out what they favor and what they're talking about? CJay Engel joins me.

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Show notes for Ep. 1378

The news continues to be grim about purges on major social media platforms, but Andrew Torba, creator of Gab, has just released Dissenter, a browser extension that adds an independent comments section to any website. We discuss this, and the future of social media, including alternatives like Gab.

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Show notes for Ep. 1377

During the critical year of 2007, between the end of the housing bubble and the onset of the financial crisis, major officials of the Federal Reserve made claims that appear to have been designed more to prop up confidence in a shaky system than to give real insight into what was actually happening. These people were supposed to be the country's experts on the topics involved, and they could not have been more consistently wrong. Why?

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Show notes for Ep. 1376