Nick Gillespie Podcasts

This is a bonus episode, hosted by Reason Features Editor Peter Suderman. A few weeks back, at our Washington, D.C. HQ, he moderated a discussion with former Reason Editor in Chief Virginia Postrel (Reason archive here)and American Enterprise Institute Fellow James Pethokoukis about the future—why it matters, why it's misunderstood, and how we migh…

My guest today is Sandra Newman, my favorite novelist currently at work in America—I highly recommend her recent works The Men and The Heavens. Her new book is titled Julia and it's a retelling of George Orwell's 1984 from the point of view of Winston Smith's lover who, as you probably recall, is ironically a member of the Anti-Sex League. I don't …

Born and raised in Texas, Jeb Bush moved to Florida in 1980. The son and brother of presidents, he was governor of the Sunshine State from 1999 to 2007, where he quickly became known as a champion of school choice and fiscal responsibility. In 2016, he made an unsuccessful run for the Republican presidential nomination and he now resides in Miami-D…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. "Senator Paul, you do not know what you what you are talking about." Those were the words that Anthony Fauci spoke in July 2021 to Sen. Rand Paul (R–Ky.) following a series of questions from Paul about the possibility that Fauci's agency had fund…

"I'm under no illusion that humanity will completely eradicate the racial tribal instinct or racism or bigotry itself. But I feel that colorblindness is the North Star that we should use when making decisions," argues Coleman Hughes during a live taping of The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie podcast in New York City. Hughes is a writer, podcas…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. When Russ Roberts, an economist and host of the podcast EconTalk, received a job offer to become president of Jerusalem's Shalem University, it seemed like "a no-brainer," he wrote in his 2022 book Wild Problems: A Guide to the Decisions That Def…

My guest today is Colleen Eren, a sociologist at William Paterson University in my favorite state in the country, New Jersey. She's also the author of the fantastic new book Reform Nation: The First Step Act and the Movement To End Mass Incarceration. Signed into law by Donald Trump in 2018, the FIRST STEP Act is one of the few major reforms in the…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. "At its core, money is a ledger," writes investment analyst Lyn Alden in her new book Broken Money: Why Our Financial System is Failing Us and How We Can Make it Better. And if money is a ledger, she says, the most important question to consider …

Today's guest is Swedish historian Johan Norberg, author of The Capitalist Manifesto: Why the Global Free Market Will Save the World, which caught the eye of Elon Musk. "This book is an excellent explanation of why capitalism is not just successful, but morally right," Musk tweeted. Norberg wrote the book to combat a growing belief on the right and…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. Javier Milei, the self-described libertarian candidate for Argentina's presidency, surprised the world with a first-place finish in the primaries this August. But in the presidential election this past weekend, he finished second behind Argentina…

"We've taught young people that any of their missteps or any of their heterodox opinions are grounds to tear them down. That's no way to grow up." That was journalist Rikki Schlott speaking before a sold-out crowd on Monday night at a live taping of The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie podcast in New York City. Schlott, 23, teamed up with Greg …

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern time. "Despite clear interests on almost all sides against a regional war [in the Middle East], all sides are acting in a manner that makes such a war increasingly likely," writes Trita Parsi in an October 15 article calling for the Biden administ…

My guest is Shane Mauss, a comedian who tours the country discussing his psychedelic experiences in fantastic, immersive shows like DMT: A Love Story and A Better Trip. If you're in the New York City area, he'll be appearing at the Psychedelic Assembly in midtown October 27-31 as a part of a Halloween-themed show called Spookadelic. I caught up wit…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern time. Hamas stunned the world last weekend by launching a brutal terrorist attack on Israeli civilians and posting their crimes on social media. Israel's government responded with a sustained bombing campaign and a total blockade of the Gaza Strip…

Beyond obvious political polarization and the rancor that generates, Alexandra Hudson says that contemporary America—and the world—is "otherizing" people in a way that makes us all worse off by threatening our ability to peacefully coexist. In her new book The Soul of Civility: Timeless Principles To Heal Society and Ourselves, Hudson draws on the …

This is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. On June 30, Pornhub—America's most-trafficked adult website—announced that it was blocking access in Mississippi, Virginia, and Utah. Why? Well, Pornhub was reacting to the passage of age-verification laws in those thre…

My guest today is Johns Hopkins professor Yascha Mounk, the founder of the online magazine Persuasion and the author of the important new book The Identity Trap: A Story of Ideas and Power in Our Time. The Identity Trap explains how identity politics and social justice discourse have come to dominate contemporary discussions of just about everythin…

This is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. The second GOP primary debate of the season took place this Wednesday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, absent frontrunner Donald Trump. The debate revealed real divides among the candidates on issues like fore…

In 2001, Danish political scientist Bjorn Lomborg burst onto the international scene with his bestselling and controversial book The Skeptical Environmentalist. The onetime member of Greenpeace said that climate change is real and that human activity is clearly contributing to it, but he said the best science didn't support the apocalyptic visions …

This is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. This week, Reason's Zach Weissmueller and Liz Wolfe sat for an in-depth discussion with Johan Norberg about the lessons to draw from Sweden's pandemic policies The Swedish government's decision to forgo lockdowns as mos…

Over the past few episodes, I've been talking with people involved with what we at Reason are calling a psychedelic renaissance, or a rebirth of interest in substances long associated with the CIA and hippies and counterculture. Today's interest in these substances is mostly motivated by a desire to help veterans and victims of sexual violence who …

This is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. It's back-to-school season, and for some parts of the country, that means dealing with COVID restrictions again. Americans are no longer experiencing indefinite school closures or ubiquitous masking, but intermittent sc…

In June, I traveled to Denver with Zach Weismueller to cover the Psychedelic Science 2023 conference, organized by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), a group that has been working to gain Food and Drug Administration approval of MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD since the late 1980s. We produced a 30-minute documentary a…

This is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. Reason's Zach Weissmueller and Liz Wolfe sat down for a live discussion about the political and social ramifications of the indictments of Donald Trump with George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin. "Trump's att…

In June, I traveled to Denver with Zach Weissmueller to cover the Psychedelic Science 2023 conference, which was organized by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), a group that has been working to gain approval of MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD and related ailments since the late 1980s. We produced a 30-minute documentar…

This is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. The topic this week was a lawsuit challenging California Community Colleges' new diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility—or DEIA—teaching standards, which allegedly "mandate viewpoint conformity" and "compel pro…

My guest today is Eli Lake, a repeat guest who for almost 30 years has been one of the country's leading national security journalists, working as a columnist for and contributor to publications such as Bloomberg Opinion, The Daily Beast, The New Republic, The New York Sun, and Commentary. His 2010 article for Reason, "The 9/14 Presidency," strongl…

Today's episode is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. The topic this week was the rise of Javier Milei, a self-described libertarian and Austrian school economist who defied polling expectations in Argentina's recent presidential primary elections, finishing in …

Carol Roth is a self-described recovering investment banker and bestselling author whose new book is You Will Own Nothing: Your War with a New Financial World Order and How To Fight Back. "The United States has been at the center of the global financial universe for about 80 years," she tells me, but that's changing for a whole lot of reasons, most…

Today's episode is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. Zach Weissmueller talked with Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine, economics, and health research policy at Stanford University, and John Vecchione of the New Civil Liberties Alliance. They are among th…

My guest today is Eric Boehm, a reporter at Reason who specializes in economic and trade policy. He's also the host of a fantastic, new six-part podcast series, Why We Can't Have Nice Things. Each episode looks at different ways that import and export laws and other sorts of mostly hidden regulations radically alter what we can buy, how much things…

Today's episode is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. The topic this week was the strikes by Hollywood writers and actors and the guest was Rob Long, whose long and storied career in the entertainment industry includes stints writing and show running for the cla…

What does Kim Kardashian have in common with Leonardo Da Vinci? Much more than you might have ever guessed, says Tara Isabella Burton, author of the new book Self-Made: Creating Our Identities From Da Vinci to the Kardashians. As in her previous work Strange Rites: New Religions for a Godless World, Tara explores the amazing and ever-increasing fre…

Today's episode is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. The guest this week was actor and filmmaker Alex Winter, whose new documentary is The YouTube Effect, an in-depth look at the ways in which that video site has radically altered how we produce and consume pol…

My guest today is comedian Doug Stanhope. No performer is as idiosyncratic and outspoken about their politics and their personal habits as Stanhope, who dresses exclusively in Goodwill cast-offs and has written can't-put-down books about everything from helping his terminally ill mother commit suicide to celebrating the on-the-road debauchery that …

Today's episode is an audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern on Reason's YouTube channel. A recent poll found that 44 percent of Millennials want to criminalize misgendering people, showcasing a censorial attitude that has been building among some young people for years. Many Millennials also feel…

Before Matt Taibbi was sparring with Democratic members of Congress on Capitol Hill earlier this year over the Twitter Files, he was a darling of the progressive left, appearing regularly on shows like Democracy Now! and others hosted by Bill Moyers and Rachel Maddow. Though he was always a fierce critic of the Democratic establishment, the rise of…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. A recent House of Representatives committee report entitled "The Proximal Origin of a Cover-Up" exposes how Anthony Fauci and other leading government officials pressured researchers and the media into dismissing the COVID lab leak theory. Acclai…

Today's guest is Mike Rowe, the bestselling author, Emmy winner, and podcaster best known for his stint hosting The Discovery Channel's long-running Dirty Jobs, where he performed the sort of work we all rely on but don't want to think about too much. From cleaning septic tanks to putting hot tar on roofs to disposing of medical waste, he's done it…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. The COVID-19 pandemic and the government's response to it cost millions of lives and trillions of dollars and resulted in a major hit to global freedom. What should governments, private companies, and individuals do differently next time disaster…

Over the past quarter-century, Jonah Goldberg has made his name as one of the most provocative and unapologetic conservative journalists around. He was the editor of National Review Online for years before leaving over differences related to Donald Trump and he's penned bestselling books such as Liberal Fascism and Suicide of the West. He was a Fox…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. The guests this week were the podcaster and writer Coleman Hughes and the Cato Institute's Walter Olson. We talked about the recent high-profile Supreme Court cases that struck down the use of affirmative action in college admissions and ruled th…

Today's guest is the immensely popular podcaster and writer Bridget Phetasy, who recently packed up her family and left Los Angeles for Texas in search of affordable living, lower crime, and quieter evenings—all within an easy drive to Joe Rogan's Comedy Mothership club in Austin, where she sometimes performs. Leaving the hustle-heavy entertainment…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. The guest for this week's livestream was Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the environmentalist and anti-vaccine activist who is running for the Democratic presidential nomination. My colleague Zach Weissmueller and I talked with him about the war in Ukrain…

My guest today is Kevin Kelly, one of the original gang of people at Wired magazine back when it was not just reporting on but helping to create digital culture and cyberspace (he remains listed on the masthead as a "senior maverick"). He's a longtime techno-optimist who worked with people like Stewart Brand at the Whole Earth Catalog, Whole Earth …

My guest today is Brendan O'Neill of Spiked, whose new collection of essays, A Heretic's Manifesto: Essays on the Unsayable covers heated topics such as attacks on J.K. Rowling by trans activists; dismissals of populist moments that gave rise to Brexit, Donald Trump, and Emmanuel Macron; and the refusal by elites to own up to their mistakes related…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. The guest for this week's livestream was Clark Neily, senior vice president for legal studies at the Cato Institute. We talked about the indictment against Donald Trump, the parallels between the former president's behavior and Hillary Clinton's,…

Adam Smith turns 300 this week, and the July issue of Reason commemorates his life and legacy with a great set of articles by fantastic economists such as Deirdre McCloskey and Nobel Prize–winner Vernon Smith (no relation!), both of whom are recent guests on this podcast. My favorite piece in the issue, though, was created by today's guest, Peter B…

This is the audio version of The Reason Livestream, which takes place every Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern. The guest for this week's livestream was Cody Wilson of Defense Distributed, the creator of the 3D-printed "Liberator" gun. We talked with Cody about the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, which is trying—and failing—to shut do…

Today's guest is the Gutfeld! show and Fox News contributor Kat Timpf, whose new book, You Can't Joke About That: Why Everything Is Funny, Nothing Is Sacred, and We're All In This Together, is a massive bestseller. It's also a full-throated defense of free speech and a compelling argument for humor as the best possible coping mechanism. I talk with…