Beyond Talking Points

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about the idea of secession in modern day America. We talk about what it could take to make secession politically palatable, what secession could look like if it actually happened, and if it would make people's lives better.

In this episode, Matt and Matt discuss the role of empathy in government, policy, and politics. We both listened to an old episode of the Very Bad Wizards podcast that touched on the topic, and we riffed off there. We use the word "heuristic" so many times that the word loses all of its meaning. Generally, we discuss the disconnect between our interpretation of events and the true impact of policy or policy-making.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about "All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace", a documentary series produced by Adam Curtis. We react to all sorts of elements covered in the series, such as Reagan, Ayn Rand, capitalism, technocracy, and central planning.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about the French film "Martyrs" - a movie known for some disturbing sequences and graphic content. They talk about the themes that the movie overtly touches on and other parts of the film that jumped out to them.

Spoilers ahead. We both recommend the film if you can handle disturbing content, maybe not a date night movie.

Matt and Matt discuss the SoHo forum debate between Bill Kristol and Scott Horton about US interventionism. This was a fun one - if you haven't seen the debate, it's worth watching. We don't often discuss foreign policy and the thoughts/principles that inform our foreign policy views, so this is an interesting change of pace.

In this episode, Matt and Matt discuss what "is" in terms of government, society, and human action. We often argue about moral intuitions or how things "ought" to be; this time, we dug into thinking that is true regardless of more judgements that are usually tied into ideology.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about things related to globalism, the elite class, technocracy, international institutions, and government. A fun episode where we get to agree a lot.

In this episode, we talk about Louis Lingg and Johann Most's excerpts from "The Anarchist Handbook". We talk about revolutionary actors, martyrs, political violence, and more. This eventually devolves into a debate about the importance of political participation that references Jordan Peterson, Martin Luther King, and others.

The Matts discuss their views on the law as an institution, and whether or not politicians should concern themselves with following the law or being Machiavellian in pursuit of their goals and interests. This is a laid back episode with a fair amount of agreement, although The Rule of Law is definitely a point of departure between the two of us.

This topic was pitched by Ancap Matt. There are a lot of "liberty" oriented people that have odd purity tests that are ignorant of long term strategy. This is not claiming that all of the bad politicians are good in the long run, but a good congressman's compromise might be the best for liberty under certain circumstances.

In this episode, the Matts continue to make their way through Michael Malice's "The Anarchist Handbook". They covered Lysander Spooner's essay, "No Treason", and discussed whether the US Constitution has any authority, how politicians are able to properly represent their voters, and individualist anarchism. There was a lot of disagreement over the content of this essay, what intuitions it plays into, and if the arguments Spooner make have any utility. As always we hope you find some instruction and entertainment in this conversation.