Rob Henderson is one of the most interesting young thinkers active today. A writer with an engaging Twitter account and must-subscribe newsletter, he is perhaps most well known today for his popularization of the concept of “luxury beliefs.”

My conversation with Rob occurred in the midst of the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. I was looking for his perspective on the world, and the reality of American decline, because his own life story is so unique, and yet so American. Given up for adoption by a Korean mother with drug addictions, Rob was raised by a Korean American lesbian in relative poverty in Red Bluff, California. Red Bluff is in the heart of California’s conservative and poor Central Valley. A very different California than the dreams of out-of-staters.