The Human Action Podcast

Two of the Institute's Fellows—a Frenchman and a German—join Jeff Deist for a freewheeling discussion of the political and economic situation in Europe.

Can Austrian economics revive Europe's liberal tradition, or will statist impulses thwart any hope for liberation from Brussels? And can the Mises Institute and its fellow travelers have an impact on academia on the continent? Sascha and Louis see hope for optimism, despite the bad news that seems to dominate European media.

Dr. Robert Higgs delivered one of our most popular and most-watched Mises U speeches in 2013, a terrific exposition entitled "The State is too Dangerous to Tolerate". It's an intellectual tour de force from Higgs, where he demolishes many of the popular misconceptions about (and justifications for) the state in one compelling talk. This is Dr. Higgs at his most formidable, and well worth an hour of your time, this weekend. It's the kind of content that you won't hear anywhere else.

Jeff joins Daniel Ameduri of FutureMoneyTrends.com for a no holds barred discussion of current events, including Trump vs. Hillary, Gary Johnson's chances, the symbolic importance of Brexit, and why the leftwing focus of groups like Black Live Matter will make society more violent, not less.

The UK is poised to vote on Brexit next week, deciding for the first time since 1975 whether to leave the European Union. The Brexit vote mirrors populist, nationalist, and anti-globalist trends around the world, and if successful it raises serious questions about the viability of the Euro itself. The whole world is watching, and markets are nervous: rarely is globalism so directly challenged.

Here to discuss Brexit is Godfrey Bloom, the great un-PC British politician who was a member of the European Parliament—where he sometimes quoted Rothbard to an uneasy audience of continental technocrats. Jeff Deist and Bloom discuss the odds of whether the "leave" campaign will be successful, whether the ECB's failure to prevent sovereign debt crises in Europe influences the vote, whether Brexit would cause actual Eurozone countries to follow suit, and what Mises had to say about theoretically taking self-determination and secession down to the individual level.

For further reading, see "The UK's EU referendum: All you need to know" by Brian Wheeler and Alex Hunt (http://bbc.com/news/uk-politics-32810887). Also, watch Godfrey Bloom cite Murray N. Rothbard in "The State is an Institution of Theft" (http://youtu.be/CBVFpYN0iNo).

Conservatives once stood for judicious use of government power and minding our own business in foreign affairs. Today, 100 years after the beginning of the progressive revolution, conservatives don't conserve anything. They vote for big-government schemes, favor globalism over real capitalism, and advocate an aggressive foreign policy that installs American troops around the globe. They've lost any claim to the mantle of "limited government," and lost every battle concerning abortion and social issues. Worst of all, Republicans have created a bloated jobs programs for themselves—Conservatism, Inc.—that shows nothing but contempt for its own voting base.

Is the GOP the next Whig party, consigned to history?

For further reading, see Murray Rothbard's 'The Betrayal of the American Right' (mises.org/Betrayal), Justin Raimondo's 'Reclaiming the American Right' (mises.org/Reclaiming), and "The Coming Conservative Dark Age" by Matthew Continetti (mises.org/DarkAge). See also Mises.org/AmericanMercury.

Mises defined "liberalism" as rooted in property. Modern progressives and social justice warriors—mislabeled as "liberals"—attack property as an impediment to their program of radical egalitarianism. In their view, all human conduct must be viewed through the filters of identity politics, privilege, and undefinable concepts of social justice. Disagree with them and you'll find your campus building or political rally attacked by angry demonstrators who view dissent as hate.

Where does libertarianism fit into this equation? Should we adopt the premises, language, and goals of progressives, but argue for achieving them through capitalist means? Should we inform our worldview using utilitarianism? Should we side with SJWs in the culture wars? Or, should we make the case for a nonpolitical world, one grounded in Misesian private property and Rothbardian natural law ethics?

Jeff Deist makes the case that the real issues confronting us are war and peace, central banking, and state power—not inequality or racism or sexism. And, he argues against adopting leftist language used to advance the libertarian message.

For further reading, see Mises's 1927 classic 'Liberalism' (mises.org/Liberalism) and Jeff Deist's recent "Notes on the LP Convention" (mises.org/NotesLP).

It's Memorial Day weekend, a time when we (hopefully) reflect on war rather than celebrate it. So it's the perfect opportunity to revisit an inspiring antiwar talk from our own Senior Fellow Tom Woods. You may not know it, but Tom was once a neocon who considered the libertarian position of noninterventionism unrealistic and naive. But his mind was changed by none other than the late Murray Rothbard, who convinced Tom that peace and liberty cannot be severed, that empire abroad leads to socialism at home, and that foreign policy should be front and center in a libertarian worldview.

Jeff Deist joins Joshua Bennett on the Patriots Lament show (KFAR AM 660, Fairbanks) and gives his thoughts on the 2016 election. Jeff discusses how the ultimate outcome of any election season is greater division among society, and argues that libertarians should focus on making the case for decentralizing power. Liberty will never come from the White House, but from winning over the hearts and minds of our friends and neighbors in our own communities.

This weekend, Jeff Deist and John O'Donnell discuss central banking and culture. We tend to think of central banking as a dry subject for professional economists, rather than a cultural and even moral issue. But the Fed and other central banks create huge moral hazards, degrade longstanding social mores like hard work and thrift, and encourage economic hedonism today at the expense of tomorrow. Every healthy society is built on capital accumulation and building for a future beyond lives, whereas central banks encourage consumption and turn us into zombie debtors. What happens to the future when ultra-low interest rates mean saving is for chumps? And why have we allowed Greenspan, Bernanke, and Yellen to hide the Fed's harmful cultural effects behind a wall of technical Fed-speak?

Thirty-five years ago, Ron Paul and Lewis Lehrman published 'The Case for Gold', their minority report from Reagan's gold commission. Today, Jim Rickards has written 'The New Case for Gold', an uncompromising call for using gold as money and reestablishing a gold standard for central banks.

In this wide-ranging interview, Jeff Deist and Jim Rickards discuss gold in the context of current geopolitics and enduring myths about monetary growth. While the "anti-gold reflex" is strong among older generation monetary economists in the west, a new gold-friendly order is emerging in Asia. Jeff and Jim even discuss whether Hillary will be indicted, leading to a Joe Biden/Elizabeth Warren ticket. This is a fascinating interview that you won't want to miss.