The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie

Almost 70 years after a U.S.-backed coup deposed the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh and replaced him with Shah...

In the time of a global pandemic, soaring unemployment, massive wildfires, and racial strife, it feels like the world is going to hell. It's not, says Reason Science Correspondent Ronald Bailey, the coauthor (with HumanProgress.org's Marian Tupy) of Ten Global Trends Every Smart Person Should Know: And Many Others You Will Find Interesting. The planet is objectively getting richer, cleaner, and safer, and our future will be bright if we keep the institutions and optimism that started to develop about 200 years ago.

"Democracy doesn't die in the darkness," writes Bridget Phetasy, "it dies when politics become team sports, in full view of a bloodthirsty, cheering electorate."

Phetasy is a popular podcaster, comedian, and writer who a year ago penned a great column titled "The battle cry of the politically homeless." She followed it up just a few days ago with an equally powerful piece called "Why I won't vote," which channels the frustration felt by the 41-percent plurality of us who are political independents.

Since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in late May, demonstrators in Portland have taken to the streets every night, often smashing windows, setting buildings on fire, and scuffling with local and federal law enforcement as well as fellow city dwellers. Veteran journalist Nancy Rommelmann has been covering the Portland protests for Reason. She knows Rose City like the back of her hand, having lived there for 15 years. Nick Gillespie spoke with her about the roots of the unrest in Portland, what she's learned by talking with the protesters and authorities, and what might be coming next.

In a world where Facebook recognizes more than 70 sexual identities, are we really witnessing what author Debra Soh calls The End of Gender?

The Toronto-based sex researcher's new book is subtitled "debunking the myths about sex and identity in our society" and she tells Nick Gillespie that scientific rigor is being tossed aside in the name of political activism when it comes to talking about gender differences and flashpoint issues such as allowing pre-pubescent children to transition sexually.

Fox News host and Greg Gutfeld explains his new self-book The Plus, why he thinks Americans have so many problems controlling our worst impulses, how we will eventually emerge better off from the Covid-19 lockdowns, and why we will re-elect Donald Trump in November.

Cliff Maloney, president of Young Americans for Liberty, tells Nick Gillespie why he thinks the city of Dallas canceled the libertarian student group's conference for political reasons, why he's optimistic about the 2020 election, and how YAL's focus on being anti-war and pro-civil liberties resonates with younger voters.

What will the COVID-19 pandemic and the lockdown of our society mean for the hundreds of thousands of foreign workers, refugees, and asylum seekers who apply annually to become Americans? Nick Gillespie talks with Jia Lynn Yang, author of One Mighty and Irresistible Tide: The Epic Struggle Over American Immigration, 1924-1965, about the intersection of immigration and pandemic.

What is driving instances of what many call "cancel culture"? To answer that question, Nick Gillespie turned to Jonathan Rauch—a fellow at the Brookings Institution, a contributing writer to The Atlantic, and a signatory to the recent open letter in Harper's warning that "the free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted."

Kmele Foster is the co-founder of FreeThink, a media company that showcases social and technological innovations, a co-host of The Fifth Column podcast, and an outspoken libertarian critic of Black Lives Matter, cancel culture, and political orthodoxy.

In a wide-ranging, in-depth conversation with Nick Gillespie, Foster explains why he signed the Harpers letter on cancel culture, why he thinks that racism is not the primary factor for most African Americans' success or failure, and why libertarians need to be pushing individualism now more than ever.