The Reason Roundtable

Promised an improved way of life, Remy does everything he can to believe in a new ideology–except the math.

Post Malone parody written and performed by Remy. Video produced by Austin Bragg. Music tracks and mastering by Ben Karlstrom.

As she begins her 2020 presidential campaign, Sen. Kamala Harris is trying to position herself as a reformer who tirelessly works to correct the abuses of the criminal justice system. But the California Democrat has one big problem: her long record as a law-and-order prosecutor.

Harris's new memoir, The Truths We Hold, makes no mention of her past as an old-school drug warrior, a defender of dirty prosecutors, and a political opportunist who made life more dangerous for sex workers. Harris doesn't apologize for her previous stances, even those she now disavows; instead, she's decided to try to convince voters that she's always been a progressive prosecutor.

Here are some parts of her record that Harris is hoping you'll forget in the run-up to 2020.

Hosted by Katherine Mangu-Ward. Written and Edited by Justin Monticello. Shot by Austin Bragg and Meredith Bragg. Additional graphics by Joshua Swain. Music by Matt Harris.

Photo credits: Jonathan Ernst/REUTERS/Newscom, Kenneth Song/News-Press/ZUMA Press/Newscom, Chris Kleponis/CNP/AdMedia/Newscom, Yichuan Cao/Sipa USA/Newscom, ELIJAH NOUVELAGE/REUTERS/Newscom, Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Newscom, Hector Amezcua/ZUMA Press/Newscom, Ron Sachs - CNP / MEGA / Newscom, imageSPACEimageSPACE/Sipa USA/Newscom, Jeff Malet Photography/Newscom

Nick Gillespie and Matt Welch talk about the deep and ever-changing political and cultural meaning of football's biggest game.

Mercedes-Benz Stadium is home to the Atlanta Falcons and the site of this year's Super Bowl. Costing $1.5 billion, it's one of the most expensive stadiums in America.

The owner of Atlanta's football team, billionaire Arthur Blank, persuaded Atlanta officials to force taxpayers to pay for more than $700 million in subsidies for his stadium.

John Stossel says he understands why politicians subsidize stadiums. "They like going to games, and like telling voters, 'I brought a team to our town!'" says Stossel.

He also understands why billionaires take the money, "if politicians are giving money away, Blank's partners would consider him irresponsible not to take it."

And when it comes to already-rich people getting poorer people to fund their stadiums, Atlanta is not unusual. The Oakland Raiders got $750 million of taxpayer money to move the Raiders to Las Vegas.

Economist J.C. Bradbury points out that while money spent at football games is the "seen benefit, the unseen cost is that those people would otherwise be spending their money elsewhere in the local communities. At the local bar there's one less bartender. There was one less waitress hired at another restaurant. A movie theater that had one less theater full."

Stossel reminds everyone, "When politicians brag about their stadium and the many economic benefits, let's also remember all the jobs they destroyed and taxpayer money they squandered."

Assessing Elizabeth Warren's "tippy-top" tax, Howard Schultz's presidential candidacy, Donald Trump's shutdown-shutdown, and more

Assessing Elizabeth Warren's "tippy-top" tax, Howard Schultz's presidential candidacy, Donald Trump's shutdown-shutdown, and more

Q&A with the president of National School Choice Week, Andrew Campanella

Over 30,000 public school teachers, nurses, counselors, and librarians went on strike last week in Los Angeles—the first teachers' strike there in nearly 30 years.

Driving the protests were union demands for higher salaries, smaller class sizes, and more funding for school nurses and counselors. District administrators said those demands would hasten the system's descent into insolvency.

While teacher salaries haven't increased much in inflation-adjusted terms since the 1990s, total teacher compensation has soared because of ballooning health care and retirement contributions. There's a growing disconnect between what teachers see in their paychecks and what their employers are actually paying for their services.

Reason spoke with Chad Aldeman, an editor at TeacherPensions.org and a senior associate partner at Bellwether Education Partners, to discuss what's really driving schools to the brink of bankruptcy. The interview is based in part on Aldeman's article in Education Next, "Teachers Have the Nation's Highest Retirement Costs. But They'll Never See the Benefits."

Interview by Nick Gillespie. Produced by Alexis Garcia. Camera by Garcia, Justin Monticello, Meredith Bragg, and Mark McDaniel.

Photo credits: Christian Monterrosa/Sipa USA/Newscom, Ronan Tivony/Sipa USA/Newscom, Jonathan Alcorn/REUTERS/Newscom, Leah Mills/REUTERS/Newscom.

"Can't Believe," "Code," and "Treeline" by Music for Nothing are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/). Source: https://musicfornothing.com/.

There are unschooling groups in every major American city, with some specially themed versions—even Pagan unschooling. The movement dates back to the 1970s and was shaped by the work of educator and author John Holt.

"School is a place where children go to learn to be stupid," Holt once said in a televised interview. "And the process that makes them stupid...is other people trying to control their learning."

Holt, who died in 1985, began his career as a progressive school reformer, but lost hope that meaningful change was possible within the formal system. So he turned to the burgeoning homeschool movement as the most promising avenue for fixing what he viewed as America's broken education system. Some modern homeschoolers reference Holt as the movement's founding father, but his radical vision differed from that of the conservative religious practitioners who dominate public perception of homeschooling today.

Produced by Zach Weissmueller. Camera by Jim Epstein, Mark McDaniel, Brynmore Williams, and Weissmueller.

"Float," "Ether Oar," Don't Force This," "Goodnight Shapeshifter,"Bubble," "Tides," and "Sanguine Bond" by Joel Corelitz are licensed under a Creative Commons attribution license.

"Static Shoes" by Loyalty Freak Music is licensed under a Creative Commons Universal 1.0 license.

The Manhattan Institute's Howard Husock debates Economic Policy Institute's Richard Rothstein at the Soho Forum.