Two recent podcast interviews are now available on Youtube. The first is an interview about nationalism that is part of Jerry Bourdeau's new Argue with Me podcast series. It concerns the critique of nationalism that I outlined in my recent article on national politics, “The Case Against Nationalism” (co-authored with Cato Institute scholar Alex Nowras).
We discuss what nationalism is, why it's terrible (including how it resembles socialism), and what might replace it.
The Argue With Me series is relatively new. But Bourdeaux has already published interviews with several prominent (mainly libertarian or libertarian-leaning) economists and political theorists, including David Friedman and Chris Fryman. Check it out.
The second podcast is about the legal and moral aspects of the current situation at the US southern border. This is part of Michael Liebowitz's Rational Egoist podcast series.
We discuss whether illegal immigration constitutes an “invasion” (the subject of a notable recent court decision handed down only after filming this), the conflict between Texas and the federal government, and the border situation. It addresses many issues, including how to deal with it. It follows libertarian principles (or liberal principles more generally).
Along the way, we also discuss some really awful legal arguments that have gotten quite a bit of attention on Twitter/X (e.g., whether civilians detaining immigrants are somehow violating the Third Amendment to the U.S. Constitution) ). A useful lesson here is that the fact that someone is a Twitter “influencer” with a lot of followers doesn't mean they know what they're talking about. is. This is true for the right-wing “influencers” we discuss on the podcast, but it is also true for many left-wing “influencers.”
I have detailed my views on what to do about the border situation in this article. USA Today Article (co-authored with David Bier). See also this post on why the supposed “immigration crisis” is actually primarily caused by immigration restrictions and regulations that prohibit most asylum seekers from working legally ( Exclusive zoning is also an important factor in some cities).
