The Political Orphanage

Where do non-partisan people tend to live? What factors are most associated with political prejudice? Comedian and political scientist Dr. Andrea Jones-Rooy joins Heaton to a discuss a recent PredictWise survey trying to quantify each of America’s 3,000 counties according to partisanship. (Plus, Heaton ranks world leaders according to who he would want to vacation with).

The head of the Food & Drug Administration, Scott Gottlieb, is leaving, so Heaton is officially nominating Stu Burguiere to be its new commissioner. He talks with Heaton about the false sense of security the FDA brings the public, and the ways it can be counterproductive for life-saving pharmaceuticals.

Why we should rename Mt. Everest, what hipsters are and aren’t, when cemeteries become yoga studios, and the best legislation to come out of Utah—all this on another installment of Friday Release Valve.

Garrett Graff, author of Raven Rock: The Story of the U.S. Government's Secret Plan to Save ItselfÑWhile the Rest of Us Die joins Heaton to discuss the presidential succession, secret military bunkers, and the history of the cold warÑfrom the perspective of doomsday plans.

Bernie Sanders John Hickenlooper and (probably soon) Beto O’Rourke have jumped into the already crowded Democratic 2020 primary. Meanwhile Donald Trump has his own challenger in the GOP. Will Weld help or hobble the Donald? Who’s the Democrat’s Jeb of the 2020 election well-positioned but destined to flame out? Justin Robert Young and Brian Brushwood join Heaton for industrial-strength rampant political speculation.

Senator Mike Lee of Utah joins Heaton to talk about how federalism has become out of whack, and ways to restore balance to the Force.

Bernie Sanders and Tucker Carlson have both settled onto a single big problem in America—stuff. Katherine Mangu-Ward the Editor-in-Chief of Reason Magazine joins Heaton to explain how an adorable Japanese tidying celebrity provides an alternative mindset.

Mike Kaplan, co-host of the “Lost in America Podcast,” joins Heaton to sort the week’s most baffling headlines. Including: The artistic abilities of pigs, radioactive cremations, the sex life of Adam West, and the feasibility of leprechauns.

Commander Dale Brown, owner of a private security firm, joins Heaton to talk about the history of racial theory and how ethnicity is a social construct.

The Pentagon is ramping up efforts to develop sophisticated AI before China does. What happens if China beats us? Either way, is AI going to murder us in our sleep, like Elon Musk says? Joe Leonardo and David Ryan Polgar, hosts of the “Funny As Tech” podcast join Heaton to allay and stoke his fears.