The Government Shutdown: Why Our System Fails on Purpose
American Angst1 Nov 2025

The Government Shutdown: Why Our System Fails on Purpose

Boo! In this Halloween edition of American Angst, political philosopher Dr. Michael Bailey leads a brisk, illuminating tour of the current government shutdown and what it reveals about our constitutional machinery. Michael lays out why both parties share blame in different ways, but, more importantly, why the structure itself incentivizes brinkmanship over basic governance. He explains how the Senate filibuster concentrates leverage, why “who’s actually in charge?” is maddeningly opaque to vo...

Episoder(30)

Democratic Backsliding: How Democracies Erode (with Dr. Sam Call)

Democratic Backsliding: How Democracies Erode (with Dr. Sam Call)

We may begin talking about sweater weather and niceties about upstate New York, but we quickly let the angst flow deep and wide. Join us as Sam Call (comparative politics) joins Michael Bailey (politi...

27 Okt 20251h 6min

Faith & the Founders, Part 2: The Godless Constitution Thesis

Faith & the Founders, Part 2: The Godless Constitution Thesis

We’re back with another crossover of American Angst and Church Potluck—and it’s the middle slice of a three-part series. In Part 1, we explored evidence for a religious impulse at the founding of the ...

20 Okt 20251h 8min

Faith & the Founders, Part 1: The Christian Commonwealth Thesis

Faith & the Founders, Part 1: The Christian Commonwealth Thesis

It’s a crossover feast: American Angst meets Church Potluck for a lively, thoughtful dive into religion, politics, and the Founders—setting the table for an upcoming conversation on Christian national...

10 Okt 20251h 4min

San Francisco De-Angstified: A Father-Daughter Conversation

San Francisco De-Angstified: A Father-Daughter Conversation

San Francisco is often painted as a city in crisis by conservative politicians and pundits, but does that picture hold up when you actually live there? In this special episode, political scientist Mic...

6 Okt 20251h 1min

Climate Change and Glimmers of Hope: A Conversation with Courtney Cooper

Climate Change and Glimmers of Hope: A Conversation with Courtney Cooper

Environmental policy professor Dr. Courtney Cooper joins American Angst to untangle climate science, local vs. federal solutions, and why adaptation and mitigation aren’t either/or options. With Dr. M...

29 Sep 20251h 13min

Trump Loyalty Shakedown: Free Speech’s New Fault Line

Trump Loyalty Shakedown: Free Speech’s New Fault Line

Is America’s free-speech problem moving from online pile-ons to state-pressured loyalty tests? Political scientist and philosopher Dr. Michael Bailey makes the case that we’re drifting into a new, int...

25 Sep 202551min

Why Don't We Trust the Experts? Science and the Crisis of Authority

Why Don't We Trust the Experts? Science and the Crisis of Authority

Physicist and astronomer Dr. Todd Timberlake joins the conversation to explore the modern crisis of expertise. What does it mean to trust science when experts sometimes get things wrong? How do peer r...

22 Sep 202549min

Charlie Kirk's Tragic Death and the Temptation of Collective Blame

Charlie Kirk's Tragic Death and the Temptation of Collective Blame

Political philosopher Dr. Michael Bailey and host Dale McConkey reflect on the public murder of Charlie Kirk and a week already heavy with 9/11 remembrances. With humility about their limits and the f...

12 Sep 202551min

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