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. Michael Bailey (our resident “Avatar of Angst”) pressing on partisanship, expertise, and the politics of denial, and host Dr. Dale McConkey steering the conversation, we move from Andean glaciers and wildfire smoke to bike lanes, data centers, and why “co-benefits” (healthier cities, better transit) might be the bridge past stalemate. Expect insights on models and evidence, frank talk about costs and tradeoffs, and a grounded hopefulness: we can’t do everything, but we can do a lot—together.

The views expressed on American Angst are solely those of the participants and do not represent any organization.

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, internet-era McCarthyism—a “Trump Loyalty Shakedown”—while host Dale McConkey presses on what truly protects expression: not just the First Amendment, but civic norms that resist conformity. We warm up with rectangles on the U.S. map and West Coast daydreams, then trace three classic threats to speech (government coercion, social self-censorship, and the gray zone where politics chills private actors). Along the way: Madison, Lincoln, WWI, HUAC, Tocqueville, and Mill—and practical steps listeners (especially conservatives who value free expression) can take right now.

The views expressed on American Angst are solely those of the participants and do not represent any organization.

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 review, replication, and the broader scientific community create self-correcting systems that still move knowledge forward, even through mistakes? And why has public trust in institutions—including science and medicine—eroded so dramatically in recent years?

Together with our angsty leader, Michael Bailey, Todd unpacks why skepticism toward expertise has shifted from a fringe view to a mainstream force shaping policy and public life. They consider the dangers of dismissing experts altogether, the tension between democracy and authority, and the challenges citizens face in discerning credible evidence from persuasive rhetoric. The conversation also raises a crucial question: what responsibilities do experts themselves bear in making their work transparent and trustworthy?

To end on a lighter note, we close with “Dear Michael Bailey—Give Us a List.” Michael shares his three favorite things about physics, from the vast scales of the universe to the counterintuitive truths revealed by math. Then Todd returns the favor with his list of the three most angsty things about government—highlighting complexity, the problem of uninformed decision-making, and the limitations of what government can realistically achieve.

Hosted by Dale McConkey.

The views expressed on American Angst are solely those of the participants and do not represent any organization.