Advertise on podcast: The John Stossel Interviews

I hear bees are dying, polar bears are going extinct, and weather is getting more extreme every day! All lies. Media tell me the Great Barrier Reef is dying. But “the Great Barrier Reef is doing fine,” says climate researcher Linnea Lueken. "Corals thrive in tropical conditions.” Environmental groups says recycling will save the planet. That’s another myth. Author John Tierney says “recycling is garbage ... It’s a sacrament of the green religion." In this podcast, we debunk lies activists push about the environment.

Politicians always want to “improve” our economy.But again and again, they make things worse. “The more we move away from free markets, the worse things become” says economist Don Boudreaux, author of “The Triumph of Economic Freedom."Boudreaux explains how government intervention made the Great Depression last longer, caused the Great Recession, and more.He also debunks myths like the "growing gap" between rich and poor:“If you look at the data, that growing gap isn’t growing. That gap is due to a statistical illusion.” In this podcast, we talk about “The Triumph of Economic Freedom" and debunk myths about poverty, AI taking jobs, and the dumb ways politicians claim to “improve" the economy.

Fearmongering media say climate change is “our greatest threat in thousands of years.” Climate change is real, but is it the apocalypse? Climate researcher Roger Pielke Jr. doesn’t think so. But just expressing skepticism got him attacked by our government. Al Gore blamed extreme weather on climate change. “Every storm is different now because it takes place in a warmer and wetter world.” But that isn’t true.Roger Pielke Jr explains: "we haven’t observed changes in the frequency or intensity (of storms) that are beyond natural variability." He adds, “The increasing impacts of extreme weather…are due to what we build, where we build, how much wealth we have in harm’s way.” In other words, weather costs more because people build more expensive properties in risky places. Pielkie's research has won awards and is cited by the U.N. climate committee. Still, activists hate it. A congressman investigated him, and the University of Colorado shut down his research center. Pielke didn’t back down. Now, the American Enterprise Institute supports his work. “You can’t be cancelled," says Pielke, "You can let them cancel you, but you can’t be cancelled.” His full story in the podcast above.

Who owns you?Government often acts like they own us.But lawyer Tim Sandefur of the Goldwater Institute reminds us, we own ourselves.“People should not have power over other people’s lives,” says Sandefur.His book, You Don’t Own Me, talks about that, and how popular culture often reflects this message.“Ours is a nation where the individual’s right to pursue happiness is written into it’s foundational document” he reminds us.In this podcast, more on Sandefur’s book, libertarianism, Hollywood propaganda, and his fight against government overreach.

Politicians say they can “fix” the economy.But economists Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig von Mises pointed out how government “fixes" lead to bigger problems.Hayek and Mises predicted the fall of the Soviet Union. They warned that centrally planned economies fail.But today, socialism is popular again. New York and Seattle have elected socialist mayors.Many politicians still believe that government can manage the economy—an idea popularized by economist John Maynard Keynes.Keynes was revered. Politicians love his arguments.But Hayek and Mises warned that government intervention leads to inflation, instability, and boom-bust cycles.They were right.In this podcast, Ryan McMaken of the Mises Institute explains why we should read Hayek and Mises today.

“I'm going to speak the truth here, and this is not pleasant for people to hear.” In my podcast with author Heather Mac Donald, she says uncomfortable things about race, crime, feminism and more.For example, she says, “The reality of our world today is not white privilege. It's black privilege.” She says many jobs and colleges today unfairly favor black candidates with fewer skills. “Harvard until recently had about 16% blacks in its freshman class,” says Mac Donald, “If it admitted based on academic merit, there would be less than 1%.” She’s been repeatedly called “‘racist’ for saying things like that. “Am I a racist for bringing this up? I am not!” responds Mac Donald, “The facts are the facts … They have been completely kept out of the public eye to keep this systemic lie of racism going on.” In this podcast, more facts you won’t hear covered by mainstream media.

During the last 5 years our government has imposed lockdowns, caused inflation, increased the deficit, started trade wars, and now a real war. It makes me wonder; how would things have been different if we had a libertarian President? Well, here’s my discussion with 2020’s libertarian Presidential candidate, Jo Jorgensen. We originally spoke 5 years ago, but our conversation covers issues that are still important today.

I don’t bother interviewing most politicians. But former presidential candidate Andrew Yang is interesting. Unlike most politicians, he has experience as an entrepreneur, he criticizes politicians for their "magical thinking," and he even left his party (the Democrats) to start the "Forward Party." I spoke to him in 2021, soon after its launch. We discuss if a third party could ever succeed, where politicians' magical thinking has failed, entrepreneurship, and I push back on his vision for universal basic income (basically free money).

Are we witnessing the fall of the American empire? Are we doomed to fall, like Ancient Athens, Ancient Rome and others? No. But if we don’t learn the lessons of history, we could be. To avoid collapse, historian Johan Norberg argues we especially need to learn from the rise and fall of past golden ages—like Ancient Athens, Ancient Rome, China’s Song Dynasty, the Italian Renaissance, and more. “What sets these golden ages apart," he explains, "is that they managed to ... give more people more freedoms.” Like freedom to trade. That helped many golden ages prosper. In this podcast, we also discuss what led to their decline. I was surprised to learn that many problems we face today (like inflation and unsustainable entitlement spending) also destroyed societies more than a thousand years ago. “But that doesn't mean that we're doomed,” says Norberg. “There are so many instances where societies faced terrible situations … but bounced back … So there is still time. We can still save this golden age.”

I once reported how great Wikipedia is. But now, it’s manipulated by leftists. That’s a big problem because its bad information corrupts AI and search results. In this podcast, Ashley Rindsberg of NPOV Media explains how, “Wikipedia's information spreads into everything online.” That means when your ask ChatGPT, Google, or your phone a question, it’ll likely to take leftist spin straight from Wikipedia. I also share an excerpt of my conversation with Veteran Wikipedian Jonathan Weiss. Three years ago, he told me how the site, like academia, has been captured by leftists. We cover many examples.

“You can’t put a price on life!” say politicians, pretending to be compassionate, spending other people’s money. But Kenneth Feinberg, Special Master of the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, says you CAN put a price on life. He's distributed funds to the victims of 9/11, the Pulse nightclub shooting, the Boston Marathon, the Deepwater Horizon spill, the Virginia Tech shooting, the Aurora movie theater shooting, and now the LA wildfires. In this podcast he explains how he does it, why it's important, but also why (despite the success of the 9/11 fund) paying out money to victims should not be something that government does.

"If your kids went through puberty on a smartphone with social media, they came out different than human beings before” says Jonathan Haidt, author of the bestseller “The Anxious Generation.”He argues that childhood is now phone-based instead of play-based, resulting in anxious and depressed kids. "They know that life would be better if they didn't spend five or six hours a day on social media. They know that, but they can't help it” says Haidt. But not all researcher agree. I challenge Haidt with the criticism. In our podcast, Haidt responds, and lays out his best advice to protect kids from smartphones.

Young people today hate capitalism. They often say socialism would be better. It's absurd. Why would they argue that? Because much of what they're told about socialism and capitalism is just nonsense. So in this podcast, we'll debunk 5 of the biggest myths about socialism, and even more myths about capitalism.

James Lindsay once exposed the woke left’s insanity with a hoax. Now he’s exposed part of the right for bashing liberty and even embracing Marxist ideas.To prove it, he sent a conservative magazine a revised version of "The Communist Manifesto." They published it! He calls them the “woke right" because they "behave like the tyrants of the woke left." In this podcast, Lindsay explains why they’re a problem. We also discuss why capitalism is hated, and how normal people fall for dangerous ideas.

Activist Robby Starbuck got companies like Target, Walmart, and Toyota to drop their woke DEI policies. It sounds hard to believe one man could do that, but he did. From DEI trainings to mandatory "ally" pledges, Starbuck posts videos about absurd woke things that big companies do behind closed doors to please activists. In this podcast, he explains how this fight against corporate America worked, how DEI hurts America, and what made him finally speak up. I also push back on his movie, "The War on Children."