The Right's Libertarian Takeover

Nancy MacLean, the William Chafe Professor of History and Public Policy at Duke University, joins us to discuss her new book Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right's Stealth Plan for America. MacLean tells the story of James McGill Buchanan, a Nobel Prize-winning economist from the South. She examines how Buchanan devised a plan to reduce the role of government in America, and how his cause was picked up and funded by the wealthy. These ideas crept into the right's philosophy, and have even reached the White House in the form of Vice President Mike Pence.