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.

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