Pushkin.

It's hard to read the news these days without asking yourself, how did we get here?

Fiasco is a history podcast for the co-creators of Slow Burn.

In our first season, Bush v. Gore, we examine an unmistakable turning point in American politics, the 2000 election, which resulted in a high-stakes stalemate, ended with one of the most controversial rulings in Supreme Court history.

So if you're trying to make sense at the present moment, check out Fiasco, Bush v. Gore. Listen on theHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

From Pushkin Industries, this is Deep Background, the show where we explore the stories behind the stories in the news.

I'm Noah Feldman. Today, we're continuing our Freedom of Speech series, and I'm going to share with you

a conversation I had with an expert whom I admire greatly and with whom I very frequently disagree.

Eugene Volick teaches First Amendment law at the UCLA School of Law. He's the author of a casebook

about freedom of speech called The First Amendment

and Related Statutes. His law review articles and his friend of the court briefs have been cited

in numerous Supreme Court cases. He's also the founder and co-author of the Volok

conspiracy, a leading legal blog, which sometimes, depending on the issue, tends towards the

conservative or libertarian.

In the world of legal academia, where I have my day job, Eugene is universally recognized

across the range of political opinions as one of the most significant and influential voices

about the freedom of speech. I spoke to Eugene back in March.

Eugene, I wonder if you would start by telling our listeners how you got interested in the freedom of speech, because your profile up until the time when you did fancy appellate court in Supreme Court clerkships and became a law professor was extremely unusual. So how did you get interested in this issue in the first place?

I've been interested in constitutional law and in particular free speech law since I was in my

mid-teens. I actually went to law school planning and becoming a prosecutor. And then I realized

in law school two things.

One is that prosecutors generally didn't do much with law, like most lawyers.

...