ZadekpediaThe Volokh Conspiracy is a law blog associated with UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh, who describes himself as its creator and co-blogger. Across the episodes of The Bob Zadek Show in which it is mentioned, the blog appears chiefly as a venue for the writing of Zadek’s guests and as a credential identifying them, rather than as the subject of extended discussion.
Eugene Volokh and the blog’s character
Volokh, introduced by Bob Zadek as a law professor teaching free speech law among other topics at UCLA School of Law, described the blog’s name as a joke, on the reasoning that anyone who really had a conspiracy would hide it rather than publicize it, and as a link to the “vast right-wing conspiracy” that Hillary Clinton had been talking about in the late ’90s. He said the blog was hosted at the Reason magazine site but was independent, and that while it was libertarian-leaning in many ways, it was not doctrinally libertarian, and that the writers tried to call things as they are as they understood them to be. He spelled his last name V-O-L-O-K-H and said a search for it would find the blog, which readers could follow on Reason, Twitter, Facebook or Parler. Criminal Memes: The Ballad of Ricky Vaughn (2021)
Zadek, for his part, called the blog a daily blog and must-reading every morning, saying it covers the law in depth, is easily readable, and is accessible to lawyers, law scholars and laypeople alike. Criminal Memes: The Ballad of Ricky Vaughn (2021)
Hosting: from the Washington Post to Reason
The episodes record a change of host. In 2016 Ilya Somin told listeners they could follow his writing at the Volokh Conspiracy blog at the Washington Post website, spelling Volokh V-O-L-O-K-H and saying that Googling “Volokh Conspiracy” would find it. Ilya Somin on Democracy and Political Ignorance (2016)
By 2019 the blog was described as being at Reason.com. Introducing Somin, Zadek called him a blogger whom he read every morning at the Volokh Conspiracy at Reason.com. How to Create a Legitimacy Crisis (2019) In the same episode Somin, discussing his then-forthcoming book Free to Move, directed listeners to the Volokh Conspiracy blog, spelled V-O-L-O-K-H, located on the Reason magazine website, where he said he wrote about numerous political issues just about every week and also legal issues. How to Create a Legitimacy Crisis (2019)
The Reason placement recurs in later episodes. In 2020 Zadek described the blog as published through Reason, the Reason Foundation, available without charge, and said he did not start his day without reading Eugene Volokh’s blog, which he called a must-read and, in his view, more important to most Americans these days than reading the daily newspaper. Eight-Dimensional Chess (2020) In 2021 Somin again directed listeners to the Volokh Conspiracy blog on the Reason magazine website, where he said all of what he wrote was available for free. Hard Questions About Asylum and Afghanistan (2021)
Bloggers identified in the episodes
Several of Zadek’s guests are identified as writers at the blog. Somin is described as a blogger there in the 2019 introduction. How to Create a Legitimacy Crisis (2019) Josh Blackman, a constitutional law professor, is described by Zadek as a frequent daily blogger at The Volokh Conspiracy, with Zadek adding that he does not start his day without reading Eugene Volokh’s blog and that it is published every day. Eight-Dimensional Chess (2020) David Bernstein, a Foundation Professor of Law, is likewise introduced as a blogger at the Volokh Conspiracy. Exploring the Borderlands of Legal Whiteness with David Bernstein (2022)
Across episodes
The topic is touched in the 2016 Somin episode, the two 2019 Somin segments, the 2020 Blackman episode, the two 2021 episodes with Volokh and Somin, and the 2022 Bernstein episode. The episodes show one development: the blog’s host is given as the Washington Post website in 2016 and as Reason in 2019 and after. Beyond that change of venue, the episodes show no development in how the blog is treated; it is named as a place to read the guests’ writing and as evidence of their public profile, and no episode takes the blog itself as its subject.