Journalist Bjartmar Alexandersson explains the outright lies of America's major witness against Wikileaks' Julian Assange. Discussed on the show: "Key witness in Assange case admits to lies in indictment" (Stundin) This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods' Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio. Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show...

Nasser Arrabyee comes on the show for an update about Yemen. There seems to be some promise of a real peace negotiation, Arrabyee says, though it's hard to get both sides to see eye to eye on the realities of the situation. The Houthis, as Arrabyee explains, feel they can negotiate from a place of strength, since they have controlled most of the country for the last few years. They are demanding that Saudi Arabia lift the blockade as a condition of sitting down to peace talks. Saudi Arabia, on...

Scott interviews Ben Suitt about his work about veteran suicides for Brown University's Cost of War Project. Suitt conservatively estimates that about 30,000 veterans of America's terror wars have taken their own lives, a truly astonishing number. This side of modern warfare often goes undiscussed, but it is every bit as concerning as the physical injuries that soldiers sustain overseas. Discussed on the show: "High Suicide Rates among United States Service Members and Veterans of the...

Ted Carpenter discusses the harmful effects of drug prohibition in America, both at home and abroad. First of all, he points out, prohibition simply doesn't work. We learned this during alcohol prohibition, when consumption remained high but prices and violence skyrocketed, and we continue to see it now, with ubiquitous street drugs, gang violence and millions of people in prison for nonviolent crimes. The public health problem of drug use is very real, Carpenter readily concedes, but that...

Scott interviews Doug Bandow about the U.S. relationship to Ukraine, perhaps the perfect case study in America's foreign policy arrogance. Ukraine, of course, has very little direct strategic relevance to daily life in America—and yet the U.S. government considers Ukraine one of its closest allies. In practice, what this means is that the United States would have to be prepared to go to war with Russia on Ukraine's behalf, if there were a sufficiently severe provocation. But as Bandow points...

Scott talks to William Hartung about America's nuclear policy and the shocking profit motives that end up determining it. Hartung draws particular attention to land-based ICBMs, which, he explains, aren't nearly as effective, since they're fixed in one place, and for that same reason are especially vulnerable to the possibility of an accidental launch. When a country's government thinks their missile silos are being attacked, they have very little time to decide whether to launch those...

Kalmen Barkin is back for an update on Israeli politics. Naftali Bennett has just taken over as Israel's prime minister, following Benjamin Netanyahu's failure to successfully form a coalition government. Bennett, explains Barkin, is quite far on the right, yet he and Netanyahu are bitter rivals—indeed, Barkin says, this whole election was less about specific policy issues than it was about mutual desire to oust Netanyahu. And so the new ruling coalition has elements from both the left and the...

Scott interviews Ray McGovern about the Biden-Putin summit. It was not exactly a groundbreaking meeting, says McGovern, though Biden and Putin did agree on at least one crucial point: America and Russia must never fight a nuclear war, since the results would be beyond catastrophic. It used to be the case, McGovern explains, that nuclear-armed powers recognized the concept of mutually assured destruction, and for that reason would never have countenanced a nuclear first strike. But the Reagan...

Ray McGovern is back to talk about America's relationship with Russia. President Biden met with Putin recently, McGovern explains, which is good for Biden's stance toward Russia, and, of course, for world peace. War with Russia is sometimes held out as an actual possibility, especially over supposed acts of provocation like Russia's annexation of Crimea or the various cyberattacks of recent months. But since Russia has nuclear weapons, there's simply no world in which we could fight a full...

Scott talks to Sam Hussini about the sudden popularity of the coronavirus "lab leak" theory. For about a year straight, Husseini reminds us, anyone discussing the possibility that the coronavirus originated in a lab—even credentialed scientists—were ridiculed in the media and kicked off internet platforms for promoting conspiracy theories. Now, it's suddenly acceptable to propose that this might have been the real origin of the global pandemic of the last year. But for those who have been...

Scott interviews Annelle Sheline about her work on the war in Yemen. Sheline says that negotiating an end to the war has proven difficult, since both the UN framework and the U.S.-Saudi mentality is totally inconsistent with the situation on the ground. Neither will confront the fact that the Houthi "rebels" have actually been in control of most of the country for the last few years already, and the Hadi "government" is really a group of men in a hotel room in Saudi Arabia. Asking for...