Attorney Joseph Margulies comes on the show to discuss his recent article about his client, Abu Zubaydah, who is currently being held by the CIA without charges. Zubaydah was one of the first men caught up in the chaos after 9/11, in this case mistakenly identified as a high ranking member of Al-Qaeda. Zubaydah is a former Mujahideen fighter but has no affiliation to Al-Qaeda or 9/11, maintaining that they, along with ISIS, are violating the teachings of Islam. He has been tortured extensively...

Gareth Porter’s latest article, The Shaky Case That Russia Manipulated Social Media to Tip the 2016 Election, takes on a recent New York Times piece claiming to outline how exactly Russian actors sought to undermine the 2016 presidential election. Porter explains that the Times implies a very misleading conclusion from the data, namely that the Russian government must have been involved just because Russian social media accounts were active during the election. In fact, since Russia is a...

Ted Snider explains the “Periphery Doctrine”, a foreign policy strategy by which a nation, in this case Israel, can either ally itself with its immediate neighbors against its more distant ones, or “leapfrog” its neighbors to be friends with those on the periphery instead. The history of Israel’s foreign policy has been characterized by one of these two options, until now. Netanyahu, Snider explains, has created a new doctrine by which he tries to turn Palestinians and Arabs against each other...

Scott talks to Eric Eikenberry about the war in Yemen and the various efforts to stop it. A small cadre in the House of Representatives has been trying to introduce resolutions that would invoke the War Powers Act, but so far have met with little success. Eikenberry thinks that popular opinion is beginning to turn sharply against the war, thanks in part to the American media beginning to focus on it. If this shift continues, he thinks the resolutions have a chance at success. Discussed on the...

Sheldon Richman returns to the show to talk about his latest TGIF article, “Trump’s Middle East Delusions Persist.” He and Scott discuss the state of negotiations between Israel and Palestine and what can be done to make Americans see the truth of Israel’s many abuses of the Palestinian people. Discussed on the show: “Trump’s Middle East Delusions Persist” (Libertarian Institute) Jason Greenblatt Mahmoud Abbas “It’s not a lie… if you believe it…” (YouTube) Palestine Liberation Organization...

Daniel Lazare comes back on the show to talk about Saudi Arabia, Trump, and the future Middle East politics. He explains an extremely common pattern in kingdoms and empires where after about three generations of family rule, massive upheaval or incompetence forces a total political collapse. Saudi Arabia is perched on this precipice, and their third-generation Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, seems unstable enough to provide the spark. Scott and Lazare talk about what this will mean for the...

Scott interviews Patrick Martin on his new article series, “The CIA Democrats,” in which he outlines the disturbing trend of dozens of former military commanders, State Department war planners, and outright CIA, FBI, and Military Intelligence agents seeking nomination from the Democratic Party in congressional elections. Their victories would create a strong pro-war faction within the party, since by Martin’s reckoning, only a single one of these candidates has come out with an anti-war...

Tim Shorrock comes back on the show to discuss his latest article at The Nation, “Moon and Kim Stage an Exuberant Summit in Pyongyang“. The two leaders met again recently, he explains, and in a ground-breaking move agreed to begin reducing military tensions between the North and South, including the removal of land mines. As usual, the American media has portrayed the meeting as theater and seems unwilling to support the promising moves toward peace. Tim Shorrock is the author of Spies For...

Jim Bovard is interviewed on his syndicated article “The Unending Bush Torture Scandal“. Jim Comey’s role in saving the torture regime while a Justice Department official and colleague of John Yoo. The mainstream media’s current sainthood of Comey and how it helps to whitewash his participation in the torture program is discussed as well. Comey’s insistence that waterboarding is not torture is also referenced, as well as numerous items from Comey’s memoirs. Jim Bovard is a columnist for USA...

Haitham El-Sabri, Palestinian activist and writer based in Texas, talks about the letter he wrote to the Beto O’Rourke campaign asking him about his position for on Israel and Palestine. The responsive he received was boilerplate support for Israel. El-Zabri talks about how this should be disappointing to everyone, and especially progressives who support O’Rourke. You can see the contents of the letter here. This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: Kesslyn Runs, by Charles...

Gareth Porter is interviewed on his article for Truthdig, “Can Trump Take Down the American Empire?” Porter talks about revelations in the Bob Woodward book “Fear”, about the Trump presidency, and how they may pertain to the American Empire. Porter also talks about the Trump presidency, North Korea, and Iran. Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist on the national security state, and author of Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare. Follow him on...

Major Danny Sjursen comes back on the show to talk about the blowback from America’s many wars in the Middle East. He explains a process with which listeners of this show will no doubt be familiar, by which the U.S. sets itself up for future wars by arming and training a generation of young rebels to help fight the current wars. All too often, the veterans on America’s side of the war then become either extremists or a part of the next brutal regime that takes the place of the old...

Filmmaker Dan Cohen comes back on the show to discuss his latest project, “The Syria Deception,” a short documentary exposing the propaganda campaign in Hollywood and the media to rehabilitate Al-Qaeda in the eyes of the American public. Cohen and Scott discuss America’s role in instigating the war in Syria and how, more broadly, U.S. intervention triggers ever worse violence by inciting blowback from Middle Eastern civilians bent on vengeance. Discussed on the show: Killing Gaza Grayzone...

William Hartung joins the show to give his views on President Trump’s proposed Space Force. He explains that American satellites are in fact vulnerable to attack by foreign powers, but that a space force is a highly impracticable approach to protecting them, and one that is more likely to provoke attack than to prevent it. The idea of a Space Force is popular, however, because the arms contractors know it will mean more money for them, the existing efforts at space warfare within the Air Force...

Daniel Lazare joins Scott to talk about his recent article in for the American Conservative Magazine about the war on drugs. He explains many of the practical reasons to end the war, demonstrated by America’s own history. For instance, alcohol prohibition tended to replace beer with stronger, more dangerous options that were easier to smuggle, like homemade gin. Just so with cocaine replacing marijuana and fentanyl supplanting heroin. Drug prohibition also tends to make violence a requirement...