1/7/21 Kelley Vlahos on America’s Endless War Against Iraq

by Scott Horton | Jan 11, 2021

Scott talks to Kelley Vlahos about America’s 30-year nonstop bombing campaign of Iraq, and the prospects for ending it. The destruction of Iraq, says Vlahos, has followed a familiar trend: American politicians sell the public on the need to get involved in some country with what looks to be a brutal dictator in charge, then the military intervenes, usually by bombing indiscriminately, and finally the country is left far worse than it was before. In recent memory, America has done this to Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and Syria, though Iraq is perhaps the most egregious example. And while Scott and Vlahos hold out some hope for Joe Biden’s willingness to make peace in Yemen and Afghanistan, they are skeptical that he will do anything to disentangle America from its role in Iraq.

Discussed on the show:

• “Iraq today is a nightmare that Americans largely sleep through” (Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft)
• “In Iraqi camps, refugees of ISIS war fear going home” (The Washington Post)
• “Iraq’s Post-ISIS Campaign of Revenge” (The New Yorker)
• “‘We Think the Price Is Worth It’” (FAIR)

Kelley B. Vlahos is the executive editor of The American Conservative. Follow her on Twitter @KelleyBVlahos.

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.

Donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal, or Bitcoin: 1Ct2FmcGrAGX56RnDtN9HncYghXfvF2GAh.

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1/7/21 Kalmen Barkin on Israeli Settlements and Netanyahu’s Political Future

by Scott Horton | Jan 11, 2021

Kalmen Barkin discusses the deplorable situation of Palestinians in Israel today, a people whose lands and rights are being slowly taken away from them by the Israeli government, while the delusive promise of a two-state solution vanishes along with them. Barkin believes Netanyahu may be in political (as well as legal) trouble these days, though he has been able to survive nearly every challenge to his regime thus far. Even if Netanyahu is replaced by another prime minister, it is unlikely that the project of expanding settlements further and further into Palestinian territory will ever be undone now that it has gotten this far along. The only hope for the Palestinians, it seems, is to gain equal rights as full citizens of the emerging single Jewish nation state.

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.

Donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal, or Bitcoin: 1Ct2FmcGrAGX56RnDtN9HncYghXfvF2GAh.

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1/7/21 Bob Murphy on the Disastrous Consequences of the Government’s Covid Policies

by Scott Horton | Jan 9, 2021

Scott talks to Bob Murphy about the economic side of all the covid policies this past year. Most obvious are the huge spending bills, which dwarf even the stimulus measures taken after the 2008 recession. Murphy reminds us that this kind of rampant spending really means the federal reserve and the treasury have “created” new money out of thin air. This money enters through the financial sector, slowly making its way through the rest of the economy, where it can cause price inflation, stagnating wages and the loss of the value of savings. But it allows the federal government to spread out the harmful effects of its policies in a way that wouldn’t be possible if it were to raise taxes or borrow the money all at once. Murphy also talks about the way that small businesses have been devastated by lockdown policies, while large corporations have absorbed the losses more easily. These large corporations will survive when the small businesses close, buying up their assets and moving in on what used to be their business. This is yet another way that huge government action benefits big business and the politically connected at the expense of the average business owner, employee or taxpayer.

Discussed on the show:

• “Understanding Money Mechanics” (Mises Institute)
• “Neoliberal Champion Larry Summers Opens Mouth, Inserts Both Feet” (TK News by Matt Taibbi)
• The Great Deformation: The Corruption of Capitalism in America
  

Bob Murphy is an economist with the Institute for Energy Research, a research fellow with the Independent Institute, and a senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute. He is the author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Capitalism and Choice: Cooperation, Enterprise, and Human Action. Find him on Twitter @BobMurphyEcon and listen to his podcasts, Contra Krugman and The Bob Murphy Show.

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.

Donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal, or Bitcoin: 1Ct2FmcGrAGX56RnDtN9HncYghXfvF2GAh.

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1/7/21 Peter Van Buren on the Stunning Revelations from Hunter Biden’s Laptop

by Scott Horton | Jan 9, 2021

Peter Van Buren discusses Hunter Biden’s lost laptop and the shocking documents it contains. He begins by pointing out that many American voters never heard about this story at all: the mainstream media refused to cover it, the tech companies silenced almost anyone who wanted to talk about it and the “intelligence community” quickly united behind the position that the laptop was likely a Russian disinformation tactic. But Van Buren has been able to look at a copy of the hard drive himself. First, he notes that Biden’s hard drive contains lots of unsavory material from his personal life, but concedes that that has little to do with his father’s election as president. More importantly, the laptop has records of many of Hunter Biden’s business dealings, including, most notably, hundreds of millions of dollars from companies in Ukraine and China. In the case of both countries, Hunter was peddling the appearance of access to his father—meetings and photo ops with the Bidens in turn granted these foreign companies political connections within their own countries. But in China’s case in particular, the activity might be even more nefarious. Van Buren found evidence that Chinese companies were paying Hunter Biden’s consulting firm hundreds of millions of dollars in “fees,” which Hunter would then transfer back into Chinese-owned bank accounts in the United States, thus laundering the money across the Pacific without U.S. government scrutiny. The rest of Van Buren’s findings are detailed in his recent piece at The American Conservative.

Discussed on the show:

• “Hunter Biden’s Guilty Laptop” (The American Conservative)
• Brandenburg v. Ohio
• Yesterday’s Man: The Case Against Joe Biden
  
• The Burn Pits: The Poisoning of America’s Soldiers
  
• “Biden’s Hawk: The Case Against Sullivan” (scheerpost.com)
• “Red Dawn (2012)” (IMDb)
• “Ukraine crisis: Transcript of leaked Nuland-Pyatt call” (BBC News)
• “The Untold History of the United States” (IMDb)

Peter Van Buren worked for 24 years at the Department of State including a year in Iraq. He is the author of We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People and the novel Hooper’s War. He is now a contributing editor at The American Conservative magazine.

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.

Donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal, or Bitcoin: 1Ct2FmcGrAGX56RnDtN9HncYghXfvF2GAh.

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