The Libertarian Institute - All Podcasts

Missiles in the air, oil markets on edge, and a White House that still can’t answer the simplest question: what’s the plan? We start with reporting from foreign correspondent Trey Yingst on US forces having only minutes to intercept incoming Iranian ballistic missiles, then I lay out why “shock” at Iranian retaliation doesn’t make sense in a war the US chose to escalate. When leaders talk like this is a surprise, it’s usually a cover for something else: drift, misreads, or a narrative meant to keep the public on board.

From there, I get...

J and I discuss the Iran war, the collapsing economy, economic hardship, true grievance, and some UFC.

The story most people miss about a widening Middle East war isn’t just who fires the next missile, it’s who can absorb the retaliation after they do. I’m solo today, moving fast through the latest escalations and then slowing down where it matters: the strategic constraints that make “hit them harder” sound simple while turning into a nightmare for bases, allies, and civilians across the region.

We talk Iran, US Central Command messaging, and the way regional dynamics can cascade when Saudi Arabia, Yemen’s Ansar Allah, and Iraqi militias all become part of the...

Here it is, FINALLY — the third installment of ‘The Mad Dream of Conquest’ series, about the Athenian expedition to Sicily during the Peloponnesian War in the 5th century BC. Enjoy!

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Glenn Greenwald joins the show to discuss the recent victories of several anti-establishment left-wing candidates in Democratic primaries and the shifts in American politics more broadly.

Discussed on the show:

Glenn Greenwald is an American journalist, author, and former lawyer. Subscribe to his Substack and follow him on X @ggreenwald 

Sign up for the Scott Horton Academy of Foreign Policy and Freedom at scotthortonacademy.com

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Scott interviews economist Robert Murphy about inflation, the Austrian school of economics, the Federal Reserve and the state of the economy today.

Discussed on the show:

Robert P. Murphy is a Senior Fellow with the Mises Institute. He is the author of numerous books: Contra Krugman: Smashing the...

John and I read and discuss chp 1-3 of Ordinary Men



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Scott interviews Jeff Deist about the significance of Ron Paul, who Deist used to work for, as well as Murray Rothbard. They then discuss the challenges and opportunities that the movement both men helped create and lead faces going forward.

Discussed on the show:

Jeff Deist is General Counsel of Monetary Metals. He previously worked as Presi...

Ukraine can look stable on a map while collapsing through its supply lines and that’s where we start. Zelensky claims his relationship with Donald Trump has “absolutely changed” after a private meeting, but we stress-test that optimism against a tougher metric: what the United States is actually providing in money, weapons, and air defense right now, and what it can realistically sustain.

From there, we dig into Russia’s ramped-up posture and why the Black Sea may matter more than another small shift in the Donbas. Larry Johnson explains the stepped-up strikes on Kiev and the s...

A nuclear power deal can sound like paperwork until the fine print turns into a proliferation crisis. We sit down with Jon Hoffman of the Cato Institute to unpack the reported US Saudi nuclear agreement and the real meaning of a “Section 123 agreement” under the Atomic Energy Act. The headline question is simple and unsettling: does this cooperation keep a civilian program civilian, or does it open the door to Saudi uranium enrichment and a future regional arms race?

We also dig into why the timing is so politically loaded. The original framework was tied to Saud...

A single line in a must-pass defense bill can change U.S. foreign policy for years, and most people will never hear about it until it is too late. We dig into Section 219 of the NDAA and why critics say it moves beyond “supporting Israel” into something far more permanent: structural military integration that could lock U.S. decision-making to Israeli security priorities. I’m joined by David Benner of Liberty Vault to unpack what that kind of legal and bureaucratic merger could mean for sovereignty, accountability, intelligence risk, and the ability of voters to actually steer policy.



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Matt Williams returns to the show to discuss where things stand in Ukraine and with Trump’s war with Iran.

Discussed on the show:

Matt is an Australian Army veteran, independent journalist, and content creator. He served in the Australian Infantry with the 7th Battalion Royal Australian Regiment from 2014-2021 and was awarded a Queen’s Order of Australia Medal. Since 2022 he has worked as an independent war correspondent and analyst. Subscribe to his YouTube Channel. 

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Scott interviews Patrick Pillow about several articles he’s written about recent and ongoing color revolutions emanating from the various agencies and NGOs that Washington uses to overthrow governments it doesn’t like.

Discussed on the show:

Patrick Pillow is an independent researcher and writer focused on protest movements, foreign policy, and regime-change case stu...

The story we’re being sold about Iran doesn’t survive contact with the facts: if Iran’s military is supposedly “obliterated,” why are US bases still getting hit and US troops still dying? We unpack that disconnect with Larry Johnson, walking through the mechanics of Iran’s survivable deterrent from underground ballistic missiles to a layered Strait of Hormuz defense that mixes mines, small submarines, underwater drones, fast boats, coastal cruise missiles, and aerial drones. When the threat network is built to hide, move, and reappear, victory slogans don’t matter nearly as much as geography and logistics.

...



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Scott interviews former British diplomat Ian Proud about how the Cold War with Russia was reignited and why the West’s chosen strategy is destined to fail.

Discussed on the show:

Ian Proud was a British diplomat for 24 years from 1999 to 2023, working on Russia for the final decade. Subscribe to The Peacemonger, his Substack and YouTube Channel. 

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Joseph Solis-Mullen comes on the show to discuss several articles he’s written recently that delve into the mess US intervention has created in several African countries.

Discussed on the show:

Joseph Solis-Mullen is a political scientist and economist at The Libertarian Institute and a professor of politics and history at SAU. He is the author of The National Debt and You and The Fake China...



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Scott interviews author and writer Ted Galen Carpenter about the Iran war, Israel’s tensions with Turkey, the Saudi Nuclear deal, North Korea and more.

Discussed on the show:

Ted Galen Carpenter is a senior fellow at the Libertarian Institute. Carpenter has written 10 books including America’s Coming War with China: A Collision Course over Taiwan and most recently Unreliable Watchdog: The News Media and U.S. Foreign P...

If you think the war is basically over because someone said Iran was “decimated,” slow down and do the math. We bring back author and longtime war and strategy teacher Michael Vlahos to dissect the claims coming out of Washington, including a clip of the Secretary of War projecting confidence about Iranian losses and U.S. stockpiles. Then we translate the language of victory into capabilities, inventories, and what actually changes on the battlefield.

We dig into the shock factor that keeps showing up in this conflict: Iran’s growing missile accuracy. Michael explains why guidan...



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Scott brings Larry Johnson back on the show to discuss where things stand between the US and Iran. Johnson explains why he’s convinced things are ultimately headed towards escalation.

Discussed on the show:

Larry C. Johnson is a former CIA officer and intelligence analyst, and a former planner and advisor at the US State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism. Follow his analysis at Sonar21

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Scott interviews Nick Cleveland-Stout from Responsible Statecraft about his reporting on the Israel lobby’s multifaceted attempt to influence the American public.

Discussed on the show:

Nick Cleveland-Stout is a Research Associate in the Democratizing Foreign Policy program at the Quincy Institute. Previously, Nick conducted research on U.S.-Brazil relations...

Trump’s posture on Iran is getting judged from an unexpected angle, and we dig into why. We react to Tucker Carlson calling Trump “weak” not for avoiding intervention, but for failing to stand up to allies, especially Israel, as the conflict widens. From there, we lay out a clear case for shared responsibility at the top: pressure from partners can be constant, but a US president still decides whether to provide refueling planes, intelligence sharing, maintenance support, and missile defense that make sustained operations possible.

We also walk through the memorandum of understanding and why it...

John and I discuss the evils of men, changing ourselves, and reading the preface to Ordinary Men.

I further examine the strategic deficit disorder that absolutely dominates the US and western military establishments.

America has a singular inability to execute large and complex wars without failing in a spectacular fashion.

I speak to the tools and critical thinking modalities that could spark and encourage competent martial imagination. Moral courage is necessary to tell the flag officer dullards and their Senior Executive Service (SES) necromancers that the emperor has no clothes.

Recommended Listening:

On Strategic Empathy

Recommended Reading:

Michael Mazarr Leap of Faith...

A single yes or no question can expose an entire political strategy. We sit down with activist and independent journalist Misty Winston to unpack why so many Democratic leaders can’t answer plainly when Israel and Palestine comes up, especially on the hardest point: do Palestinians have a right to resist an occupying military, and what standard should apply when civilians versus soldiers are involved?

We react to the viral independent media grilling of Rep. Ro Khanna and talk about why long form interviews on YouTube are changing the game. Misty breaks down the generational sp...

A 500% tariff on anyone who does business with Russia sounds like “strength” until you follow the blast radius. We walk through the revived Graham sanctions bill and why secondary sanctions can punish far more than the intended target, from US partners and global trade to everyday Americans who feel the ripple in prices, shipping, and energy markets. Along the way, we ask a blunt question that Washington often dodges: if sanctions are supposed to change behavior, what do we do when years of draconian restrictions don’t end the war or deliver a settlement?

Kelly joins...

The official story is simple. The timeline is not. We take a hard look at the reporting around Senator Lindsey Graham’s death and ask a basic question that gets skipped too often in political news: does the schedule even work. With Larry Johnson back on the show, we walk through the travel route to Kyiv, the time zone math, and why conflicting accounts keep surfacing when high profile foreign policy figures are involved.

Then the focus shifts to the West Bank after Representative Ro Khanna says he was detained by Israeli settlers armed with Am...

Calling it a “lab leak” makes the story feel tidy, but the real scandal might be the system that makes lab-origin disasters plausible in the first place. We sit down with independent journalist Sam Husseini to unpack gain-of-function research, why “potentially pandemic pathogens” are funded and defended, and how a small circle of incentives, prestige, and national security framing can turn high-risk virology into business as usual. We also dig into why Sam avoids the word “unintentional” and why the most important question isn’t only where a virus started, but what oversight failed and what evidence still hasn’t been disclosed...



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Scott interviews John Mearsheimer. They take a step back and take a big picture look at both the conflict with Iran and the ongoing war in Ukraine. They then take an even bigger step back and consider whether the escalating great power competition we’re in right now was ever inevitable.

Discussed on the show:

John Mearsheimer is an American poli...

A US president casually threatening to cut off trade with Spain is not normal “tough talk” it’s a signal flare for how unstable alliance management can get when policy is driven by impulse. We walk through Trump’s comments from the NATO summit and what a real break with a NATO partner would mean, then zoom out to the deeper issue underneath the drama: the attempt to force allies toward a 5% of GDP defense spending target and the reality that most countries cannot reach it without huge political and economic fallout.

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson joins us...

Trump goes from ceasefire language to “it’s over” in a matter of hours, and the Strait of Hormuz becomes the pressure point again. Host Kyle Anzalone and guest LtCOL Karen Kwiatkowski walk through the reports of Iranian shots at transiting ships, the follow-on CENTCOM strikes, and what it means when a president talks like a full-scale war is on the table while the Pentagon still faces real constraints in ships, air defense, and weapons stockpiles. If you’re trying to understand Iran, US military posture, and how quickly an MOU can unravel, this conversation lays out the incentives and the...

Ukraine’s air defenses are hitting a wall, and the numbers are terrifying. We walk through Zelensky’s warning that Patriot interceptors are running short, why ballistic missiles are a different problem than drones and cruise missiles, and what it means when Ukraine says it could not stop any of a recent wave of Russian ballistic strikes. The hard question isn’t whether Kyiv “needs more,” it’s whether the US and Europe actually have more to give without leaving themselves exposed elsewhere.

From there, we zoom out to the NATO summit and the politics shaping the...

John and I finish reading Rules for Radicals.

Col Chris Wyatt joined me to discuss South Africa and the refugees from South Africa entering the US.

Col Chris Wyatt YouTube

Tommysalmons.com

YouTube @YearZeroPod

The Fourth of July is supposed to feel like a reset, but it hits differently when people look around and see a country that can fund anything abroad while families cut back at home. We start with a viral political message about America’s contradictions, then challenge the instinct to turn Independence Day into a scolding session. For us, the better move is to separate the ideals worth celebrating from the government actions worth opposing and to ask what it would take to return the American empire to a constitutional republic.

From there, we dig in...

Putin says Russia is in a “challenging period,” but the more revealing question is what comes next when a war stops feeling like a crisis and starts running on autopilot. We unpack why Russia can look simultaneously steady and stuck: not prone to emotional swings, yet still locked into a slow, costly grind where drone strikes reach deep targets, NATO proximity raises the stakes, and every month of fighting makes the eventual political settlement harder to swallow.

From there, we zoom in on the Ukraine endgame that rarely gets discussed honestly. If Russia holds territory in t...



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Scott interviews Michael Boldin of the Tenth Amendment Center about his new book about how the efforts and accomplishments of the American revolutionaries have been betrayed, bringing about a system of government that is effectively identical to the one they fought a war to overthrow.

Discussed on the show:

Michael Boldin is the founder and executive director of the Tenth Amendment Center, which advocates state nullification as a means of local resistance to unjust federal laws. Follow him on X @michaelboldin. 



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Scott brings Kyle Anzalone on the show to run through where things stand with the fighting in Lebanon, the talks between the US and Iran, the flare-up between the Houthis and the Saudis, the unending suffering of the people of Gaza and more.

Discussed on the show:

Kyle Anzalone is news editor of the Libertarian Institute, opinion editor of Antiwar.com, co-host of Conflicts of Interest and host of The Kyle Anzalone Show. Follow him on Twitter @KyleAnzalone_ 

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Calling everything “communism” might win a news cycle, but it doesn’t explain why so many Americans feel the ladder to a stable life is disappearing. Kyle sits down with Jim Webb to sort propaganda from incentives, starting with Trump’s warnings about socialist takeover and asking the blunt question: are there even enough communists in the United States to matter? We argue the bigger threat looks more like crony capitalism, captured regulation, and an economy where people who followed the rules still can’t buy a home near where they grew up.

From there, we get spe...

I discuss the possibilities of America relinquishing its global ambition to reduce its footprint to a regional hegemon in the Western hemisphere. The new technologies of AI, UAVs and hypersonics rather easily challenge the spending paradigms and mission architecture of the American armed forces.

There are no near-peer competitors, every nation on Earth is now a peer to modern western war machines.

America boasts a magnificent 20th century war machine is not fit for purpose for 21st century peer warfare.

The crossroads is chock-full of landmines.

References:

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Believe it or not, CJ has been doing the Dangerous History Podcast for 12 years now! Despite many trials & tribulations that have caused him to be slowed down or even knocked down, he has always staggered back up to his feet, wiped the blood out of his eyes, and resumed fighting the good fight of spreading brushfires of freedom via historical samizdat; and, with your help, he intends to keep doing it for at least another dozen (or couple dozen) years more!

To commemorate this anniversary, in this episode, CJ shares & expounds upon a dozen of his many...