Thanks in part to “mandatory minimum” laws starting in the 1980s, the US has the largest prison population — per capita and total — of any country on earth. Including China. Is that because Americans are that much worse than others? No, it is due to a completely dysfunctional justice system where, for example, jury members are not allowed to know the potential sentence of a defendant before they decide whether guilty or not guilty. If they were allowed to know, they would likely hesitate before sending someone away for life for smoking a marijuana cigarette. The Senate is expected to take up a mandatory minimum reform bill sometime in the next couple of months, which might be a step in the right direction to correcting the completely broken and unjust US justice system. Tune in to today’s Liberty Report for more:

Free trade — not corporatist, managed trade — is the best guarantor of peace and prosperity. Protectionism leads to trade wars which very often lead to hot wars. In the US presidential race the issue of tariffs and other taxes on trade have begun to enter the conversation. We should remember how dangerous this kind of isolationism is, especially to working and middle class Americans. In today’s Liberty Report, Ron Paul explains the importance of real free trade:

The quick resolution of the potentially difficult situation of US sailors caught inside Iranian territorial waters should have been celebrated in Washington as a triumph of diplomacy. With the Naval personnel in Iranian custody, Secretary of State John Kerry telephoned his Iranian counterpart and was able to talk the crisis back down to a relative non-event. This, of course, infuriated the neo-cons who saw it as a sign of weakness that the US did not respond with bombs instead of words. More in today’s Liberty Report:

President Obama can’t be bothered with following the rule of law so he decided to tackle the “gun crisis” in the US by simply issuing an Executive Order increasing background checks and clamping down on non-dealer gun sales as well. Will more background checks really solve the problem of people being killed by guns in the US? Well perhaps it would — if we are talking about better background checks for armed federal officials! Today’s Liberty Report is joined by special guest Adam Dick, Senior Fellow at the Ron Paul Institute:

Why did the US fly a B-52 over South Korea yesterday? Was it a sign of superiority…or insecurity? North Korea tested some sort of nuclear device last week and the fly-over was part of a multi-pronged US response to the test. Today on the House Floor a bill strengthening sanctions against North Korea is likely to pass overwhelmingly. There is no shift in US thinking over the past 60 years. But if you think about it, even Kim Jong-Un’s foreign policy is more rational that Obama’s: in response to the threat posed by US troops in South Korea and strong rhetoric from Japan, North Korea has developed an effective nuclear deterrent. North Korea does not practice “regime change” overseas, it does not attempt to invade its neighbors. It merely has developed a deterrent to a threat. More on ineffective US foreign policy toward North Korea in today’s Liberty Report:

What is the role of federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws in the current Oregon standoff? At its core the dispute is about a federal government that runs roughshod over states, forcing otherwise peaceful ranchers like the Hammonds to be charged under federal terrorism laws for a controlled burn that accidentally scorched some federal government parkland. Setting aside the sideshow that is the armed occupation of a federal building in the remote nature preserve, the real issue is one of federal government over-reach and bullying. More today on the Liberty Report with special guest Jacob Sullum of Reason Magazine:

Cries of glee must have emanated from the military-industrial complex and the Beltway think tanks as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made another of his periodic pleas for global attention. The nuclear detonation is looking less likely as powerful and thus significant than the North Korean government initially claimed, but that is not stopping vested US interests in playing up the threat. To some, like Donald Trump, it’s all China’s fault. To others, like Jeb Bush, it’s all the fault of the Obama/Hillary foreign policy. To the think tankers, more policy papers are being feverishly crafted all calling for more of the same to produce different results. More military spending and more sanctions!

But the North Korean “problem” is a direct result of US interventionism and the uncertainty it produces. After all, the Libyans gave up their nuclear program and not long afterward were “regime changed” by Washington. No one thinks a similar attack on North Korea is imminent. So as a deterrent, North Korea’s nuclear policy actually works well. Why would anyone expect them to change? Perhaps taking away the incentive for such a deterrent would be more successful? Don’t count on new thinking among the entrenched elite. Instead, turn to the Ron Paul Liberty Report:

Is House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce purposely deceiving the American public, or is he just that badly informed? As the Saudis beheaded 47 prisoners, including a prominent Shiite cleric, Royce went on CNN to blame the whole thing on the Iranians! The problems started when the Iranian military invaded Yemen, he said. But that is demonstrably untrue. It was the Saudis who invaded Yemen. The presidential candidates are no better, promising to use the US military to defend our “ally” the Saudis. Why are they so seemingly bought off by the Saudis? It could have to do with the hundreds of millions of dollars the Saudis spend on PR in Washington each year. More on these neocon lies in today’s Liberty Report:

The Saudis and Iranians are at each other’s throats after Saudi Arabia’s penchant for executing the political opposition netted a prominent Shiite cleric. US reaction was muted. The Saudis have broken diplomatic relations after angry Iranians stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, and Riyadh is considering banning citizens from traveling to Iran. Meanwhile, the Chinese stock market crashed today, leading to a big initial Dow drop and a spike in gold prices. If 2016 is coming in with a bang, can we expect even louder explosions as the year goes on? Tune in to today’s Liberty Report with host Ron Paul and co-host Daniel McAdams:

Last week in Moscow, US Secretary of State John Kerry said it was not US policy that Assad must be overthrown in Syria. Days later in his end-of-year press conference President Obama said, once again, Assad must go. Is President Obama not in control of his own administration, as a recent Seymour Hersh article has suggested? Whatever the case, US policy toward Syria seems completely incomprehensible. Do they know what they are doing? Those are the questions we have on today’s Liberty Report:

Brand new Speaker of the House Paul Ryan made grand-sounding promises of reform. The House would go back to regular order, no more sneaking bills to the Floor in the dead of night. Well that didn’t last long: Ryan snuck a dangerous and anti-American “PATRIOT Act, II” into the “must-pass” Omnibus spending bull. As bad as the PATRIOT Act was, allowing the government to spy on us nearly at will, the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISA) may be even worse. The bill forces private companies to spy on their customers and hand the information over to US intelligence services. When Obama signed the bill into law days ago, he essentially turned the “private” sector in the United States into an adjunct intelligence service for the government. More on this chilling move in today’s Ron Paul Liberty Report:

Host Wolf Blitzer set the tone for last night’s Republican Party presidential debate when he solemnly told the audience that Americans are more fearful now than at any time since 9/11. The fear of terrorism is the number one issue, he emphasized, trumping all other concerns. With the stage thus set, the candidates, with a few exceptions, proceeded to tell voters how many new wars they would start, how many civilians they would kill overseas, how many of our liberties we must give up at home. Today’s Liberty Report takes a look at the dismal future laid out by most of the candidates: