RealClear Defense presents Hot Wash

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, J. Peder Zane speaks with Noah Rothman of the National Review about his insightful new book “Blood & Progress: A Century of Left-Wing Violence in America.” On the news round-up, Zane and RCI contributor Ben Weingarten discuss the vast wealth President Trump and his family have accumulated since he began his second term, with a special...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, J. Peder Zane speaks with Duke Professor Adrian Bejan about his new book, “Diversity through Freedom” about the physics of politics. On the news round-up, Zane and RCI Reporter & Editor Vince Bielski discuss an Associated Press investigation detailing how and why the DEA allowed hundreds of thousands of potentially lethal fentanyl pill...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, J. Peder Zane and James Varney speak with Dr. Kendall Conger who lost his job after challenging a 2021 statement issued by his employer – Duke Health – declaring racism a “public health crisis.” On the news round-up, Zane and Varney discuss the challenges of reporting on the Iran war – and peace deal – when the government seems loath t...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, J. Peder Zane and James Varney speak with Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University, about the national civics education he has spearheaded and how to have conversations across the political divide. On the news round-up, Z...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, J. Peder Zane and James Varney speak with Joel Kotkin about his recent article for RCI exploring how and why fascism has become a buzzword of American politics. On the news round-up, Zane and Varney use a City Journal piece suggesting why fraud in Medicaid and Medicare seems an unsolvable problem to discuss a Wall Street Journal articl...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with author Andrew G. Bostom about the rise of Shariah law in the U.S. and the EU and challenges it poses to those western laws, customs and society. On the news round-up, Zane and Varney use a Tablet article saying the U.S. has few good options in Iran to discuss some...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Patrick Steel, the former CEO of Politico who is now a Senior Advisor to Antenna Group, about the changing landscape of the media business.  On the news round-up, Zane and Varney discuss articles published by Reuters and the Washington Post that detail Iran’s conf...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Leighton Woodhouse about his RCI article on the surprising partnership between left-leaning activists and MAGA influencers to oppose a farm that breeds beagles for scientific experiments.    The New York Times is the focus on this week’s news roundup. Zane and Var...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Gary Saul Morson, a professor of Arts and Humanities at Northwestern University and a scholar of Russian literature about what Dostoevsky can teach us about modern progressives. In our round-up of the week’s best investigative reporting, Zane and Varney discuss a...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Paul D. Thacker about his RCI article which details the central yet largely hidden role played University of North Carolina virologist Ralph Baric in both the risky scientific work that may have created the virus that causes COVID-19 and the subsequent campaign to...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with RealClearPolitics reporter Susan Crabtree about her new book (co-authored with Jed McFatter) “Fool’s Gold: The Radicals, Con Artists, and Traitors Who Killed the California Dream and Now Threaten Us All.”   In our round-up of the week’s best investigative reportin...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Roger Pielke Jr., a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, about his article detailing how Al Gore’s seminal 2006 book and film on climate change, “An Inconvenient Truth,” helped politicize science. In our round-up of the week’s best investigative reporting,...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Jan Jekielek, a senior editor at The Epoch Times, about his bestselling new book, “Killed To Order: China’s Organ Harvesting Industry and the True Nature of America’s Biggest Adversary". On the news roundup, Zane and Varney discuss a CBS News investigation of pote...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Walter Curt – a podcaster and investigative journalist who operates The W.C. Dispatch - about how the Trump administration's push to open source some government payment systems and the rise of artificial intelligence are empowering citizen sleuths to track down fr...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Jacob Siegel about his masterful new book, “The Information State: Politics in the Age of Total Control,” which details how technology and progressivism have helped give rise to mass censorship, surveillance and propaganda. In our round-up of the week’s best inves...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Nancy Rommelmann about her recent RCI article about a man who became a MeToo scapegoat thanks to the New York Times. On the News Roundup, Zane and Varney discuss Paul Sperry’s RCI exclusive report detailing new evidence of bias and misconduct in Special Counsel Ro...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney use the new Netflix documentary “Cover-Up,” on investigative reporting legend Seymour Hersh as a springboard for a wide-ranging discussion with RCI contributor Aaron Maté about the decline of skepticism and rise of propaganda in the legacy media. On this week’s News Roundup,...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with RCI contributor John Murawski about his article detailing the backlash against policies adopted by thousands of public schools that aim to conceal the gender identity of trans students from their parents.   In our round-up of the week’s best investigative reportin...

On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Jeremy Portnoy, a researcher for OpentheBooks.com who writes RCI’s Waste of the Day feature, about rampant fraud, waste and abuse in government spending. In our round-up of the week’s best investigative reporting, Zane and Varney discuss the Daily Caller’s report...

YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/2YcAFTe3L_A Articles discussed in this podcast: Paul D. Thacker for RCI: Deporting Censorship: US Targets UK https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2026/02/18/deporting_censorship_us_targets_key_ally_of_british_government_over_free_speech_1165667.html New York Times: Obama Took On Recession, Health Care and Iraq. What He Didn’t See Coming Was Trump https://www.n...

YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/W939iZBA-VU RealClearInvestigations: Caring for Mom Is an Education in Scams and Fraud https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2026/02/10/caring_for_mom_is_an_education_in_scams_and_fraud_1163842.html Wall Street Journal: Trump Admin Nepo Babies Love Their Crypto  https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/one-generation-runs-the-country-the-next-cashed-in-on-cryp...

YOUTUBE:  https://youtu.be/j5MoleO39Kw Read the articles discussed in this episode: Mark Hemingway article for RealClearInvestigations: Model City: Portland’s Journey From Symbol of Chic to Shabby | RealClearInvestigations https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2026/02/05/model_city_portlands_journey_from_symbol_of_chic_to_shabby_1162950.html Washington Free Beacon: Democrat Stacey Plask...

For more, check out: https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2026/01/07/one_fell_swoop_lawsuit_eyes_death_blow_to_racial_preferences_1157201.html YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/XSAaTiGdHPI Sign up for the RealClearInvestigations Newsletter .  Watch each episode on the RealClearPolitics YouTube Channel Contact us with your thoughts and feedback: jpederzane@realclearinvestigations.com &nbsp...

January 30, 2026—On this week’s episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney discuss our round-up of the week’s best investigative reporting. 00:00 Zane and Varney discuss articles that report on President Obama’s efforts to protect Hillary Clinton from legal problems while advancing the Russiagate hoax against Donald Trump; the risi...

On the first episode of the RealClearInvestigations Podcast, RCI Editor J. Peder Zane and RCI Senior Reporter James Varney speak with Ryan Thorpe of the Manhattan Institute, who helped uncover massive Somali fraud in Minnesota’s social welfare programs. In our round-up of the week’s best investigative reporting, Zane and Varney discuss articles that report on the aggressive resistance percolating...