Slate.com: on Homeland Security

Jill Stein: Don't take sides in Yemen; arms embargo instead

STEIN: Well, we already are taking a side in Yemen.

Q: But should we be?

STEIN: Yeah, we certainly should not be taking a side in Yemen. We are party to the war crimes that are being committed by Saudi Arabia, who's using cluster bombs made by us. And we've supplied $100 billion worth of weapons to the Saudis, who have been massively committing human rights abuses. It's against our own laws. The Leahy bill requires that we not sell weapons to human rights abusers. So just in accord with our own policies, we should not have anything to do with Yemen.

Q: What happens if the Houthis take over Yemen? If the U.S. disengages in Yemen, how does ISIS respond?

STEIN: Well, the point is, ISIS needs to be deprived of its nutrition and its life-blood. That's why we need to start an arms embargo, that's why we need to cut off the funding that flows through our allies, in particular.

Jill Stein: Warsaw Pact ended NATO's reason to exist, then NATO expanded

STEIN: That certainly needs to be revisited, yes it does.[We should] work with Europe to transfer NATO to being a European defense organization that doesn't involve us. We're not funding it, we're not using it to do an end-run around the need for Congress to approve our foreign policy. We shouldn't be making foreign policy through NATO.

Q: You don't think that NATO gives us leverage in Europe, particularly in regards to Russia?

STEIN: We promised Gorbachev that we would not be moving one step to the east. Remember, the Warsaw Pact was the counterweight to NATO. The Warsaw Pact went away, and what did NATO do? NATO expanded and went east. We said we wouldn't move one inch to the east; we have.

Q: Countries were under Soviet control, though.

STEIN: That was the reason for NATO, right? That reason went away, yet NATO only got bigger. So it's really important not to think like the only show in town here.