Outside the Beltway

Fifty years after the Stand in the Schoolhouse door, there’s another standoff with recalcitrant states on civil rights.

Rand Paul used word-for-word excerpts from Wikipedia in two speeches in Virginia.

Under 21 in New York City? No more smokes for you!

Will this new Australian oil discovery shake up world politics?

Roger Goodell wants to see the NFL expand to Los Angeles and London. One city seems like an obvious choice, the other not so much.

Nothing to write home about in the September Jobs Report.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch has endorsed “none of the above” for governor of Virginia.

Wendy Lower documents the half-million women who helped Hitler carry out the Holocaust.

Nick Brown spelled bullshit and managed to debunk an entire academic subfield.

Two Boy Scout leaders toppled a rock formation at Utah’s Goblin Valley State Park that dates to the Jurassic period.

Nearly two-thirds of House Republicans voted for default. They lost.

As long as we’re tacking on unrelated measures in order to secure a deal to end the government shutdown-debt ceiling standoff, why not some related measures?

Two states are creating a voting system that will make some people ineligible to vote in state and local elections.

An agency has won the Nobel Peace Prize for something that hasn’t happened yet.

The Supreme Court heard argument in a major campaign finance case yesterday.

Recent anti-corruption measures have contributed to making American government worse.

63% are angry at Republicans, 57% are angry at Democrats, and 53% are angry at President Obama.

A tense afternoon on Capitol Hill.

Reasonable members of the House GOP caucus are fighting back. Are they outnumbered?

The Defense Department might open for business while the rest of government remains shut down.

Nick Gillespie advances the counterintuitive argument that President Obama is responsible for today’s government shutdown.

The American taxpayer spent a lot of money today paying their employees not to work.

The Miley Cyrus of college football will be back too soon.

One inmate’s view of the asylum.

Exit, Sandman

The next shoe has dropped on the case against Bashar al-Assad for the use of chemical weapons.

The United States and Russia have agreed to the framework of a deal to turn over Syrian chemical weapons.

I’ve been up since 3 am and drinking since 6 pm, so my reaction to a presidential war speech at 9 am may not be the definitive word

Washington Post Magazine profiles a local woman with a horrible secret: her father designed and ran Auschwitz.

The long investigation into rape at the Naval Academy has revealed some ugly truths.

The American jobs market continues to disappoint.

Three counties in New Mexico are under orders to issue licenses to same-sex couples.

We’re almost certainly going to launch punitive strikes against Syria. They’ll almost certainly be ineffective.

Western military action in the Syrian civil war now appears likely.

Don’t expect the Federal Government to push for DUI reform.