Outside the Beltway

Rather than fighting over the remnants of the FY 2011 budget, the GOP should make a deal and get ready for the bigger, and more important, battle ahead.

House Republicans engaged in a publicity stunt on Friday that displayed a profound misunderstanding of how government actually works in the United States.

The next week promises to be a battle between John Boehner and the Tea Party over whether or not compromise is a good idea.

The American people have no idea what’s really in the Federal Budget, which makes any discussion about what to cut virtually impossible.

Like all Presidents before him, Barack Obama is asserting the right to virtually unfettered discretion when it comes to military matters.

Nor, it would seem, are really tired clichés.

Operation Odyssey Dawn has resurrected the eternal battle over what limits there are, and should be, on the President’s ability to use military force without Congressional authorization.

Republican budget cuts to this point have been less than serious.

So far, the Republican House’s effort to cut back Federal spending isn’t very impressive.

Republicans are about to take a walk along the third-rail of American politics.

Speaking before Congress yesterday, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke debunked the assertion that the GOP’s relatively modest $61 billion spending cut package would significantly harm economic growth.

Judge Gladys Kessler upheld the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate, but she did so by essentially ruling that the Interstate Commerce Clause means whatever Congress wants it to mean.

Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown was a Tea Party darling when he picked up Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat last year, but he’s not embracing the movement as he prepares to run for re-election next year.