Outside the Beltway

Even if you trust the current occupant of the White House to exercise the powers granted to the agencies operating in secret under him, do you trust all future Presidents?

We’re actually not speculating about who might be running any more than we used to.

The wacko fringe of the GOP is increasingly finding room in the mainstream of the party.

A former Navy SEAL charges that Blackwater snipers killed American citizens in New Orleans during Katrina’s aftermath.

Targeting terrorist leadership may be counterproductive.

One in eight Americans support drone strikes against Americans on American soil.

Rand Paul’s questions about the nation’s drone war were only the beginning.

Rand Paul’s filibuster is one that all American’s should thank him for that.

Mr. Paul Goes To Washington.

The Obama White House is not ruling out targeted strikes against Americans inside American territory.

Silly things members of Congress say (plus musings on authoritarianism).

Here we go again.

While I’m sure President Obama has fantasies of launching drones on Congress, it’s not over his drone policy.

American troops may now earn the fourth highest combat medal from the comfort of their desk chair.

“Killing Americans,” my latest for The National Interest, has posted.

The Obama Administration has given us a peek at its legal arguments for targeted killings and they are troubling to say the least.

A 5-year-old Alabama boy is safe after authorities killed his kidnapper.

Basically, it’s inconsistent with the strategy.

US military drones are crashing at civilian airports around the world.

President Obama easily won re-election last night, carrying virtually all of the battleground states. Meanwhile, abortion, gay marriage, and recreational marijuana also won big.

In a posting for New Atlanticist titled “Status Quo Election,” I note the near total absence of foreign affairs from a presidential campaign that’s mercifully coming to an end.

If you thought the War On Terror might be over, think again.

Like the men who came before him, Barack Obama has vastly increased the powers of his office. Someone should have asked him about that last night.

Mitt Romney is a deeply flawed candidate, but that doesn’t mean the President is any better.

An attack on Iran’s nuclear program would be far more complicated than a one-off attack.

President Obama didn’t blow the doors off the Time Warner Cable Arena last night, but he didn’t need to.

The White House and the Pentagon are buildings, not unitary actors.

My latest for World Policy Review, “Oversight or Not, Drones Are Here to Stay,” has posted.

From one Nobel Peace Prize winner to another.

NASA was in need of new telescopes and got a helping hand from their good pals at the DoD.

The first shots have been fired in cyberspace. How will it end?

You have Martin Luther King’s statue in your office, but you are sending these unmanned drones out, and bombs are dropping on innocent people.

Is there a Romney Doctrine?

My first piece for The New Republic, “Why the Obama Administration’s Drone War May Soon Reach a Tipping Point,” is up.

Mitt Romney is making claims about Naval readiness that are, at best, misleading.

How far should the press go in challenging assertions by politicians?

The US intelligence community has more information at its disposal than ever. Unfortunately, it can’t efficiently process it and make the necessary connections.

Not surprisingly, most of the Republican candidates for President aren’t too keen on reducing the excessive growth in Executive Branch power.

While unfortunate, the loss of an RQ-170 drone over Iran may not be the intelligence disaster some make it out to be.

Don’t believe the fear mongering about the coming decreases in the growth of defense spending.