Outside the Beltway

There aren’t many glad tidings at the White House these days.

Newt Gingrich’s foreign policy vision leaves much to be desired.

Some good news in the November jobs report, but not very much of it.

The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 authorizes the President the authority to indefinitely detain persons, even American citizens arrested on American soil, without trial because they allegedly support the enemy.

There’s a little historical revisionism going on on the right.

Guess who got advance warning of government actions on the eve of the 2008 financial crisis?

How did Republicans get in this mess?

Another meme debunked, plus some thoughts on policy.

Herman Cain has either doubled down on his foreign policy ignorance or proven himself a man of great nuance.

More revelations regarding the relationship between Solyndra and the Obama White House.

Twitter is abuzz with news that Congress has declared pizza to be a vegetable. It’s actually not news at all.

The Supreme Court will decide on the Constitutionality of the President’s health care law by June 2012.

A cynical racial play by Herman Cain.

Rick Perry’s tax plan isn’t very impressive.

President Obama is being attacking from the right for following through on a policy decision made by his Republican predecessor.

One of the less ballyhooed parts of ObamaCare has been tossed aside as too expensive before it even went into effect.

Obama is trying to get into Guinness under “US President with Most Simultaneous Wars”

Ronald Reagan’s chief economist has a radical plan for solving the housing crisis.

The Tea Party flame was lit by the battle over TARP, but they quickly forgot about those bailouts that supposedly upset them so much.

Obama’s Justice Department continues its crackdown on medical marijuana, despite campaign promises to the contrary.

With the advantage of hindsight, it’s clear that more creative strategies were needed. But they probably couldn’t have been passed.

Harry Reid’s “nuclear option” has changed the rules of the game, for now.

My latest for The Atlantic, “Romney’s Realist Foreign Policy Is a Lot Like Obama’s,” has been posted.

We’re learning more about the Obama Administration’s decision to kill Anwar al-Awlaki

Where should we look to understand the failings of the government?

Giving the President the unchecked power to kill American citizens raises some serious red flags.

My latest for The Atlantic, “The Thorniest Question: When Can a President Order an American Killed?” has been posted.

The health care battle is formally joined in the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court is on track to issue its most anticipated ruling in years right in the middle a Presidential campaign.

During last night’s debate, Mitt Romney repeated a charge that has become part of the conservative zeitgeist. But is it true?

Does America have a social contract? If so, is it broken?

Based on the numbers, Barack Obama is an immigration hawk.

Rick Perry’s speech criticizing the President’s policies in the Middle East raised more questions than it answered.

Foolishly, the Palestinians are going forward with their effort to get Palestinian statehood recognized by the United Nations.

More pay for play at the White House?

Allocating Electoral Votes by Congressional District is an idea whose time has come.

Despite previous denials, the White House did in fact intervene in the approval process for a loan to Solyndra.

The President’s jobs push isn’t doing much to help his job approval numbers so far.

It’s not a given that we’ll have a massive recovery during the next presidential term but it’s a pretty decent bet. And the party in power will get too much credit for it if it happens.

The “how to pay for it” part of the President’s jobs plan seems destined to be rejected by the GOP. Which may be exactly what the President wants.

Measuring our progress a decade after the 9/11 attacks