Outside the Beltway

President Obama is rewarding unqualified hacks who raised huge sums for his campaign with ambassadorships.

There are more self-identified Independents in the country than at any time in the past two decades, according to a new Gallup poll. And it’s mostly at the expense of the GOP.

Once again, a poll shows that large numbers of Americans, and most Americans, reject Evolution via Natural Selection as the explanation for humanity’s origin. How do we explain that?

Marin Bashir’s ugly comments about Sarah Palin are being compared to Rush Limbaugh’s ugly comments about Sandra Fluke.

Conservatives have their own Kennedy myth to compete with the myth of Camelot.

The economy of the Euro Zone remains in quiet dire straits, unless you’re lucky enough to live in Germany.

It’s a party thing.

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

Paul Ryan is back, and he has a plan his party ought to be paying attention to.

The first poll taken after the shutdown began has little good news for the Republican Party.

Presidents have gotten away with ignoring Congress when it comes to foreign military adventures for a very long time.

Some thoughts on reform.

The architect of President Obama’s re-election campaign is going to work for the Tories.

The 10th anniversary of McCain-Feingold teaches a lesson we should already have learned.

Words don’t always mean what you think they mean.

if reports are to be believed, there is a coup d’etat underway in Egypt.

John Boehner clearly wants to see an immigration bill passed this year, but he has a very narrow path to victory.

As of today, John Dingell has been a Member of Congress for 20,997 days, a new record. That’s not something to celebrate.

Inside the Treasury Department’s Inspector General for Tax Administration investigation into the IRS scandal.

What’s going on in England and Sweden?

The GOP’s public image continues to be bad and there seems to be little sign that they’re doing anything to change that.

The Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether limits on contributions to political candidates is Constitutional.

The negotiations continue.

There are very rational reasons behind the current gridlock on Capitol Hill.

Are two-term Presidencies the new normal?

The Democratic Party appears to have a lock on a substantial part of the Electoral College. That poses a problem for Republicans.

Increasingly, the right of people to speak is being sacrificed in the name of “tolerance” and “security.”

Should we stop televising political debates?

The biggest surprise of the Presidential race to date is the fact that Mitt Romney has lost the edge he once had on economic issues.

There’s no doubt about it, our political culture is pretty horrible.

The 9/11 attacks and our response to them changed America, and not for the better.

The recent;y concluded party conventions are further evidence that the events have largely outlived their usefulness.

Depending on what time you watched any of last night’s proceedings in Charlotte, you got a very different experience.

Obama heads into his convention in a good position, but with several potential pitfalls in his path.

The political convention we know is a 19th Century relic. It’s time to modernize it and make it a lot shorter.

As Isaac bears down on the Gulf Coast, will the Republican Convention be even further impacted?

The GOP is set to approve rules changes that will impact the 2016 primaries, and beyond. They’re a good start.

The quadrennial political conventions have become, long, boring, tedious, and largely predetermined. It’s time to shake things up by making them a lot shorter.

It would be nice if people who make authoritative decisions had some idea what they are talking about.

What does the US Constitution actually provide in terms of guidance for governance?