Outside the Beltway

A group of states led by Texas has filed a suit in response to new guidelines from the Federal Government regarding the rights of transgender students.

A bad day for the Clinton campaign.

Begun, the bathroom wars have.

Surprising results from a new poll regarding “bathroom” bills and transgender Americans.

One of the pioneers of the technology revolution of the past four decades has passed away.

A Federal Judge in New York has denied an F.B.I. request to force Apple to extract data from iPhones involved in a Federal drug case.

This year’s Nevada Caucuses are a good argument for why there should not be any more caucuses.

Apple is resisting a Federal Court order that it assist the F.B.I. in decryption of the iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino terrorists.

Work Phones Are Being Phased Out at Banks

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul has dropped out of the race for the Republican nomination.

The gun control regulations to be announced later today by President Obama later today amount to far less than the hype would lead you to believe.

There have been many arguments that polling has over-stated Donald Trump’s actual level of support among likely Republican voters, but there’s also a good argument that they are understating it and that Trump may do better when people start voting than many think.

If Donald Trump is going to win in early states like Iowa or New Hampshire, he needs a ground game that will get voters to the polls. It doesn’t seem like he has much of one right now.

The Director of the F.B.i. told Congress today that the San Bernardino shooters were apparently radicalized much earlier than previously believed.

As we deal with the fall out from the attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, we need remember the years after September 11th, 2001 and avoid holding an entire religion responsible for the actions of fanatics.

The attack in San Bernardino has seemingly left the Administration’s anti-terror strategy in disarray, so the President is addressing the nation tonight to say, well, something I guess.

Yesterday, cable news networks, and most especially MSNBC, showed their profession at its most pathetic.

The October 2014 shooting of 17 year old LaQuan McDonald is beginning to have a political impact in Chicago and could have national political implications as well.

A new poll taken in the wake of the Paris attacks finds Americans increasingly fearful of ISIS attacks in the U.S., opposed to the admission of Syrian refugees, and not very confident in President Obama’s ability to deal with the ISIS threat.

A Federal Judge has ruled that the N.S.A. metadata collection program is unconstitutional, but it’s unclear if the ruling will have much of an impact.

Thanks apparently in part to body camera footage, two police officers in Louisiana are facing murder charges in the shooting death of a child during a police chase.

The nurse who was detained by New Jersey officials in a quarantine despite not displaying any symptoms of Ebola is suing Chris Christie and others for civil liberties violations.

In the wake of yesterday’s shootings in Oregon, President Obama took the airwaves to offer the same empty rhetoric he has on this issue in the past, and to make the false claim that there are simple solutions to what is a very complex problem.

While new information seems to come out on a daily basis, Hillary Clinton would rather that everyone think that her private email server wasn’t really a very big deal.

A few days late, but a story worth noting if it has escaped notice.

The Supreme Court ruled that police are not entitled to access to a hotel registry without a warrant.

Dave Schuler proposes a “radical idea” to safeguard individual privacy “in the wake of the hacking of Sony and the multiple credit card exploits over the last year or so.”

The Senate passed a bill that renews, and modifies, the Patriot Act

Many provisions of the Patriot Act lapsed at midnight, but apparently the world hasn’t ended.

The Senate returns tomorrow to try to pass an extension of the PATRIOT Act before it expires, but it may not be able to do so.

Rand Paul held the Senate floor for nearly twelve hours yesterday to talk about the PATRIOT Act, but it’s unclear if he accomplished anything.

Fresh off an election victory, British Prime Minister David Cameron is set to propose a series of new measures to crackdown on extremism that raise serious civil liberties concerns.

Hillary Clinton told supporters she’d require Supreme Court nominees to pledge to overturn Citizens United, a decision she completely misrepresented.

The House has passed a bill that would place real restrictions on the National Security Agency’s data mining program. Now, it moves to the Senate.

A new survey shows that Americans are becoming less Christian, and less religious overall.

A Federal Appeals Court has ruled that the N.S.A.’s data mining program is illegal, but its ruling may not have a very big impact.

Ted Cruz and Steve King think the Court should be prevented from hearing any case involving same-sex marriage. Because they know they’re losing.

An attack on al Qaeda outposts in January resulted in the death of two hostages, but also resulted in the death of two high value al Qaeda targets.

Ubiquitous tracking isn’t all bad.

Hillary Clinton addressed the week-long email controversy, but her explanations only raised new questions.

The Army’s investigation of the disappearance five years ago of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl has been referred to a top General, who will decide if a court martial should be convened.

Sony is warning the press not to publish material leaked by hackers, but it doesn’t have much of a legal leg to stand on.

For the fourth time in three years, a Federal Court has ruled that Florida’s law requiring drug tests for welfare recipients is unconstitutional.

Next week, the Supreme Court will be asked to determine the line between free speech online and criminal threats

A popular idea that does nothing useful while simultaneously violating the Constitution.

Not surprisingly, a law passed in the wake of the September 11th attacks has been used mostly for things that have nothing to do with terrorism.

Rebranding alone isn’t going to fix what’s causing the GOP to lose ground among a whole host of demographic groups.

There’s nothing wrong with choosing not to vote.

New York State’s gun law takes rights away from nearly 35,000 people without any due process whatsoever.

America’s “Patient Zero” doesn’t appear to have spread Ebola very far, but continued vigilance is called for. And, we need to focus on the part of the world where there really is an Ebola Crisis.