Outside the Beltway

Happy Thanksgiving!

It’s still the best Thanksgiving television episode ever.

The Butterball Turkey Hotline still thrives even in the era of the Internet.

An ongoing attempt to summarize the complex.

Earlier this month, Senator Lindsey Graham blocked a bipartisan resolution condemning the Armenian Genocide, Now we know why.

There were few fireworks during the first day of public impeachment hearings, but the ground work for a case against the President was laid.

French President Emmanuel Macron declared that the NATO alliance is suffering brain death due to President Trump’s neglect and lack of leadership.

There’s apparently big news in the fight against ISIS.

President Trump’s sudden decision to withdraw troops from Syria isn’t receiving much public support.

As American forces retreat, Russia and Turkey are dividing up northern Syria like,well,a turkey.

So far at least, Elizabeth Warren is not doing a good job of articulating her foreign policy positions. That needs to change if she’s going to be a serious candidate.

American negotiators are claiming a ceasefire in northern Syria. The Turks, Syrians, and Russians are the winners, the Kurds are the losers, and we look like schmucks.

There’s no rational explanation for this.

Concluding thoughts (for the moment).

As the Turkish invasion of northern Syria continues, Donald Trump responds with basically nothing.

Turkish forces advance, American forces retreat, the Kurds seek new allies, and Syria and Russia come out the winners.

Trump’s error in Syria.

Trump makes a particularly dumb comment about our alliance with Syrian Kurds.

Just days after President Trump agreed to remove American forces from the scene, Turkish forces are entering northern Syria and Kurdish forces say they ar ready for war.

President Trump’s latest Syria move is coming under heavy criticism even from fellow Republicans.

The United States is withdrawing its small force from Northern Syria, clearing the way for a Turkish invasion that will likely
aim to wipeout the Kurdish forces in the region.

It’s been one year since Jamal Khashoggi walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, never to be seen in public again. We are no closer to justice in his case than we were a year ago.

The Trump Administration has effectively declared economic warfare against the government of Nicolas Maduro. It won’t succeed, and will further victimize the already suffering Venezuelan people.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg isn’t very impressed by the proposals made by several liberal politicians lately to increase the size of the Supreme Court to counterbalance the conservative tilt created by the Gorsuch and Kavanaugh confirmations.

Mark Esper has been confirmed and sworn in as the next Secretary of Defense, ending a period of nearly 100 days during which the Pentagon was headed by a succession of Acting Secretaries.

How times have changed, and not for the better.

Some 2020 Democratic hopefuls are turning to a surprising source for counsel.

The Trump Administration’s policies toward Iran aren’t going to work, but that’s because they aren’t supposed to work.

The Israeli prime minister is engaging in a familiar but dangerous gambit to retain power.

The mea culpas and I-told-you-so’s are rather premature.

It’s been a rough two years under Trump, but America’s institutions are surviving.

After two years of spitting in their faces, President Trump is finding it hard to get America’s European allies to come to his aid.

Rather than pulling completely out of Syria the United States will be leaving behind a token force of about 200 troops. This is a mistake.

Thanks mostly to it’s complete and enthusiastic embrace of Donald Trump , the Republican Party faces a bleak demographic future.

Lyndon LaRouche, an eight-time Presidential candidate who ran a cult-like organization that spread bizarre conspiracy theories, has died at 96.

The President is blaming Democrats for the fact that so many of his Ambassadors have not been confirmed. The truth, of course, is quite the opposite.

President Trump has lost another one of his top advisers on the fight against ISIS.

The Trump Administration is reportedly preparing to withdraw the small contingent of American troops from Syria. If it actually happens, this would be a good move.

While most Hollywood blockbusters have male leads, films starring women actually do better on the aggregate.

Citing substantial cooperation, Special Counsel Robert Mueller is recommending no jail time for former Trump associate Michael Flynn.

Notwithstanding the temptation to do something, both the United States and NATO need to resist the temptation to get involved in the latest conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

National Security Adviser John Bolton offered an utterly absurd explanation for why he had not listened to the tape of Jamal Khashoggi’s murder.

Happy Thanksgiving!

As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly.

In what has to qualify as one of the most horrifying displays of moral depravity on the international stage, the Trump Administration is saying it doesn’t really care if the Saudi Crown Prince is a murderer or not.

The C.I.A. has apparently concluded that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. What will the Trump Administration do about this?

As the Saudis continue to dissemble and put forward an utterly implausible explanation for the death of Jamal Khashoggi, the Trump Administration shows no sign of having a spine.

It’s been a month since Jamal Khashoggi disappeared after entering the Saudi consulate in Turkey. The Saudis are continuing to lie about it, and the Trump White House is letting them get away with it.

Saudi Arabia’s story about the disappearance and death of Jamal Khashoggi continues to “evolve.”

The Saudi Foreign Minister expanded on his nation’s utterly implausible explanation for the death of Jamal Khashoggi