Outside the Beltway

Mitt Romney stumbled in his bid to become Utah’s next Senator but he’s still likely to win the nomination anyway.

An essay from earlier in the year by Jacob T. Levy underscores some of the points I recently tried to make about democratic norms in the current era.

The Kim regime has announced the end, for now, of its nuclear and ballistic missile testing programs. To understand why they made this concession, one needs to read between the lines.

In response to inquiries about frequent media mentions of the Director’s wartime service, the CIA has confirmed he did not serve in combat.

A longtime “Hillary Beat” reporter ruminates on what she and her candidate could have done differently in 2016.

Former F.B.I, Director James Comey’s memos regarding his meeting with Donald Trump early in 2017 have been released, and they corroborate everything Comey has said about those conversations.

Randa Jarrar was classless and contemptible, which is protected by the First Amendment. As a tenured state employee so is her job.

Republicans are blaming the President for the fading popularity of the tax reform law passed in December. It’s more complicated than that.

Barbara Bush, only the second woman in history to be the wife and mother of a U.S. President, has died at the age of 92.

Sean Hannity was Michael Cohen’s “secret client,” but it’s not clear that should matter to anyone.

Whoops.

The next time you sign a credit card receipt could be the last.

Republicans have been hoping that the tax bill passed in December would help them in the midterms. That’s appearing to be less and less likely by the day.

For intelligence and law enforcement to function, their leaders must remain outside the partisan fray—even in recent retirement.

A Federal Judge has struck down the revised version of the ban on transgender members of the military from serving openly, and the ruling has significance that goes well beyond the issue at hand.

An attempt at defining the conversation.

Top positions in the State Department are vacant, and there’s only one person to blame for that.

President Trump is on the attack against James Comey as the former F.B.I. Director begins his book tour.

There is no obvious strategy and even the expressed rationale makes no sense.

Given a choice between Robert Mueller and Donald Trump, most Americans are siding with Mueller. Unless they’re Republicans that is.

Hang on, the ride on the Trump Train is about to get a lot bumpier.

Out of the blue, President Trump plans to pardon Dick Cheney’s former Chief of Staff, but the move seems to have more to do with James Comey than it does Scooter Libby.

A decryption device called GrayKey is being used by all manner of government agencies.

Once again, President Trump’s foreign policy tweeting is causing problems.

Mark Zuckerberg’s second day before Congress was somewhat more contentious than the first, but at the end of the day it’s still unclear that more regulation is the answer to the issues raised by recent Facebook “scandals.”

President Trump took to Twitter this morning and decided poke a stick in the eye of the Russian bear.

Paul Ryan won’t be running for re-election this year, opening up both a Congressional seat and a leadership spot.

Not surprisingly, a joint Senate Committee failed to really lay a glove on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg at yesterday’s hearing.

Controversies involving Jimmy Kimmel and “The Simpsons” highlight a perennial question.

The United States has several options in Syria. None of them are good and one of them would be disastrous.

The Marvel superhero film passed ‘Titanic’ in US ticket sales. Unless we adjust for inflation. Which we absolutely should.

For every Trump tweet, there is literally something that says exactly the opposite.

A response to one of the most deadly chemical attacks in the Syrian civil war has come, probably from Israel. What’s next?

Trump’s tariff plan isn’t going over well in farm country, and that could cause problems for the GOP in November.

Dan Drezner notes some challenges on this topic, and I add some of my own thoughts.

President Trump is continuing his dangerous and misguided trade war rhetoric,

Argumentation without the intent to persuade is masturbation, not journalism.

The Atlantic fired one of their few conservative voices for saying women who have abortions should be hanged. Was this beyond the pale?

Donald Trump broke his silence on Stormy Daniels. That was a bad idea.

A woman who was fired after a photograph of her giving the middle finger to President Trump’s motorcade went viral is suing her former employer. She doesn’t have much of a case.

Thanks to a combination of sensationalism and outright lies, a fairly conventional story about an annual protest march in Mexico was turned into Fox News fodder that raised images of an invading army of illegal immigrants.

The “caravan” of immigrants that sent the President off the deep end on immigration issues is basically coming to an end.

Old-fashioned notions of journalistic neutrality are chafing young reporters in the Age of Trump.

A blog post and resulting Twitter exchange point to a larger problem in our political dialog.

More than 1200 refugees, mostly from Honduras, are trying to come to the United States. What should we do about it?

News anchors at dozens of local stations owned by conservative-leaning Sinclair Broadcast Group were recently required to read a script mandated by corporate headquarters, and it’s leading to some bad media coverage for Sinclair.

In a bizarre Twitter rant, President Trump declared a DACA deal “dead,” blaming Democrats when it’s clear that it’s largely his fault.

Their website has been scrubbed! Tillerson has all but vanished! The sky is falling!

A Federal Judge In New York City is allowing a lawsuit against the President’s DACA order to go forward, and he based part of his ruling on the President’s own rhetoric.

Under the proposal certain visa-seekers (such as China and India) would have to have their social media presence scrutinized.