Outside the Beltway

The United States is as politically polarized as it was in 1865.

The prospects for gun control appear to be dimming.

The Manchin/Toomey proposal on background checks isn’t perfect, but it isn’t horrible either.

Much touted snowstorm set the DC area atwitter, only to fall short of expectations and yield derision.

About 8.1 percent of U.S. workers have commutes of 60 minutes or longer and nearly 600,000 have “megacommutes” of at least 90 minutes and 50 miles.

The GOP seems to be drawing all the wrong lessons from the 2012 elections.

Josh Marshall explains what it’s like to be a non-gun person in a very pro-gun culture.

No Labels is attempting to relaunch itself after amounting to exactly nothing in the 2012 cycle. Let me save you the trouble: They won’t matter in 2014 or 2016, either.

In “Eyes on the Prize,” Chuck Culpepper looks at Saban’s first season as a head coach, with Toledo, way back in 1989-90. It seems that Nick Saban has been Nick Saban for a very long time.

The Mid-Atlantic region is under the gun.

Mitt Romney visited an Ohio coal mine to promote jobs in the industry, unwittingly showing why a job in the industry sucks.

Andrew Hacker argues that, while quantitative skills are “critical for informed citizenship and personal finance,” making kids master algebra to graduate high school has disastrous consequences.

A new study suggests that taxing millionaires sends millionaires to somewhere that doesn’t tax millionaires.

London’s iconic clock tower, known affectionately as “Big Ben” for some 150 years, has been renamed “Elizabeth Tower” in honor of QE2’s 60 years as royal figurehead.

Rick Santorum would do well to listen to the words of the last Catholic to be President of the United States.

Things aren’t all sunshine and roses for the Obama 2012 campaign.

There’s no perfect system for choosing a champion but we can do better than this.

Looking back at the Electoral College results of the modern era–and ahead to November.

Mark Richt, head football coach of the University of Georgia Bulldogs, inadvertantly broke NCAA rules by paying coaches and other employees extra money out of his own pocket.

Is Herman Cain for real, or is this rise int he polls just another boomlet destined to fade away?

Steve Clemons highlights former first lady Laura Bush’s continuing work in promoting education and international engagement.

Is it every appropriate to ask candidates about their religious faith? In some cases, yes it is.