Outside the Beltway

Legendary musician Levon Helm is dying.

Pat Summitt, arguably the greatest women’s basketball coach of all time, is stepping down to deal with Alzheimer’s .

Ted Nugent, whose music I really liked when I was in junior high school, said something vile and crazy.

The story of Ensign Chuck Lord may be the greatest—or perhaps only—prank in Pentagon art history

Why the Internet is awesome: a Taiwanese animatronic take on the Secret Service hookers scandal.

Shockingly, the “Springfield” in the long-running sittcom “The Simpsons” is Springfield, Oregon, near where creator Matt Groening grew up.

Jeffrey Brown has a children’s book titled Darth Vader and Son scheduled for release on April 18.

Should you lie to your kids about holiday fantasy characters?

The Sky News leadership is taking a novel approach to charges that it illegally hacked emails: Claiming a right to break the law when they think it’s in the public’s interest to do so.

The student-athlete fairytale is true. Except where you would reasonably expect it to be a lie.

Sometimes, art imitates life rather than the reverse. And sometimes reality seems stranger than fiction.

Reebok is rushing to sell Tim Tebow merchandise before its NFL rights expire. Nike is crying Foul.

Roger Ebert and I don’t agree on much, from politics to movies. But share a fondness for Samuel L. Jackson and a contempt for George Zimmerman.

Tebow on the block.

Dear Bill Maher and Alexandra Pelosi: The plural of anecdote is not data.

Sure, he routinely uses gender-specific slurs against conservative women. But he’s not a misogynist!

Doug Mataconis’ Thursday posting “Herman Cain Releases Bizarre New Video Involving Apparent Goldfish Murder” got picked up on that night’s edition of The Colbert Report.

Movie theater snacks are expensive. This is not cause for a lawsuit.

The New Yorker’s cover has Rick Santorum in a doghouse strapped atop Mitt Romney’s car.

Was Return Of The Jedi the best of all the Star Wars films? One writer thinks so.

CBS Sports’ Mike Freeman takes a new look at New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton’s bestseller Home Team in light of the bounty scandal that broke yesterday.

Barbara Boxer takes the Daily Show’s “The Vagina Ideologues” bit out of context and deconstructs it during the Senate’s Blunt amendment debate.

President Obama talks sports with Bill SImmons.

Davy Jones, the face of The Monkees, has died.

A discussion in the comments thread of my “Time Running Out For GOP?” post led me to a post from four-plus years ago by frequent commenter and erstwhile blogger* Michael Reynolds titled “Money, Bombs and Jesus.”

An object lesson in celebrity worship from the State of New Jersey.

Cal Thomas made a tasteless joke at Rachel Maddow’s expense. He describes the lesson in civility he learned.

Today’s the 20th anniversary of Wayne’s World

We can feel that we “know” athletes, entertainers, politicians, and others that we’ve followed, rooted for, or whatnot over a period of time and feel a genuine sense of loss when they’re gone.

Whitney Houston, once one of the biggest stars in American popular culture, has died.