Outside the Beltway

Texas has become the latest state to eliminate red-light cameras amid increasing evidence that they are largely counterproductive.

Congressman Duncan Hunter Jr’s defense of campaign law violations against him suffered a big setback yesterday when his wife and co-Defendant entered into a plea agreement with prosecutors.

Scot Peterson, the school resource officer who hid from fire during last year’s school shooting in Florida has been charged criminally. The legal basis for those charges seems flimsy.

Further progress for advocates of marijuana legalization from the Land of Lincoln.

Last week, New Hampshire became the latest state to repeal the death penalty. Thus becoming the 21st state to do so.

A dozen people died late yesterday in a workplace shooting at the Virginia Beach Municipal Center.

The Democratic frontrunner is being wrongly blamed for an explosion in the prison population.

Stan Lee’s former business manager has been arrested on charges that he used his influence over the late Marvel Comics founder to divert funds and alienate Lee from his family in his final months of life.

In the latest development in the child sex abuse investigations in the Catholic Church in the United States, five former Priests in Michigan have been arrested on sex abuse charges.

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been indicted on seventeen counts under the Espionage Act arising out of his role in the Chelsea Manning affair.

John Walker Lindh, the so-called “American Taliban,” has been released from prison but the war in which he was captured goes merrily along.

Michael Avenatti, the former attorney for Stormy Daniels who briefly flirted with the idea of running for President, has been charged with multiple counts of fraud and other charges, some of them in connection with his representation of Daniels herself.

The way the Navy and Congress have handled this has been abysmal.

In a first of its kind move, voters in Denver have voted to decriminalize psychedelic mushrooms.

Sexual misconduct in the military continues to frustrate observers.

This is my shocked face.

A cautious analyst makes a strong claim.

In military justice Bizarroland, Rep Duncan Hunter intentionally commits “reverse UCI.”

Sanders’ position on felon voting is logical, yet politically suicidal.

A Federal Appeals Court has rejected Chelsea Manning’s bid to be released from jail notwithstanding her refusal to comply with a Grand Jury Subpoena.

The other shoe has dropped.

California Governor Gavin Newsome may have put the issue front and center for 2020.

As many states contemplate restoring voting rights to felons who have completed their sentence, a leading Democrat wants to go further.

The Justice Department has issued a damning report.

The replacement of Anthony Kennedy with Brett Kavanaugh is already having a significant impact.

The Lawfare gang and Popehat weigh in.

“His sexual needs were his sexual needs.” And, you know, criminal.

Minutes after a Federal judge added 43 months to his sentence, New York state prosecutors unsealed an indictment that could yield another 7 years.

An over-the-top police response to a non-violent offense.

Actresses Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman are the most famous of dozens of rich folks trying to get their kids into elite schools.

The relatively light sentence that Paul Manafort received is raising eyebrows. Hopefully it will lead to a long-overdue debate on sentencing reform.

Chelsea Manning is in jail for refusing to comply with a Grand Jury subpoena apparently related to an ongoing investigation of Julian Assange and Wikileaks.

Paul Manafort walked into court yesterday facing the possibility of 20 years in prison. He came away with a much better outcome.

Michael Cohen, the President’s former lawyer and “fixer,” is set to deliver several bombshells in his testimony before Congress today.

Cardinal George Pell, the top Catholic Cleric in Australia, has been convicted of sexually abusing boys in the 1990s.

After a decade of using the alleged problem of “voter fraud” to justify things like Voter ID Laws, Republicans are remarkably silent in the fact of an actual example of fraud and election tampering.

Actor Jussie Smollett is charged with staging an attack initially called a “hate crime.”

A Coast Guard officer and aspiring domestic terrorist was arrested late yesterday for plotting to kill Democratic politicians and members of the media.

Roger Stone is being ordered to Court after an Instagram post that appears to be a direct threat against the Judge presiding over his criminal case.

The shooter who killed five people in a factory in Illinois on Friday should not have had a gun to begin with.

The ignominious saga of Anthony Weiner appears to have reached its end.

Pope Francis defrocked former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick after decades of allegations of abuse of young boys and seminarians.

Two new reports identify hundreds of Catholic Priests who have been credibly accused of abusing children over the past decades.

A Federal Judge found that former Trump Campaign Manager Paul Manafort lied repeatedly after entering into a plea agreement with Special Counsel Robert Mueller. This either makes him incredibly stupid or willing to sacrifice himself to hide the truth from Federal investigators.

Critics on both the Left and the Right rightly see an injustice here but the US Supreme Court allowed it to happen.

A Chicago police officer convicted of second-degree murder has been sentenced to seven years in prison, but could be out in as little as three-and-a-half.

A new blockbuster report implicates the President in no less than five Federal crimes.

Florida’s New Governor has removed the Sheriff of Broward County over his officer’s lack of response before and during the Parkland shooting.

Paul Manafort’s attorneys reveal in a pleading that their client provided insider campaign data to Russian intelligence sources, something that seems an awful lot like collusion.

A new law set to take effect in Utah before the New Year will lower the BAC limit for drunk driving by 40% to .05. Will the rest of the nation follow?