Outside the Beltway

The tumultuous turnover at the top of the Trump team is too much.

Strategic move or pointless provocation?

There are even higher obligations than taking care of Marines.

Despite some obstacles, America’s armed forces drink other professions under the table.

The Constitution’s invitation to struggle over foreign policy continues.

He’s a national treasure who has been appropriately honored for a lifetime of service and sacrifice. But this seems different.

Findings of “foreign influence, conflicts of interest, concerning personal conduct, financial problems, drug use, and criminal conduct” were dismissed.

The legendary figure was in charge of strategic forecasting at the Pentagon for decades.

Military culture is a strange beast.

History’s first all-female spacewalk was thwarted by a lack of smaller suits.

The (Acting) Secretary of Defense has issued an unconstitutional order.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is cutting short his US trip to deal with what his government is calling a Hamas attack.

The office has been vacant for 81 days. President Trump has yet to nominate a replacement.

Lock them up.

Free expression sometimes enables horrible crimes. How does a free society deal with that tension?

Another white supremacist attack raises disturbing questions about our information environment.

The Trump Administration still doesn’t have realistic goals for its negotiations with North Korea.

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.

In the wake of the failure of the Hanoi Summit to reach any agreement at all, North Korea appears to be returning to old form.

For the second time in a week, reports indicate that the President intervened to get a family member a security clearance.

Once again, President Trump gets taken for a sucker by the North Koreans.

There appear to be enough votes in the Senate to pass the resolution disapproving President Trump’s border wall “emergency,” but there’s not enough Republican support to override an expected veto.

In the end, the reason the Hanoi Summit failed is because the Trump Administration is pursuing an unattainable goal.

Once again, President Trump proves that in the face of evil he is a coward and a disgrace.

President Trump personally overrode the objections of security officials, the White House Counsel, and the Chief of Staff to make sure his son-in-law got a security clearance.

Instead of merely seeking to block the President’s declaration of an “emergency” at the southern border, Congress should instead significantly amend the National Emergencies Act.

The second summit between President Trump and Kim Jong Un ended early without any kind of agreement, signalling that no real progress has been made in talks between the two countries.

While the rest of the world looks at other events, tensions are flaring in a long-standing global hot spot.

American military intervention in Venezuela would make the situation in that country worse, not better.

Republicans face a choice in the coming days. Do they support the Constitution, or do they support Donald Trump? You can count on them making the wrong choice.

While not subject to filibuster, it’s still subject to Presidential veto.

President Trump and Kim Jong Un hold their second summit in Hanoi later this week, but it’s unlikely anything significant will happen.

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.

A bipartisan group of foreign policy luminaries says there is no factual basis for President Trump’s claim.

US policy is creating nonconstructive confrontation.

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.

Now that women are allowed into all combat roles, the rationale for excluding them from Selective Service has evaporated.

The House of Representatives has begin the process of challenging the President’s recent declaration of a ‘national emergency’ at the southern border.

President Trump will get his Space force, but it won’t exactly be what he wanted when he first proposed that idea.

Robert Mueller appears to be winding down his investigation and getting ready to submit a report to the Attorney General.

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

Following Donald Trump’s lead, the GOP is making clear that its game plan for 2020 is paint all Democrats as ‘socialists, baby killers, and anti-Semites.’

The end of racism may have been prematurely declared.

The Trump Administration continues to drive a wedge between the United States and Europe, can it ever be repaired?

President Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border while at the same time undercutting his own case for doing so.

Walter Jones, a former supporter of the Iraq War who became one of the most prominent anti-war voices in Congress, has passed away at the age of 76. He will be missed.

In a rare display of assertiveness in the foreign policy arena, the House voted yesterday to bar U.S. assistance in Saudi Arabia’s genocidal war on Yemen.

The self-appointed Acting President of Venezuela has said he doesn’t rule out the idea of American intervention in his country, but we should rule it out immediately.

The arguments against withdrawing American forces from Afghanistan are becoming weaker and weaker.

In his business career Donald Trump relied largely on fear and intimidation to get his way on business deals. As President, he’s finding that nobody is afraid of him.