Outside the Beltway

Thirty years after the hostages were freed from captivity in Iran, the United States still hasn’t figured out how to deal with the Islamic Republic.

While the violence is down in Iraq, it’s not gone.

The Stuxnet virus that has set back the Iranian nuclear weapons program by several years at least appears to have originated as a joint project between the United States and Israel.

Information made public by Wikileaks appears to have played a role in sparking the protest movement that has brought down the President of Tunisia.

America’s foremost tax foe has weighed in on the Afghanistan War debate.

The relationships between inflammatory rhetoric and political violence is complicated.

While our politics are seldom violent, our violence is often politicized.

We have laws preventing the sales of gun to crazy people. We’re not enforcing them very well.

The American military personnel system works against keeping the best and brightest officers in the service.

Captain Dee Mewbourne, who previously commanded the EISENHOWER, will skipper the ENTERPRISE.

Andrew Sullivan makes a rather bizarre charge offhandedly: “Who among the neocons would have thought that one of George W. Bush’s final legacies would be bringing pogroms, bombings and genocide to Christians in his new zone of freedom?”

The lawyer who argued The Pentagon Papers case points out how Julian Assange is not Daniel Ellsberg, and how prosecuting him could have disastrous results for press freedom in the United States.

The reaction to President Obama’s recent recess appointments provide us with yet another example of bipartisan hypocrisy.

With just over a week to go before the 112th Congress convenes, battle lines are already being drawn in battle over the defense budget.

The TSA’s crusade to fondle whomever they please continues.

Now that the US has ratified New Start, it’s Russia’s turn.

With DADT Repeal now on its way to being fully implemented, the right is now claiming that it poses a threat to the religious liberties of military chaplains. As with their other arguments, this one is totally without merit.

Sarah Palin waded into the foreign policy pool today with a piece about Iran, and it was about as empty as most of the other ideas on Iran that we’ve heard over the last six years or so from everyone else.

The repeal of DADT has resulted in some odd claims being made.

Unless you paid close attention, you probably missed most of the coverage of the war in Afghanistan in 2010.

Now that gays will be allowed to serve openly in the military, the command will have some new issues to address.

The repeal of DADT may open the doors for ROTC to return to many elite institutions, if cost doesn’t get in the way.

What’s up with McCain and DADT?