Outside the Beltway

For the moment, Republicans appear to be blocking Chuck Hagel’s nomination to be Secretary of Defense but they don’t seem to know why they’re doing it.

It’s time to end this absurd annual spectacle.

My latest for The National Interest, “Ignoring the Hagel Hearing Farce,” has posted.

A good start toward solving a long standing problem.

A potentially significant ruling on Separation Of Powers.

Two-term Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss will not seek re-election in 2014.

Once again, the filibuster survives. Nobody should be surprised.

Despite some tough questions, Congressional Republicans didn’t land a glove on Secretary of State Clinton.

Once again, Harry Reid is pursuing a far less ambitious filibuster reform package than originally threatened.

Despite the push it’s likely to receive, most of President Obama’s gun control proposals will barely even see the light of day in Congress.

Fitch is out this morning with a warning on the nation’s credit rating that both Republicans and Democrats need to listen to.

The GOP is following a strategy on the debt ceiling that cannot possibly succeed.

Marco Rubio has some good immigration reform ideas. Will his fellow Republicans listen to him?

Once again, the House GOP is risking sending the economy into the tank to prove a political point.

The ultimate impact of the Newtown tragedy on the nation’s gun laws is likely to be very limited.

Welcome to the latest crazy scheme to avoid reality.

Minting a Platinum Coin would be a really bad idea.

Resurrecting and old, and bad, idea.

The House GOP is moving in an ever more dangerous direction.

Are we really going to do this again? The answer appears to be yes.

The attempted coup against John Boehner resembled something you’d see in a banana republic.

Could a coin like this solve the looming debt ceiling crisis?