Outside the Beltway

Like all Presidents before him, Barack Obama is asserting the right to virtually unfettered discretion when it comes to military matters.

Nor, it would seem, are really tired clichés.

Operation Odyssey Dawn has resurrected the eternal battle over what limits there are, and should be, on the President’s ability to use military force without Congressional authorization.

Republican budget cuts to this point have been less than serious.

So far, the Republican House’s effort to cut back Federal spending isn’t very impressive.

Republicans are about to take a walk along the third-rail of American politics.

Speaking before Congress yesterday, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke debunked the assertion that the GOP’s relatively modest $61 billion spending cut package would significantly harm economic growth.

Judge Gladys Kessler upheld the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate, but she did so by essentially ruling that the Interstate Commerce Clause means whatever Congress wants it to mean.

Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown was a Tea Party darling when he picked up Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat last year, but he’s not embracing the movement as he prepares to run for re-election next year.

Thanks to the help of a group of Tea Party Freshman in the House. Congress has finally cut off funding for a second engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter that the Pentagon never wanted.

President Obama’s new budget involves nothing less than a thumb in the eye of anyone who hoped he would seriously address federal spending in his first term.