Outside the Beltway

Contrary to what Donald Trump claims, immigrants are less likely to commit crime than others.

Depending on who you listen to, it’s either peace in our time or an epic catastrophe.

The unqualified hack who led OPM while China stole 21 million sensitive personnel files has finally resigned.

In the past month, the Chinese stock market has lost more than 1/3 of its value.

The June Jobs Report was okay, but it certainly doesn’t inspire much confidence.

For the first time since 1961, there will soon be an American Embassy in Havana, and a Cuban Embassy in Washington. It’s well past time that this happened.

PolitiFact rates President Obama’s claim that other countries don’t have mass shootings at rates comparable to America”Mostly False.”

Pope Francis’s new encyclical isn’t exactly being received positively by American conservatives, because they seem to be missing the point.

Was this simply ordinary intelligence collection? Or something more insidious?

Cardinals executives were doing a little more than just stealing signs, apparently.

We live in a random and chaotic universe.

In a case that took seven months to decide, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Presidency’s broad authority in foreign affairs, and inserted itself just a little bit in the thorny politics of the Middle East.

North Korea now claims it has miniaturized nuclear warheads sufficienctly so that they can be placed on missiles. They also say they can launch missiles from submarines.

North Korea’s mercurial leader has apparently executed yet another high ranking official.

Most managers work beyond 9-to-5.

The sources of new immigrants to the United States are changing, but it’s unclear if that will have any impact on the political debate over immigration reform.

Republicans on Capitol Hill are talking about fundamentally changing what it means to be an American, and it’s a bad idea.

Far from being a positive, Hillary Clinton’s time as Secretary of State provides ample material for those who would attack her over the next eighteen months.

Chinese analysts are telling their American counterparts that North Korea’s nuclear arsenal is far more sophisticated than previously believed.

Conditioning an Iranian nuclear deal on recognition of Israel is foolish, unrealistic, and very bad diplomacy.

Rand Paul has changed position on several foreign policy issues, but he doesn’t seem to want to talk about it.

Democrats like New York Senator Chuck Schumer could end up being the ones that scuttle the Iranian nuclear deal.

President George W. Bush had a running battle with the CIA throughout his eight years in office. Now, they’ve given him an award.

Modern Singapore’s founder passed away at age 91 earlier this week.

Rand Paul now says he signed the Cotton Letter to strengthen the Administration’s bargaining position.

Can a country entry reap the benefits of the connected age while successfully tying down the Internet?

While the issue of income inequality is quite real, Oxfam’s numbers are not.

The price of oil is continuing to fall, but it won’t last forever.

The first popularly elected African-American Senator, and the first African-American Senator to serve since the end of Reconstruction ended, has passed away.

The Commerce Department had a Christmas present for investors, businesses, and consumers today.

There are again reports of Chinese frustration with the Kim regime in North Korea, but change is unlikely to happen in the DPRK until Beijing is ready to let it happen.

There’s not a whole lot the United States can do to respond effectively and proportionally to North Korea’s hacking attack against Sony.

Two potential candidates for the Republican nomination in 2016 traded barbs this week over the President’s new policy toward Cuba.

The U.S. Government has formally charged North Korea with responsibility for the hacking attack on Sony. How to respond to that attack is a more complicated question.

With major theater chains having pulled out, Sony bowed to the inevitable, but now there appears to be proof that a foreign power is behind the Sony hacking attacks and threats of violence.

The resumption of diplomatic relations between U.S. and Cuba, and expansion of some commercial trade ties, is historic but it’s only the first step toward the goal of ending an outdated embargo.

Sony is warning the press not to publish material leaked by hackers, but it doesn’t have much of a legal leg to stand on.

Russia’s own government is projecting that its economy will slip into recession next year. How that will impact Putin’s current belligerence remains to be seen.

The abrupt departure of Chuck Hagel says much more about Administration policy than it does about Chuck Hagel.