Outside the Beltway

Convicted leaker Chelsea Manning lost a bid for the Democratic nomination for Senate in Maryland, to the surprise of nobody.

Turkey’s authoritarian leader is going to be around for a long time.

A new survey shows that Americans are increasingly unable to tell the difference between fact and opinion. That’s a problem.

Madison was right about politicians and ambition. He just didn’t see the how it would all play out.

Either the President of the United States is a knowing liar or he is very easily duped. Neither is a comforting thought.

Another unilateral withdrawal from an international institution.

Dan Coates, the Director of National Intelligence, has issued a strong warning that has received little attention.

The actions of the Trump administration are helping Russian-EU relations (to the detriment of the US).

This President lies on a daily basis. It’s time to start calling him what he is.

Just as they did three years ago when they legalized same-sex marriage, Irish voters turned out in record numbers to repeal the nation’s ban on abortion.

In an election that pretty much everyone agrees was illegitimate, Nicolás Maduro has won a second term as Venezuela’s President.

Does the administration know what it is doing?

While longtime supporters have turned on the legendary attorney over his support of Donald Trump, he’s been astonishingly consistent.

For Donald Trump and his supporters, “Fake News” means any news that doesn’t shower enough praise on him.

A Federal Appeals Court has reversed a lower court ruling that struck down Texas’s Voter ID law as discriminatory against minority voters.

An essay from earlier in the year by Jacob T. Levy underscores some of the points I recently tried to make about democratic norms in the current era.

A longtime “Hillary Beat” reporter ruminates on what she and her candidate could have done differently in 2016.

Another early-morning edition of Late Night OTB.

Another Federal Court loss for gun rights activists challenging state laws banning “assault weapons.”

A woman who was fired after a photograph of her giving the middle finger to President Trump’s motorcade went viral is suing her former employer. She doesn’t have much of a case.

Under the proposal certain visa-seekers (such as China and India) would have to have their social media presence scrutinized.

As a general rule, Presidents are entitled to have a Cabinet and advisers he is comfortable with, but a Cabinet full of “yes men” is not ideal with any President, and certainly not with this one.

California has pushed back quickly against the Trump Administration’s decision to include a question regarding citizenship in the 2020 Census.

Critics warn this move would lead to a drastic undercount of Hispanic voters, impacting Congressional districting, federal programs, and more.

Republicans on Capitol Hill worried about all the leaking coming from the Trump White House would be wise to actually do the oversight the Constitution compels them to do.

Challengers to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s ruling on Congressional redistricting suffered two big setbacks in court yesterday that suggest that they’ve reached the end of the road legally.

Joseph E. diGenova has touted the theory that rogue FBI elements have tried to frame Trump in the Russia probe.

Will Bunch wildly exaggerates the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

A contest with no serious challenger will make him the longest-serving Russian leader since Stalin.

The FBI’s former deputy director was shamefully fired late Friday night, after which President Trump gloated on Twitter.

Nine years later, at least one member of the Norwegian Nobel Committee is admitting what seemed at the time a rather obvious fact.

While Team Trump has gone out of its way to waylay the Russia investigation, this may not be is part of that effort.

With the Winter Olympics over, the next step on the Korean Peninsula is utterly unclear.

Daniel Triesman offers an explanation as to “Why the poor don’t vote to soak the rich.”

China’s Xi Jinping solidified his hold on power well into the next decade over the weekend.

An emerging technology will take “fake news” to a whole new level.

A series of scandals at Oxfam and other charitable organizations raise troubling questions.

A few key observations on the bigger picture.

The Russian government likely is quite pleased.

President Trump’s military parade would come with a not insignificant cost.

Despite what his own intelligence chiefs are saying, President Trump still does not believe that Russia interfered in the 2016 election.

Intelligence officials are warning that the Russians are set to seek to influence the 2018 elections just as they did in 2016. Despite this, the Trump Administration refuses to acknowledge this publicly while the President seeks to undermine the investigation into past Russian interference.

My latest for RealClearDefense.

In a healthy democracy we need not agree, nor must we finally even respect one another’s objects of devotion.  But we should exercise a salutary measure of mutual forbearance and be willing to acknowledge that no side has a monopoly on either truth or justice.

Poland’s President has signed a controversial bill that purports to criminalize any effort to tie Poland to the Holocaust.

The 2008 Republican nominee for president condemned his party and its president for the release of a controversial memo attacking the FBI.

The current budget deal expires in six days and Congress doesn’t seem to know what it’s going to do about it.

The Trump Administration has acted in a manner to create the impression that there is “no daylight” between the United States and Israel. This is a myth, and pursuing such a goal poses real dangers for America’s national interests.

The recent cooling of relations between North and South Korea has led to some talk of eventual reunification, but for many South Koreans that idea is a non-starter.

Democratic norms are eroding.