Outside the Beltway

A big change in an important nation in the most volatile part of the world.

December’s jobs growth numbers were very good, but the numbers below the headlines show that there’s still work to be done.

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

NYPD Officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were shot dead while sitting in their patrol car In Brooklyn. And those suggesting that anyone other than the killer has “blood on their hands” are being absurd.

For better or worse, Marion Barry was a fixture in D.C. politics for much of the 40 year period of home rule that began in 1975.

A knowledgeable observer has a dim forecast.

The GOP is dominant in the Southern United States, but it’s unlikely to last as long as Democratic dominance of the region did.

Good news that ought to quiet people’s concerns significantly, on the Ebola front.

The City of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho will not force two Christian ministers to open their wedding chapel business to same-sex wedding ceremonies.

After a disappointing August, the jobs report for September showed the same good numbers we’ve seen for much of 2014.

Politics, the law, culture, and a very old language collide.

The war in Gaza seems to be winding down, but the underlying issues remain.

A much better Second Quarter.

In a logical extension of the Supreme Court’s decision in D.C. v. Heller, a Federal Judge has struck down D.C.’s law barring people from carrying handguns in public.

Trying to make sense of a very complicated issue.

There is no such thing as a consistent free market, limited government case in favor of restricting immigration, whether legal or illegal.

TNR makes the worst possible case for a proposition that’s almost certainly right.

Mostly because of politics, the hopes of some and fears of others will never be realized.

In no small part because of a brutal winter, the economy shrank in the first three months of the year.

Economic growth in the first quarter was so weak, we nearly fell into a recession.

I’m uneasy about a world in which a private conversation, illegally recorded, can be used in this fashion.

Not only does the headline-making rancher have unique views on the nature of both grazing fees and the federal government, he has some positively retro (to use a kind word) views on race.

Time to have some sympathy for those poor penny-pinching Congressmen and Senators? Hardly.

Some good news, but also plenty of reason to worry about the future.

Wonkblog’s founder is leaving the Washington Post to start a new media outlet of his own.

After eight years in a coma, Ariel Sharon has passed away.

A new book by former SecDef Robert Gates is making political waves in Washington power circles, but will it matter to ordinary Americans?

A Federal Judge in New York upholds, for the most part, that state’s new gun control law.

The Sunbelt continues to dominate.

Fourth time’s the charm? Probably not.

For veterans who get in trouble with the law, *when* they commit a crime can have profound implications on their future. Does this make sense?

Wall Street Journal was looking hard for a story.

Some signs from Silicon Valley seem to indicate that the heady days of the 90s Tech Bubble are returning.

It wasn’t a Thermonuclear move, more like something the size of Hiroshima, but today the Senate took an historic move nonetheless.

Phil Carter draws attention to “The Vets We Reject and Ignore.”

A better than expected jobs report in October, but one that comes with a few caveats.

Mayor Booker is now Senator-Elect Booker.

An historic same-sex marriage ruling out of New Jersey.