Outside the Beltway

Twenty-five years ago today, the American space program came crashing to Earth in a horrible accident.

The political firestorm that has erupted in the wake of the shootings in Arizona is drifting, inevitably, into calls for more government control over the content of speech.

The lawyer who argued The Pentagon Papers case points out how Julian Assange is not Daniel Ellsberg, and how prosecuting him could have disastrous results for press freedom in the United States.

Is calling Côte d’Ivoire “Ivory Coast” linguistic colonialism? Where do we draw the line when English names for countries go out of vogue?

Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, who may end up running for President in 2012, has reopened wounds that finally seemed like they were closed.

Unless you paid close attention, you probably missed most of the coverage of the war in Afghanistan in 2010.

Is the West’s string of luck about to end?

Has WikiLeaks changed journalism forever?

Mike Brown, who discovered Xena, decided he could not in good conscience allow it to be made a planet. And killed off an old favorite in so doing.

Michael Wilbon departs the Washington Post after more than 30 years to work full time at ESPN. Here are his last — and first — columns.

The Obama administration is banning hundreds of thousands of federal employees from calling up the WikiLeaks site on government computers because the leaked material is still formally regarded as classified.

The Pentagon could have taken down WikiLeaks but decided not to. Out of kindness, I suppose.

The two English language newspapers who have been Julian Assange’s accomplices in disseminating stolen secrets defend themselves.

Israelis and Palestinians don’t agree on much these days, but they do agree that Barack Obama hasn’t helped the peace process at all since coming to office.

The Washington Independent goes dark in December, failing to find profitability in three years.

Is the current media environment a problem for proper political discourse?

After three months, Rupert Murdoch’s strategy of walling off the Times websites isn’t looking so smart.

If the polling is anywhere close to accurate, a Republican wave will come crashing down today, repudiating the first two years of the Obama administration. What does it mean?

Responding to the rant that got Rick Sanchez fired, Slate’s Brian Palmer investigates the question, “Do Jews Really Control the Media?” His short answer, “Maybe the movies, but not the news.”

It’s getting harder and harder to tell blogs from newspapers.

Both the Constitution and the Federalist Papers, impressive as they are, must be understood in terms of not just applied political philosophy, but practical politics as well.

Most people who record television shows skip the commercials. Despite that, TV remains by far the most effective form of advertising.

Rand Paul is apparently taking heat from some of his more socially conservative supporters after FEC reports indicate he received a donation from the owner of an Adult web site. People need to get a life.

Should black people quit using the N-word to set an example for white folk?

Harry Reid has spent the summer trying to portray is opponent as a kook. So far, it’s working.

Congress has been wrestling with the net neutrality issue for years. Two major players may force a decision soon.

While it may be true that facts are stubborn things, a lot of American are stubborn in the face of them.

Blogs are all grown up now and indistinguishable from other online media.

A growing number of conservatives are in dismay about the state of their movement.

Some principles transcend political borders.

By filling out Captcha’s two word phrases, you’re helping digitize old books. It’s still really annoying.

Electronic books outsold paper books on Amazon over the past three months, but the death of the hardcover is greatly exaggerated.

Journalists have been following Maxwell Scott’s advice since long before “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” was made.

News headlines are increasingly divorced from the article content, with serious connotations for a nation of skimmers.

Did the American media cover up torture by the Bush Administration?

Magazines routinely run great pieces by highly biased writers. Why can’t newspapers do the same?

If you’re reading this at the office, are you stealing from your boss?

An article attempting to illustrate the obsolescence of newspapers inadvertently does the opposite.

Sharing your unvarnished thoughts on a listserv is just asking for trouble, as Dave Weigel is the latest to discover.