Outside the Beltway

A handful of young male bloggers have launched themselves to the head of the line, leapfrogging those who’ve spent years playing the game by the old rules.juice

Quite improbably, Mike Huckabee seems to be positioned at the top of the GOP field right now. The only question is whether he really wants to run for President again.

Former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson is running for president.

With minor exceptions, all of the potential candidates for the GOP nomination in 2012 seem to have accepted the idea that defense spending, and the Bush-era interventionist foreign policy, are off the table when it comes time to talk spending cuts.

Republicans are starting to sour on Sarah Palin, meaning that they’re finally starting to catch up to the rest of the country.

Mitt Romney starts his 2012 run as the frontrunner for the Republican nomination. But, in reinventing himself yet again, the “authenticity” issue that troubled many of us in 2008 looms again.

Florida has again scheduled its primary ahead of the deadlines set by the Republican and Democratic parties.

You don’t have to be Admiral Akbar to suspect that the President’s refusal to deal with entitlements in his budget proposal is a trap for the GOP.

Politico (Jay Carney got $270K from Time magazine after leaving) has uncovered a major payola scandal. Or is hyping a complete non-story.

Ron Paul has won the CPAC straw poll for a second straight year. But YAF has voted him off its board over his opposition to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Four Senators who just happen to be up for re-election next year are silently looking for alternatives to the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate.

Mashup of White House spokesman Robert Gibbs telling reporters what jobs he’s never held

It really shouldn’t be a surprise that that Democratic Leadership Council is on its last legs.

Rep. Jane Harman is leaving Congress to become president of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

Sarah Palin spoke about Ronald Reagan last night, but seems to have forgotten the optimism that is part of The Gipper’s legacy.

The debate over Senator Rand Paul’s proposed $500 billion spending cut plan has focused almost exclusively on one issue, and one nation.

Virginia Thomas’s political activism is once again a political issue.

Glenn Beck seems to have more in common with End Time preachers than he does with a serious political analyst.

In response to charges that it was attempting restrict abortion access beyond the boundaries of the Hyde Amendment, the GOP has agreed to drop the phrase “forcible rape” from its abortion bill.

Clarence Thomas has amended 13 years’ worth of disclosure reports.

Comedienne Joan Rivers tells Howard Stern why she ditched a joke calling Michelle Obama “Backie O.”

Sarah Palin’s unfavorability ratings continue to climb. And there’s very little room for her recovery.

George Allen is running for his old Senate seat.

Palin’s “blood libel” speech continued to keep here in the conversation about Tucson, and not in a positive way.

Over the past two days, Sarah Palin has become the center of the media firestorm over the tragic shootings in Arizona, she doesn’t belong there.

The tragic shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and 19 others in Arizona has started another debate about political rhetoric. It’s a stupid debate, and it’s utterly pointless.

More breaking news on the shooting-in this case, about the shooter.

The filibuster reform package that Senate Democrats unveiled yesterday has much to recommend to it. Unfortunately, it’s probably doomed.

Why is the press gushing over routine movement in White House team?

Those who argue that tariff increases, and not slavery, were the key reason for secession have some basic problems with the historical sequence.

The new House Republican majority will force lawmakers to vote when they want to raise the nation’s debt ceiling, publish committee attendance records, ban former members from lobbying in the House gym and require new mandatory spending to be offset by cuts to other programs.

The incoming House Republicans aren’t making a good first impression.