Outside the Beltway

On one level, it is rather amusing; on another is it quite insidious.

Two-thirds want social media platforms to ban harassment and racist, sexist, and other offensive speech.

Free expression sometimes enables horrible crimes. How does a free society deal with that tension?

Another white supremacist attack raises disturbing questions about our information environment.

Why rational discourse seldom changes the minds of some people.

Mandatory vaccination laws raise personal liberty issues that ought to be taken seriously, but in the end, public health concerns weigh heavily in favor of laws mandating vaccination.

The relatively light sentence that Paul Manafort received is raising eyebrows. Hopefully it will lead to a long-overdue debate on sentencing reform.

A decade-long study once again establishes that there is no link between childhood vaccination and autism.

In what was basically a throwaway line, Joe Biden said something nice about Mike Pence. The reaction from his fellow Democrats says a lot about our current political culture, and none of it is good.

The President of the United States and the most-talked-about freshman Representative in ages could not be more different.

Washington Governor Jay Inslee is running for the Democratic nomination for President on a platform primarily focused on climate change. Whether that helps distinguish him from a growing field of candidates remains to be seen.

Breathless coverage of this freshman Congressman is getting tiresome.

Grammar and spelling errors abound at all but a handful of news sites.

After posting an image that clearly threatened a Federal Judge, Roger Stone walked out of court with a full gag order imposed on him. It could’ve gone a lot worse.

Actor Jussie Smollett is charged with staging an attack initially called a “hate crime.”

Tennis great Martina Navratilova is facing criticism for raising questions about how sports handles the issue of transgender athletes competing within the gender they identify with. She shouldn’t be.

While I’m sympathetic to his plight, he has no case.

Roger Stone is being ordered to Court after an Instagram post that appears to be a direct threat against the Judge presiding over his criminal case.

Gender bias is real. Most examples cited, though, aren’t.

It was only a matter of time before Trump’s rhetoric against the press would lead to something violent. Last night in El Paso, it happened.

The right has spent a seemingly inordinate amount of time focusing on relatively powerless Members of Congress.

A new poll shows that Virginians don’t necessarily believe their state leaders need to step aside in the wake of recent scandals.

After a week of scandal and chaos in Virginia politics, there’s no sign that Virginia Governor Ralph Northam is going anywhere, and there’s very little that can be done to force him out of office.

Two more defections from the stable of writers at RedState provide further proof of the extent to which conservative media has become a pro-Trump echo chamber.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has managed to become a media star, but she has a lot to learn about politics.

In both cases, appeals to emotion are not diminished by disregard for accuracy.

Can society forgive the men caught up in the #MeToo movement? Is it even our place to decide?

The longer video and deeper investigation of the incident reveals a very different story.

Nancy Pelosi is “suggesting” to the President that the State of the Union be rescheduled for a time after the government shutdown ends, but it clearly seems like more than just a suggestion.

Paul Manafort’s attorneys reveal in a pleading that their client provided insider campaign data to Russian intelligence sources, something that seems an awful lot like collusion.

Bernie Sanders is facing questions about sexual harassment from women who worked on his 2016 campaign as he prepares a likely run for President in 2020.

Before even taking office, Mitt Romney is taking on the President. It’s a good sign, but we’ll see what it leads to.

Begun, the 2020 campaign has.

I’m not saying it was aliens, but……..

President Trump tried to get into the Christmas spirit last night. He failed.

French authorities are investigating reports that Russian interference may be helping to exploit and expand the five-week-old “yellow vest” protests.

Moscow continues using information warfare to sow division in Western society.

Protests that have killed four and injured hundreds have been rewarded and show no sign of ending.

Honoring the 41st President cast a poor light on the 45th.

Glenn Reynolds announced via his USA Today column that he has deleted his Twitter account.

After initially saying no, Texas Congressman Beto O’Rourke is now reopening the door to the idea of running for President.

Now that’s a lot of beef.

Sherrod Brown pulled off the only statewide Democratic victory in Ohio on November 6th. Because of that, he’s being looked at as a potential 2020 candidate for President.

Forty years ago tonight, the Star Wars universe came to television in a production so bad that it makes Jar Jar Binks seem positively Shakespearean by comparison.

A slight variant of the uniform from World War II and Korea is coming to a soldier near you.

Beto O’Rourke should consider running again in 2020, but not for President.

President Trump’s selection to serve as Acting Attorney General does not appear to be Constitutionally authorized to serve in that position.

Somewhere, Tim Russert is smiling.

Florida voters approved an amendment to the state’s Constitution that will restore the voting rights of as many as 1.2 million ex-felons and make it easier for future released felons to get their civil rights back.

The emergence of a silly talking point.