Outside the Beltway

Rick Perry is sounding for all the world like a candidate for President, and says he’s a different candidate this time, but initial perceptions are hard to overcome.

Some on the left are suggesting Democrats should write off the South for the foreseeable future, but that would be as foolish as Republicans assuming that their dominance in the region will last as long as Democratic dominance did in the century after the Civil War.

The GOP donor class would like the 2016 race to be short and sweet, but that’s unlikely to happen.

The Supreme Court is set to decide if the state can deny a license plate with the Confederate flag design because it is “offensive.”

You’ve got your playoff College Football fans, as imperfect as it was inevitably going to be.

Texas has joined with 16 other states in a lawsuit against the Obama Administration over the President’s executive action on immigration. At first glance, it doesn’t appear to have much legal merit.

It’s an old story. Republican leadership wants to avoid a government shutdown, but the hard core conservatives want a fight, this time over the President’s immigration action. We have a week to see how it unfolds.

After a disastrous campaign in 2012, Texas Governor Rick Perry appears to be gearing up for a new run for the White House in 2016, but questions remain.

A new poll shows that a majority of Americans support the President’s changes to deportation policy, but don’t like that he acted unilaterally.

The numbers don’t lie, Mitt Romney remains popular among Republican voters.

Columbus, Philadelphia, or New York City (well, Brooklyn really)?

The House of Representatives has filed its lawsuit against the President. As expected, it doesn’t amount to much.

Top Republicans worry that their party’s response to the President’s executive action will alienate Latinos. However, there’s little they can do about that.

Fresh off his third statewide win in four years, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker appears to be getting ready to run for President.

On substance, the President’s immigration actions aren’t very objectionable. How he is implementing them, though, is problematic and seems needlessly confrontational.

In the end, there appears to be very little, if anything, the GOP can do to stop or roll back the executive actions the President will announce Thursday evening.

Based on the available evidence, there’s very little evidence that Voter ID laws had a significant impact on the midterm elections.

The Keystone XL pipeline bill is dead until the next Senate. Mary Landrieu’s political career, on the other hand, is basically dead for the foreseeable future.

Every member of the Supreme Court graduated from an Ivy League Law School. That kind of homogeneity is not healthy.

Another round of election losses is leading Democrats to contemplate the direction they should take going forward.

Much like the disease itself, Ebola panic seems to have disappeared as the midterm elections become ever more distant in the rear view mirror.

Same-sex marriage advanced in Kansas and South Carolina yesterday, and will soon be law in Montana, but the Supreme Court is what matters now,

Mary Landrieu’s Keystone XL Hail Mary isn’t going to save her.

Mike Huckabee seems to be making the moves necessary to run for President again, For reasons only he can understand.

The GOP’s big wins last week seem to be just guaranteeing that this year’s battle between the Tea Party and the “establishment” will continue.

A popular idea that does nothing useful while simultaneously violating the Constitution.

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

Obama proposes four ‘net neutrality’ rules.

Republicans performed better among Latino voters this year than they did in 2012, but that doesn’t mean they’ve solved their problems.

Looking into uncontested and partially contest House districts from the 2014 cycle.

An unsurprising ruling from the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals that only seems to bring closer the day when same-sex marriage will be legal nationwide.

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

Another setback for the radical fringe of the “pro-life” movement,

The Republican wave extended even to Governor’s races that, in any other year, they should have lost.

The GOP added to its majority in the House, giving it the biggest majority it has had since Truman was President.

A pair of accidents has led some to wonder if we are at the end of commercial ventures in space. Clearly, we are not.

The B.C.S. was far from perfect, and the College Football Playoff system will be, at best, only slightly better.

Mandatory quarantines are a massive violation of personal liberty. We ought to be careful in how, when, and why we impose them and who they are directed toward.

The Koch Brothers are putting money behind an effort to reform a part of the legal system that is ignored far too often.

A new outbreak, or hopefully just an isolated case.