Outside the Beltway

We have laws preventing the sales of gun to crazy people. We’re not enforcing them very well.

It was, perhaps, inevitable that someone would attempt to draw a comparison between Saturday’s shootings in Arizona and the Oklahoma City bombing, but the two events really don’t have anything in common.

The American military personnel system works against keeping the best and brightest officers in the service.

The author of AZ’s SB1070 has a new idea.

A somewhat surprising court decision from the European Union gives a glimpse of what the situation in the United States would be if Roe v. Wade were overturned.

Frustrated that it couldn’t achieve desired environmental legislation despite huge majorities in both Houses of Congress, the Obama administration has decided to govern by executive fiat.

Red States should gain 10 seats while Blue States should lose eight.

Geno Auriemma and his UConn Huskies should rightly be enormously proud of their accomplishments. But comparing them to John Wooden’s is embarrassing.

Judicial activism doesn’t mean “reaching a decision I don’t like.”

The weekend arrest of a Columbia University Professor for an apparently consensual act raises some interesting questions about why precisely a specific act should be subject to criminal prosecution.

How would appointed Senators affect the partisan mix of the Senate?

Roughly 150 years ago, the CSA was born. Is this something worthy of celebration?

Shocking Headline Of The Day: “Willie Nelson charged with pot possession in Texas.”

Tom DeLay is a sleazebag and has been found guilty by an Austin jury for skirting the law. But it may in fact be a miscarriage of justice despite the victim being as unsympathetic as it gets.

A ten year old case out of Texas raises yet more doubts about the justice of the death penalty.

The Chairmen of the National Debt Commission have released a draft report for consideration. It’s got some very good ideas, but it’s most likely Dead On Arrival.

Those images on your Facebook page may come back to haunt you if you decide to run for office someday.

The race between Jeb Hensarling and Michelle Bachmann for Chair of the House GOP Conference is a microcosm for a battle that is likely to take place within the GOP for the next two years.

Despite votes in the 2010 contest still being counted, polls for 2012 are already pouring out. They’re largely meaningless.

An NBC analysis shows Tea Party candidates winning only 5 of 10 Senate races and 40 of 130 House races, a success rate of only 32 percent.

Reports of voting irregularity in precincts across the country are threatening to further undermine voter confidence in the legitimacy of election outcomes. There’s a simple solution.

Charles Murray argues that the Tea Party is right to complain about out-of-touch elites.

There’s a trend toward using metrics to identify ways to stem the skyrocketing cost of higher education. The likeliest result is to devalue the “education” component.

The Tea Party movement doesn’t seem to have a coherent view on foreign policy. Which means that a Tea Party victory will just mean more of the same Republican neo-conservatism.

Recklessness.

Politico says 99 Democratic House seats are “in play.” They’re not. But dozens are.

A US soldier who captured a deadly 2009 rampage at Fort Hood with his cell phone camera testified Friday that he was ordered to erase the video by his commanders.

Politicians are, by definition, a bit abnormal. However, this year we seem to have more than our fair share of the truly odd.

It’s been a decade since al Qaeda attacked the USS Cole, killing 17 American sailors. The perpetrators are still at large.

If everything you know about Islam comes from Pam Geller and Christianity from Christopher Hitchens, you’re doing yourself a grave disservice.

Are we facing a Sharia take-over?

A new projection of Congressional reapportionment shows a dramatic shift to traditionally Republican states in the South and Southwest.