The New Republic

More than a decade after 9/11, the “war on terrorism” continues to produce new legal questions. The Supreme Court has plenty of cases about “enemy combatants,” the Bush-era designation for detained Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists, but it’s never had to consider Senator Lindsey Graham’s latest idea. READ MORE >>

I’m relatively agnostic about gun control. I’m from the West; I have friends who really like their guns. And I live in the East; I have friends who really hate guns. But it should be troubling to partisans of all stripes when terrible political analysis dictates public policy. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what’s happened with gun control. This week, the Manchin-Toomey amendment requiring background checks on gun purchases failed in the Senate, in part—perhaps in large part—because senators bought into the myth of an omnipotent National Rifle Association. READ MORE >>

Ever since last year's election, the nation's conservatives have been in self-preservation mode: They know something about the GOP needs to change, but they don’t want it to be them. The party establishment would prefer to jettison cultural issues, since it never cared much about cultural issues, anyway. And the faction of fiscal conservatives argues that well-educated, affluent voters are more natural GOP constituents, anyway. READ MORE >>

In every election over the last 20 years, Appalachia shifted toward Republicans and the West revolted against the incumbent party’s candidate. These patterns continued in 2008 and 2012, but Seth Stephens-Davidowitz argues that these more recent manifestations are due to racism, since they correlate with the prevalence of racist Google searches. Although this explanation matches the data, it’s not persuasive. READ MORE >>

When vice presidents seek their party’s nomination, they win. The last failed veep candidacy was in 1952, when Alben Barkley’s passive campaign failed at the DNC when labor union leaders expressed grave doubts about whether an ill 74-year-old was fit for the presidency. Since then, vice presidents Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale, George H.W. READ MORE >>

After two clear victories and “Bradley Effect” no-shows, it would seem that the fear that racism could cost Barack Obama the presidency was overstated. But Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, a Ph.D. candidate in Economics at Harvard, begs to differ; he thinks that racism significantly hindered Obama. READ MORE >>

The future of the GOP has been up for debate since its defeat in last November’s elections, and for the most part the question has been not if, but how Republicans should change. More recently, though, well-respected analysts are debating whether the GOP really needs to change at all. READ MORE >>

When House Democrats failed to win a majority last November, despite winning the popular vote, many people recognized how difficult it would be to realize President Obama’s dream of retaking Congress in 2014. Just how difficult, though? READ MORE >>

Mark Sanford is one step closer to a remarkable political comeback after locking up the Republican nomination for Congress in South Carolina’s First Congressional District on Tuesday. A general election match-up in conservative South Carolina might seem like an easy final leg for Sanford, but there’s no guarantee that he’ll waltz to victory. Next month, Sanford will face off against Elizabeth Colbert Busch—Stephen’s sister—in a deeply conservative district where Democrats don’t usually have a chance. This time, they do. READ MORE >>

It’s not unusual for candidates and interest groups to spend millions of dollars to try to change public opinion. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s recent $12 million advertising buy is a little less conventional: He’s spending millions to convince voters not to change their minds. READ MORE >>