We hear many fallacies in election years. The fallacy that seems to be most popular this year is that, if Donald Trump comes close to getting the 1,237 delegates required to become the Republican nominee, and that nomination goes instead to someone else, then the convention will have ignored "the voice of the people."
If you live any distance beyond the Capital Beltway you probably didn't notice, but an important part of government in Washington shut down on Wednesday, March 16. That's when the Metro subway system's recently installed general manager, Paul Wiedefeld, ordered a one-day shutdown of the entire 117-mile system for emergency inspection of track-based power cables.
After winning only six delegates in Wisconsin, and with Ted Cruz poaching delegates in states he has won, like Louisiana, Donald Trump either wins on the first ballot at Cleveland, or Trump does not win.
"Donald J. Trump withstood the onslaught of the establishment yet again." That's the first sentence in a Trump campaign statement tweeted out Tuesday night by the Washington Post's Robert Costa. It's also a strange way to respond to a solid defeat, reminiscent of the Monty Python knight who insists he is winning after both his arms are hacked off.
When you look at the big picture of presidential elections, and you try to discern the connection between the White House contest and the 34 Senate elections on the same ballot, it becomes obvious there are two types of years.
What does a suffering military veteran have to do to force an unresponsive government to change its ways?
"Should a Jewish baker be forced to bake a cake for a Nazi wedding?"
In the past 28 years America has elected two presidents from the “conservative” party, the one that claims to stand for lower taxes, responsible spending and limited government. Both have been named Bush.
As Wisconsinites head for the polls, our Beltway elites are almost giddy. For they foresee a Badger State bashing for Donald Trump, breaking his momentum toward the Republican nomination.
What you hear when you listen to many fervent supporters of Donald Trump is that they are victims -- victims of globalization and trade agreements that have sent their jobs to Mexico or China. Victims of competition from illegal immigrants from Mexico willing to work for starvation wages. Victims of a Republican establishment that promised to get rid of lots of things they don't like and then failed to deliver.
Donald Trump's victories in the Republican primaries may make him seem like a sure winner. But those victories have been achieved by receiving either somewhat less than 40 percent of the votes or somewhat more than 40 percent, but never a majority.
The Wisconsin primary could be an axle-breaking speed bump on Donald Trump's road to the nomination.
On June 23, when Donald Trump will or will not have won the 1,237 delegates he needs to be nominated, voters in Britain will decide an issue as divisive as Trump's candidacy: whether the United Kingdom will remain in or leave the European Union.
We live in a post-factual era. Thanks to the Internet and social media, which mix informed and uninformed views in equal measure, the old rule — that people are entitled to their own opinions but not their own set of facts — no longer applies. Somewhere in cyberspace, you can now find blogs and treatises with “facts” that support your opinions, no matter how bizarre.
In this brief cessation of hostilities between enemy forces on both sides of the political divide, it is a good time to take stock of where primary voters have taken the two parties.
It's not over. It's never over. After last week's deadly airport and subway bombings in Brussels, the Belgian government remains on high alert for jihad attacks and espionage at its nuclear facilities.
Trump! Clinton! Is that all there is? No. Fortunately, we have other choices.
I am "not isolationist, but I am 'America First,'" Donald Trump told The New York times last weekend. "I like the expression."
If there is one thing that is bipartisan in Washington, it is brazen hypocrisy.
How can one make sense of the electoral divisions in this year's Republican primaries and caucuses? The contours of Donald Trump's support and opposition don't fall on traditional lines.
