This Election Day, like every Election Day, I entered the sanctum sanctorum of the voting cubicle, searched my conscience, remembered that I’d left it in the car, then voted for my own amusement. This time, I pulled the lever for a state-senatorial longshot named Jesse Peed. It felt exciting and…
The program's and school's insiders put power and money ahead of academics, even ahead of human life, in the case of player Jordan McNair's death. Plus: No more unbeatens in the NFL.
Reince Priebus, Sith Lord. Vanity Fair has a delightful (profanity laced) interview with Anthony Scaramucci about his brief tenure in the White house. Mooch's take on Washington is so wrong, it's laughable:
On the morning of March 16, according to a police report, a 14-year-old girl attending Rockville High School in the Maryland suburb was allegedly pushed into a stall in a boys' bathroom and raped repeatedly by two males, Henry Montano, age 17, and Jose Sanchez Milian, age 18, who were also enrolled…
Lost in the momentous events of the recent election was the news that the citizens of the District of Columbia overwhelmingly approved a "state constitution" for the proposed state of New Columbia. This presages a renewed public campaign for D.C. statehood. One can easily imagine how much the…
I spend a lot of time these days wondering if anyone has ever given more thought to a relatively meaningless vote than I have this year.
For obvious reasons, I've lately been pondering examples from recent history where political nominees have proved too toxic for their own parties. There are more than a few examples—Tom Hayden, David Duke etc.—but only one with anything like contemporary resonance: The 1966 gubernatorial election…
Drive over the Potomac River from Virginia into Washington across the 14th Street Bridge, and you can’t miss a large electric sign overhead. "SafeTrack Is Here," it says. "Rethink Your Commute." That's supposed to be helpful advice. Properly understood, it's a warning.
Towson, Md.
Annapolis
Maryland's Republican governor Larry Hogan is angering immigration activists with his decision to comply with a federal immigration enforcement directive. The Washington Post reports that Hogan actually made the decision "with no fanfare" in January that Maryland will notify federal immigration…
One unexplained death. So many negative images. So many pundits talking past real issues. So many obvious problems.
They are a lousy team with perhaps the worst owner in all of professional sports, but the Imperial City wants the Redskins nonetheless. As Alex Gold and Ted Gayer of the Brookings Institute write:
There’s a small group of potential Republican presidential candidates you don’t hear much about, though they speak at events along with better-known candidates. They don’t have exploratory committees or campaign staffs. They’re one-man bands. But what they do have are impressive records. This group…
"You know, I’d really had a nightmare about this, but I didn’t realize they would do it. I didn’t think they would. The kids must be terrified.” So exclaimed Danielle Meitiv of Silver Spring, Maryland, to free-range-parenting godmother Lenore Skenazy. The “they” in this case are the…
Former Baltimore mayor Martin O'Malley said that if he runs for president, he'll launch his campaign in Baltimore:
New Jersey governor Chris Christie will be sending New Jersey cops to Baltimore. The Republican governor made the announcement on Twitter.
Is former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley moving closer to running for president? A short video on the Democrat's Facebook page looks like the beginning of a campaign ad.
Outgoing Maryland governor Martin O'Malley is commuting the sentences of the state's four remaining inmates on death row. In 2012, Maryland abolished the death penalty, but the law did not apply to those already sentenced for execution. O'Malley, a Democrat, said in an official statement that…
Speaking truth to power is easy—or easier, anyway, than speaking truth to money. We might resist a sovereign who commands us to preach his favored doctrines. But a sovereign who slips us a little cash on the side, just for a sermon or two on something we maybe don’t really disagree with all that…
Of all the rituals I count on to give my life shape, there is none so sacred as witnessing my former brother-in-law, Mike Benton, stand for local office in our pleasant burg of Calvert County, Maryland. Though my wife’s sister wound down with Mike two decades ago, he and I have a…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Matt Labash reading his essay "They Like Mike."
Larry Hogan, a Republican businessman, has won his race for governor in Maryland against Democratic lieutenant governor Anthony Brown. The Associated Press projects:
The camera caught many empty seats at a rally Hillary Clinton is headlining in College Park, Maryland:
Republican gubernatorial candidate Larry Hogan has a 5-point lead over Democrat Anthony Brown in a surprisingly close race in Maryland, according to a poll conducted on behalf of the Hogan campaign and obtained by THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
Speaking to the overflow crowd at a campaign rally at Dr. Henry A. Wise, Jr. High School in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, President Obama urged the crowd to make sure "cousin Pookie" voted in November's election.
Every election year, it seems, there’s a race that catches the political set in Washington by surprise. It’s possible that we’ve already seen the 2014 version of this with the defeat of House majority leader Eric Cantor, a result few anticipated and fewer still predicted.
CNN reported last night that while Maryland governor Martin O'Malley doesn't want unaccompanied minors to be deported, he doesn't want them in certain parts of Maryland either.
The state of Maryland has encountered many setbacks in its attempt to get a health care website up and running smoothly. (Sound familiar?) And now, it has run up the white flag. As Mary Pat Flaherty and Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post report:
The state agency in charge of Maryland's beleaguered Obamacare Marketplace, the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange (MHBE), is looking to establish a standing advisory committee to provide the board of the MHBE advice and input on a "broad range of policy issues." The MHBE sent out a letter to…
The movies folks responsible for the making of House of Cards seem to have been reading their own reviews or taking a page out of their own (ludicrous) scripts. Or something. As Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post reports:
The chief executive officer for Minnesota's Obamacare exchange resigned Tuesday after reports surfaced she had taken a tropical vacation in November, right when the state's health insurance exchange website was experiencing problems. ABC affiliate KSTP has the story:
According to the University of Maryland student newspaper The Diamondback, the university’s student health insurance plan is considering requiring coverage of sex change operations.
In mid-October, the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange quietly postponed all of the forums it had scheduled to inform small businesses about the Small Business Health Options Program (SHOP), as we reported. Now, in a Friday press release, the Maryland board overseeing the state's Obamacare website…
The attorney general of Maryland was criticized for attending an underage party that his son was DJ-ing. There you are, a reporter pointed to a picture of the party, "In front of two guys, their shirts off, with a girl twerking in between."
The state of Maryland has been front and center on the launch of open enrollment through the new Obamacare insurance marketplaces on October 1. The week before the launch, President Obama joined Maryland governor Martin O'Malley in Largo, Maryland to boost public awareness of the marketplaces, and…
On October 8, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that the privacy policy of the Maryland Health Connection (MHC), the state's Obamacare insurance marketplace, included a statement that the marketplace "may share information provided in your application with the appropriate authorities for law enforcement…
Maryland's Health Connection, the state's Obamacare marketplace, has been plagued by delays in the first days of open enrollment. If users are able to endure long page-loading delays, they are presented with the website's privacy policy, a ubiquitous fine-print feature on websites that often go…
"If you've got a doctor that you like, you will be able to keep your doctor," President Obama assured the public as he worked to sell Obamacare in 2010. However, in July 2013, visitors to Healthcare.gov received a less confident "you may be able to" in answer to the question, "Can I keep my own…
The governor of the state of Maryland, Martin O'Malley, has signed legislation to repeal the death penalty.
Maryland governor Martin O'Malley, a possible Democratic candidate for president in 2016, just passed a very strict gun law, which includes a so-called assault weapons ban. But what's especially interesting is that before the December shooting at a school in Connecticut, Governor O'Malley had no…
Senator Ben Cardin today again said he had questions for Chuck Hagel, who has been nominated as secretary of defense:
Republicans often find comfort in the suburbs. But for long-time Maryland congressman Roscoe Bartlett, having a slice of Washington, D.C. suburbia added to his district means the biggest fight of his life. He now faces a tough challenge from Democrat John Delaney, the founder of a successful…
Maryland governor Martin O’Malley is lending last minute support today to Democratic Milwaukee mayor Tom Barrett in Wisconsin, days before the June 5th gubernatorial recall election. O’Malley is chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, so trying to get Barrett elected is (at least part of)…
Maryland governor Martin O'Malley, a rising Democratic star who has generated some 2016 presidential buzz, published a photo on his Twitter feed this afternoon of New Mexico's Republican governor Susana Martinez, along with a delegation of visitors from the southwestern state. O'Malley's message,…
Annapolis
Mitt Romney is projected to win the Wisconsin Republican presidential primary, according Fox News. Currently, 162 of 3,755 precincts are reporting, with Romney getting 42 percent of the votes so far, Rick Santorum with 40 percent, Ron Paul with 11 percent, and Newt Gingrich trailing with 6 percent.
As polls close in Maryland and Washington, D.C., "NBC News projects Romney the winner of both," tweets NBC's Chuck Todd. "Should be a delegate sweep in MD but too early to call that part just yet," says Todd, suggesting that Romney will go over 50 percent of the vote in Maryland.
The latest Rasmussen poll of likely Republican voters in Maryland finds Mitt Romney well ahead of his rivals:
Mitt Romney's Maryland chairman, former Republican governor Bob Ehrlich, just appeared on local television to boost his presidential candidate. But, in fact, he might have done the opposite. He was asked by the host, "Is there a scenario in your head where President Obama doesn't win Maryland?"
Maryland governor Martin O’Malley said Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry “seceded” from the National Governors Association (NGA), of which O'Malley is a member. The Democratic governor made the tongue-in-cheek remark to reporters in Washington this morning at a breakfast sponsored by the…
Sure, we're routinely graduating kids in this country that can't read or do basic math -- but hey, let's lard up the curriculum with a bunch of politicized nonsense, shall we?:
The first men to die in the American Civil War fell on this day, 150 years ago, on Pratt Street in Baltimore. Troops en route to Washington were confronted downtown by rioters, and the fighting cost four federal soldiers and 12 civilians their lives.
Minnesota, like a lot of states, is facing a major budget shortfall. In order to close the state's $6.2 billion gap, the Wall Street Journal reports that the state's new Democratic governor is considering jacking up the state's taxes on high income earners to unprecedented levels:
Delaware Senate. It wasn’t even close. Republican Christine O’Donnell jumped out to a lead against Mike Castle right away last night and did not look back. Final result: O’Donnell 53 percent, Castle 47 percent, with a little more than 3,500 votes separating the two. Turnout was 32 percent of…