"Washington is blessed to have a top two primary, meaning that two candidates in each race will advance, regardless of party. It also means that voters can cross party lines in the primary, a system that is much preferable to that found in many parts of the country.
Since President Obama's inauguration and Rick Santelli's movement-making call to action that inspired the tea party, national politics has been a triangular affair, with the Republican "establishment" caught in the middle between an anti-incumbent reaction and a seemingly united Democratic front. This triangular dynamic guiding policymaking in the past few years -- from the credit downgrade to the fiscal cliff to the government shutdown -- has led to the exclusion of the progressive wing of the Democratic Party from having much of a say in legislative affairs.
Thirteen-year-old Stephanie Roman-Reyes can identify with the tens of thousands of refugee children in danger of deportation along the southern U.S. border.
Huddled beneath a tree in Lafayette Square with her infant sister and mother, the Queens, New York middle-school student began crying as she talked on Thursday about her father, whom authorities returned to Mexico three years earlier.
While the U.S. political scene is often described as polarized, many members within the major political parties can agree on one issue: privacy and surveillance. From Democrats like Dianne Feinstein and Dick Durbin to Republicans like John McCain and Lindsey Graham, support for the current system of NSA surveillance and data collection is one of the clearest examples of what bipartisanship looks like in Washington.
In the wake of the devastating scandal within the Department of Veterans Affairs, Congress approved a $16.3 billion appropriations bill to hire more staff members and lease more space for VA medical clinics, attempting to cut down on the long wait times and poor care experienced by veterans.
While it would be an overstatement to claim that Russia and China possess identical goals and interests -- Russia is focused on its western frontier with Europe while China has its sights set on the South China Sea off its eastern coastline -- the two regional powers have struck harmony on some matters of mutual importance.
China has signed a major natural gas deal with the energy behemoth and has largely succeeded at maintaining better diplomatic relations with Russia than it has with Japan.
In May, Vox reported that Congress was not just dysfunctional, but also the most gridlocked, the least popular, the most polarized, the least productive, and the most expensive on record.
"The real change is being felt in legislative and congressional races in districts that are reliably red or blue, but have enough voters from the other side that a moderate has a shot at beating an extremist from the same party. That’s what’s happening to Democratic Rep. Mike Honda in San Jose and Republican Rep.
A plume is haunting America -- the plume of legal marijuana. The November ballots of two states, Oregon and Alaska, and the District of Columbia will include initiatives to legalize recreational marijuana. If passed, they will join Washington state and Colorado, who passed their own legalization measures in 2012. Florida voters will decide on a constitutional amendment legalizing medical marijuana, but not its recreational use.
Chronic pain is a serious problem for veterans. Research shows that half of all veterans have some kind of chronic pain problem after returning from combat and managing that pain can be challenging. But those challenges are compounded when the VA lacks many of the options available in a civilian environment -- or fails to offer them to patients -- and are left with NSAIDs and narcotics.