In the Illinois 13th congressional district, a former Miss America winner is challenging one of the House's newest members.

With the recent May jobs report showing the United States added 175,000 jobs last month, there is not much attention on the much smaller number of jobs the federal government shed.

Much of the right-wing resistance to the post-Newtown gun control push was animated, not by gun owners’ commitment to hunting or personal defense, but by the idea that an armed society is a fundamental safeguard against government tyranny.

For example, in a hearing on gun control, NRA leader Wayne LaPierre told Congress that the Founding Fathers conceived of the Second Amendment because “they had lived under the tyranny of King George and they wanted to make sure that these free people in this new country would never be subjugated again and have to live under tyranny.”

I am one of the most useless human beings I know. Sad but true. I have three degrees in English literature, I did not get my first job until I was 30 years old, and I have never worked for more than three months except at a college or university. I have never changed a tire or balanced a checkbook.  I do not even understand sports metaphors. There is almost nothing that I can claim to be an expert about.

I am one of the most useless human beings I know. Sad but true. I have three degrees in English literature, I did not get my first job until I was 30 years old, and I have never worked for more than three months except at a college or university. I have never changed a tire or balanced a checkbook.  I do not even understand sports metaphors. There is almost nothing that I can claim to be an expert about.

In American politics, few mainstream figures are as controversial as former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura. A Navy SEAL, pro-wrestler, singer, and movie star, the one-time Reform Party candidate can boast of having achieved a great many accomplishments in an assortment of fields, though mastering conventionalism is not one of them.