Ron Elving

The United States split into red states and blue as we know them just a few presidential elections ago. Some dislike the broad brush.

In 2010, President Obama lost six seats in the Senate and 63 in the House and called it "a shellacking." Four years before that, President George W. Bush lost six seats in the Senate and 30 in the House and called it a "thumpin'. "

We need a ...

Republicans have gained the power to run the Senate. That means, they takeover all the committees, control the agenda on the floor and gain the ability to stop President Obama's appointments.

Forget the contradictory polls and the pundit spin. Look to history as a more reliable guide to what will happen on Election Day.

The world's largest film industry, by the number of movies produced, has barred women from working as makeup artists for nearly six decades. But that may be changing.

The country's Supreme Court said Monday that it wouldn't allow this "constitutionally impermissible discrimination" to go on.

The Indian Express newspaper ...

An updated look at this year's Senate races and why we might not know who has won control of the Senate on Election Day.

Incumbent Democrat Sen. Jeanne Shaheen had maintained a lead over the Republican field throughout the year in the swing state. But Republican Scott Brown, former Massachusetts senator...

The midterm elections are less than a month away, and across the country, governors are in trouble. In both parties, state chief executives are facing tough re-election fights.

Technically, the Supreme Court Monday did not establish a constitutional right for same-sex couples to marry. It merely declined an opportunity to rule definitely one way or the other on the question.

But in the not-too-long run, the consequences may well be the same. Because the situation the court created ...

It turns out the Secret Service isn't too good at protecting the White House, and maybe one reason is that we don't want it to be.

Secret Service agents are famously willing to sacrifice their own lives to protect the president and his family. They are also trained to take ...

When President Woodrow Wilson was casting about for an attorney general in 1919, his private secretary Joseph Tumulty wrote that the office "had great power politically ... we should not trust it to anyone who is not heart and soul with us."

Eric Holder's great qualification for the job he ...

This week's war vote in the U.S. Senate presented each senator with a personal puzzle of competing political considerations.

In deciding whether to arm and train Syrian rebels to fight against the group called the Islamic State (or ISIS or ISIL), senators had to judge the issue on its merits, ...

This week's war vote in the U.S. Senate presented each senator with a personal puzzle of competing political considerations.

In deciding whether to arm and train Syrian rebels to fight against the group called the Islamic State (or ISIS or ISIL), senators had to judge the issue on its merits, ...

Over the weekend, White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough was asked on NBC's Meet the Press what victory would look like in the new struggle against Islamist extremists in Iraq.

"Success looks like an ISIL that no longer threatens our friends in the region, that no longer threatens the ...

After a decade in national politics as a dove, Barack Obama has become a reluctant hawk.

Obama's long transformation reached its endpoint on the eve of the 13th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. But it came, in the end, because Americans suddenly felt a renewed sense of peril from ...

Tanned and rested after a five-week summer vacation, Congress has returned for a brief session before returning home to campaign for re-election. This autumn session is expected to last a couple of weeks, give or take a couple of days.

What can be accomplished in so short a time? A ...

Congress was back in town on Monday for a two-week sprint before the midterm elections. On the schedule: pass a budget bill so the government doesn't shut down again, decide the fate ...

With the stunning conviction of former Virginia GOP Gov. Bob McDonnell and his wife on corruption charges, people are once again posing that age old question: Why do so many politicians get into trouble with the law?

The list of reasons comes as a shock because it's so short. The ...

Former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell has been found guilty on all 11 public corruption charges that he faced. His wife, Maureen, was convicted of eight of those same charges, as well as...

A group that tracks violence against children is reporting "grave violations" in Nigeria's fragile northeast. Violence there is getting worse, the group says, despite a state of emerg...