In perfect Bush-like fashion, President Obama has invented a bogus pretense for military intervention in yet another Middle East country. The president's claim that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons — and thus crossed Obama's imaginary "red line" — will likely fool very few Americans, who already distrust their president after the massive NSA spying scandal. 

Since we began began publishing stories about the NSA's massive domestic spying apparatus, various NSA defenders – beginning with President Obama - have sought to assure the public that this is all done under robust judicial oversight.

The Supreme Court ruled on Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council Arizona today, upholding Congress’s power to regulate federal elections.

The Brennan Center for Justice released the following statement from Democracy Program Director Wendy Weiser:

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One of the ironies of warfare is that an apparently vastly superior force can be defeated by an apparently much weaker one when the weaker force refuses to meet the more powerful on its own terms, play by its rules, square off army to army, submit to punch and counterpunch. A combination of strategy and tactics designed by the weaker force to enervate the morale, confidence and finances of the powerful may prove decisive --- as it did for the American revolutionaries against the British, North Vietnamese & Viet Cong against the U.S., or the Afghanis against the Soviets.

Much of the U.S. media coverage of last week’s NSA revelations has concentrated on its impact on the constitutional rights of U.S.-based Internet users. But what about the billions of Internet users around the world whose private information is stored on U.S. servers, or whose data travels across U.S. networks or is otherwise accessible through them?