memeorandum: The Morning Plum: Revelations expose basic contradiction at heart of Obama's war on terror (Greg Sargent/The Plum Line)

2:30 PM ET, June 7, 2013

Top Items:

U.S. intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program — The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio, video, photographs, e-mails, documents and connection logs …

Wall Street Journal:

Thank You for Data-Mining — The NSA's ‘metadata’ surveillance is legal and necessary. — Well, another day, another Washington furor. This one is over a National Security Agency phone data monitoring program, but unlike the other White House scandals there seems to be little here that is scandalous.

Discussion: Yahoo! News, Althouse, Mashable, National Review, The Week, Politico, Right Turn, Outside the Beltway, The Atlantic Wire, Guardian and The Hill

Dylan Byers / Politico:

N.Y. Times changes scathing editorial — The New York Times editorial board has quietly changed the language in the most widely cited line from Thursday's scathing editorial about the Obama administration's surveillance of U.S. citizens. — The line — “The administration has now lost all credibility” …

Discussion: Washington Examiner, Mediaite, Hot Air and National Review, more at Mediagazer »

New York Times:

Anti-Surveillance Activist Is at Center of New Leak — After writing intensely, even obsessively, for years about government surveillance and the prosecution of journalists, Glenn Greenwald has suddenly put himself directly at the intersection of those two issues, and perhaps in the cross hairs of federal prosecutors.

Discussion: Guardian, TechCrunch, naked capitalism, Pressing Issues, Althouse, Daily Kos, Hit & Run, Conservative Intelligence …, The Daily Caller, Towleroad News #gay, Mediaite and The Dish, more at Mediagazer »

Guardian:

NSA PRISM program taps in to user data of Facebook, Yahoo and others — • Top secret PRISM program claims direct access to servers of firms including Google, Apple and Facebook — • Companies deny any knowledge of program in operation since 2007

Glenn Greenwald / Guardian:

On whistleblowers and government threats of investigation — No healthy democracy can endure when the most consequential acts of those in power remain secret and unaccountable — We followed Wednesday's story about the NSA's bulk telephone record-gathering with one yesterday …

Discussion: BuzzFeed, more at Mediagazer »

William Saletan / Slate:

Stop Freaking Out About the NSA — The government's phone surveillance isn't Orwellian. It's limited and supervised. — You don't need a wiretap to hear what people are saying about the National Security Agency's phone surveillance program. The program's details …

Discussion: Hit & Run, American Prospect and The PJ Tatler

Nick Hopkins / Guardian:

UK gathering secret intelligence via covert NSA operation — Exclusive: UK security agency GCHQ gaining information from world's biggest internet firms through US-run Prism programme — The UK's electronic eavesdropping and security agency, GCHQ, has been secretly gathering intelligence …

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Yahoo! News, Daily Mail, BBC, TechCrunch, Weasel Zippers, GigaOM, The Next Web and Engadget

New York Times:

Obama Calls Surveillance Programs Legal and Limited — WASHINGTON — President Obama on Friday offered a robust defense of the government surveillance programs revealed this week, and sought to reassure the public that his administration has not become a Big Brother with eyes and ears throughout the world of online communications.

Discussion: Guardian, Yahoo! News, The Next Web, The Volokh Conspiracy, Politico and Lawfare

ODNI Newsroom Feed:
DNI Statement on Recent Unauthorized Disclosures of Classified Information

Discussion: protein wisdom, Lawfare, The Volokh Conspiracy, Guardian, The Hinterland Gazette, Outside the Beltway, The Verge and RT

ODNI Newsroom Feed:
DNI Statement on Activities Authorized Under Section 702 of FISA

Discussion: Wonkblog, Yahoo! News, Mashable, Business Insider, The Daily Caller, The Next Web and Hit & Run

Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:
The Morning Plum: Revelations expose basic contradiction at heart of Obama's war on terror

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Hit & Run, New York Times, The Week and The Hill

Hugh Hewitt / Townhall.com:
Data Collection Isn't Data Abuse — Yet

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, The Hugh Hewitt Show and LewRockwell.com Blog

Wall Street Journal:
Tech Firms' Data Is Also Tapped

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Mother Jones, The Atlantic Wire, Daily Kos, Guardian, Outside the Beltway, Business Insider, Yahoo! News, Mashable, The Next Web and The Verge, more at Mediagazer »

Stewart Baker / The Volokh Conspiracy:
Minimization and the “Collection First” Surveillance Model

Discussion: Outside the Beltway and Lawfare

Tom Kludt / Talking Points Memo:
DNI: WaPo, Guardian Articles Contained ‘Numerous Inaccuracies’

Discussion: Business Insider

Michael Hirsh / NationalJournal.com:
James Clapper Clarifies Remarks Over NSA Snooping

Discussion: emptywheel, Yahoo! News, ABCNEWS and The Daily Caller

New York Times:
U.S. Confirms That It Gathers Online Data Overseas

Washington Post:
Documents: U.S. mining data from 9 leading Internet firms; companies deny knowledge

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, The Week, susiemadrak.com, Firedoglake, Business Insider and Daily Kos

New York Times:
President Obama's Dragnet

Carlo Muñoz / The Hill:
Clapper denied NSA surveillance before Senate panel in March testimony

Discussion: Power Line, Hot Air, Washington Post, Forbes and The Hill

Reuters:

Misfired 2010 email alerted IRS officials in Washington of targeting — (Reuters) - A misfired email from a U.S. Internal Revenue Service employee in Cincinnati alerted a number of Washington IRS officials that extra scrutiny was being placed on conservative groups in July 2010 …

Discussion: CBS DC, Yahoo! News, LifeNews.com, The PJ Tatler, Weasel Zippers, Hot Air, The Gateway Pundit, Alan Colmes' Liberaland, ViralRead and Jammie Wearing Fools

Bloomberg:

Why Obama Keeps Losing at the Supreme Court — In cases before the Supreme Court last year, President Barack Obama's Justice Department relied on outlandish legal theories that pushed a constitutional interpretation of extreme federal power. That posture led to unanimous losses in three …

Discussion: Conservative Intelligence …

Darren Samuelsohn / Politico:

George W. Bush critics turn wrath on President Obama — A club of Capitol Hill liberals made life hell for George W. Bush in his second term. — Now the gang is back — and they don't care that this time the president is their guy. — In the last few weeks, some of the loudest anti-Bush voices …

Discussion: Taylor Marsh and White House Dossier

Ronald Brownstein / NationalJournal.com:

Why Republicans Can Get Away With Ignoring Their Problems — The GOP can enjoy another strong midterm election in 2014 without doing much more to attract young or minority voters. — Republicans have a problem with young voters. Democrats have a problem with young nonvoters.

Discussion: Washington Monthly

Catherine Rampell / New York Times:

U.S. Added 175,000 Jobs in May; Jobless Rate Rises to 7.6% — American employers added 175,000 jobs in May, almost exactly the average monthly job growth over the last year, the Labor Department reported Friday, while the unemployment rate ticked up to 7.6 percent.

Discussion: Hot Air, The Dish, Wonkblog, Economix, The Maddow Blog, National Review, Daily Kos, americanthinker.com and Campaign for America's Future

Bill McBride / Calculated Risk:
May Employment Report: 175,000 Jobs, 7.6% Unemployment Rate

Discussion: Business Insider, Washington Monthly, ThinkProgress and Economix

Josh Gerstein / Politico:

President Obama's let's-have-a-debate defense — The Obama administration has a familiar refrain on the surveillance of Americans' telephone records: the president and his team are eager to have the debate. — Eager, that is, only after others have brought the tactics to light and the administration has spent years employing them.

Discussion: Pirate's Cove and Hot Air

Talking Points Memo:

Mike Lee Points To Patriot Act As Reason To Be Wary About Big Immigration Bill — In the midst of Senate floor debate on Friday, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) argued against the so-called Gang of Eight's comprehensive immigration reform bill because its length and scope could have unintended consequences …

Discussion: ThinkProgress and Mediaite

Justin Sink / Ballot Box:

Geraldo Rivera rules out Senate bid in New Jersey special election — In a Fox News Latino column, Rivera compares running against Newark Mayor Cory Booker to a battle in the “Lord of the Rings” books, saying the race would “be as one-sided as Théoden faced when leading his riders against Mordor.”

Discussion: Politico and Colorlines