What the ...?  —  You may be aware of press reports alleging that Internet companies have joined a secret U.S. government program called PRISM to give the National Security Agency direct access to our servers.  As Google's CEO and Chief Legal Officer, we wanted you to have the facts.

Dem.  Senator disputes Obama's claim that Congress was briefed  —  Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) on Friday disputed a claim President Obama made at a press conference only moments earlier, when the president said that every member of Congress had been briefed on the National Security Agency's (NSA) domestic phone surveillance program.

Obama orders US to draw up overseas target list for cyber-attacks  —  Exclusive: Top-secret directive steps up offensive cyber capabilities to ‘advance US objectives around the world’  —  • Read the secret presidential directive here  —  Barack Obama has ordered his senior national security …

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 …

Soldier Told Not to Read Levin, Limbaugh or Hannity in Uniform  —  A veteran member of the U.S. Army Band said he is facing retribution and punishment from the military for having anti-Obama bumper stickers on his car, reading books written by conservative authors like Mark Levin and David Limbaugh …

Texas woman arrested in ricin letters to Obama, Bloomberg: Officials  —  A Texas woman has been arrested in connection with the mailing of three letters containing a form of the poison ricin to President Obama, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg and the director of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, federal authorities said.

Manchin Seeks End to Widespread Anti-Terror Surveillance  —  President Barack Obama should end the broad surveillance of telephone calls and Internet usage, Democratic Senator Joe Manchin said today.  —  “It bothers me, and I think it bothers you and every other American,” Manchin …

We are shocked, shocked...  Is it just me or does the entire news media — as well as all the agitators and self-righteous bloviators on both sides of the aisle — not understand even the rudiments of electronic intercepts and the manner in which law enforcement actually uses such intercepts?

Detroit's Van Gogh Would Be Better Off in L.A.  —  When the news broke that if Detroit goes into bankruptcy the city might cover some of its $15 billion debt by selling Detroit Institute of Arts treasures, the reaction was predictable and the language harsh.  —  The DIA's director, Graham Beal, called the idea “sickening.”

‘Uhhh...Uh...Uhhh....People!’  Obama at Total Loss for Words When Staff Forgets His Speech  —  President Obama strolled out to the podium today in San Jose, CA and was immediately at a loss for words.  Not only did the President not have teleprompter, his aides forgot his speech.

Dershowitz To CNN: ‘Hearing Lot Of Lies’ From People Like Greenwald Who ‘Foment A Paranoid Streak’  —  Alan Dershowitz, professor of law at Harvard University, defended the Obama administration on Friday and excoriated those in the media who he says are disseminating a number of half-truths relating …

Obama speech-less  —  (CNN) - President Barack Obama got off to an awkward and unusual start Friday morning as he took the stage to give a speech on health care reform.  —  Once he took the podium, he realized he didn't have anything to talk about.  —  “Good morning everybody.

Massive Government Spying Is The Result Of A Public Obsessed With Eliminating Terrorism  —  The revelations about massive National Security Agency snooping in Americans' phone records and Internet activities appear to be shocking, but they aren't.  —  The reason programs like these exist …

Three shot, suspect detained at Santa Monica College  —  The suspect was located in the school's library and was taken into custody.  —  Three people were wounded Friday during a shooting in the Santa Monica College area, law enforcement sources told The Times.

Americans Think Officials Knew About IRS Political Targeting  —  Majority disapproves of the way Obama has handled the matter  —  PRINCETON, NJ — Nearly six in 10 Americans believe that high-ranking IRS officials in Washington were aware the IRS had a practice of targeting conservative political groups …

Get used to killer heat waves, CDC warns  —  People crowd at the beach at Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York, on June 30, 2012, as heat waves and thunderstorms hit the eastern United States  —  Think last summer was bad?  You better get used to it, federal health officials warned Thursday.

Is There Plagiarism in Jonah Lehrer's New Book Proposal?  —  Yesterday, I reported that disgraced science journalist Jonah Lehrer had sold his new book on the power of love to Simon & Schuster.  In a follow-up story last night, the New York Times quoted the book's new editor, Ben Loehnen …

GLENN GREENWALD: The US Wants To ‘Destroy Privacy Around The World’  —  The journalist who took part in breaking two attention-grabbing stories on government surveillance charged that the United States is interested in destroying privacy all over the world.  —  “There is a massive apparatus within …

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” …

Military benefits for same-sex couples to begin Sept. 1  —  The Pentagon plans to begin issuing identification cards to the same-sex partners of service members beginning Sept. 1, according to an internal personnel Web posting on Thursday.  —  The dependents' ID cards will entitle partners …

Flatten the IRS?  —  The cartoon below brings up the question that has been on my mind since the IRS scandal first broke: might this be the opening for tax reform, or better still, a flat tax?  The arguments for a flat tax have long been not just simplicity but that it would be more conducive to economic growth.

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 …

Behind the Obamacare Derangement Syndrome  —  At TNR today, Noam Scheiber looks at the deep investment Republican pols and conservative scribblers and gabbers seem to have in the failure of the Affordable Care Act of 2010, and sees a concentration of the biases we have all called the Obama Derangement Syndrome on this one issue.

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 …