Phil Everly of the Everly Brothers dies at 74  —  This post has been updated.  See note below for details.  —  Phil Everly, who with his brother, Don, made up the most revered vocal duo of the rock-music era, their exquisite harmonies profoundly influencing the Beatles, the Beach Boys …

Is the NSA Spying on Congress?  —  U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) today asked the National Security Agency director whether the agency has monitored the phone calls, emails and Internet traffic of members of Congress and other elected officials.  —  “Has the NSA spied, or is the NSA currently spying …

Degrees of Value: Making College Pay Off  —  For Too Many Americans, College Today Isn't Worth It … In the field of higher education, reality is outrunning parody.  A recent feature on the satire website the Onion proclaimed, “30-Year-Old Has Earned $11 More Than He Would Have Without College Education.”

Strategists to GOP: Restrain yourselves on debt ceiling  —  GOP strategists are urging restraint in the upcoming debt-ceiling fight.  —  They are excited by the prospect of reclaiming the Senate in November's midterms elections but anxious about the party's capacity to snatch defeat …

Why Snowden Won't (and Shouldn't) Get Clemency  —  He went too far to be considered just a whistleblower.  —  I regard Daniel Ellsberg as an American patriot.  I was one of the first columnists to write that Director of National Intelligence James Clapper should be fired for lying to Congress.

Teens in Muslim garb try, fail to rob gun shop  —  MOST TEENAGERS do dumb things.  But not trying-to-rob-Joe-Galiano dumb.  —  Galiano is the owner of Suburban Armory, the gun shop on MacDade Boulevard in Collingdale, Delaware County.  There is a giant gun-shaped sign on the roof.

I, Like David Brooks, Have Smoked Marijuana  —  In order to comment on the marijuana legalization debate, it is apparently necessary to confess to your own history of pot-smoking first, so here goes: While in college, I experimented with marijuana.  To be precise, I conducted 132 experiments with marijuana.

Political palliatives won't cure ObamaCare's ills.  —  While we were away, the Department of Health and Human Services offered what might be termed a concession to reality.  In a Dec. 19 letter, Secretary Kathleen Sebelius informed Virginia's Mark Warner and five other members …

Cold U.S. Temperatures Expected To Break Records As ‘Polar Vortex’ Blasts Midwest  —  SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — The weather warnings are dire: Life threatening wind chills.  Historic cold outbreak.  Bitter cold temperatures.  —  Winter is normally cold, but starting Sunday tundra …

GOP's “Duck Dynasty” problem: Why Phil Robertson was a hugely important political story  —  Phil Robertson explains more about our country's political culture than almost anything else that happened in 2013  —  I was on vacation for the last two weeks of December, and off the grid for most of that time.

IMF Says: By the Way, There's a Debt Crisis  —  Two summers ago, we ran the Power Line Prize contest to try to focus attention on the exploding national debt.  The contest was successful, in that it incentivized the production of many high-quality videos, songs, pictures …

Al-Qaeda force captures Fallujah amid rise in violence in Iraq  —  BEIRUT — A rejuvenated al-Qaeda force asserted control over the western Iraqi town of Fallujah on Friday, raising its flag over government buildings and declaring an Islamic state in one of the most crucial areas …

The Social-Minded Pope Francis Is a Very Different Kind of Pontiff  —  Pope Francis, the first Pope from a developing nation, sees the world through the eyes of the poor and dispossessed.  —  Add my name to the long list of souls who have leapt aboard the Pope Francis bandwagon.

Rude and Crude: Why MSNBC keeps getting into trouble  —  Is there something in the water over at 30 Rock?  —  Whether you love or detest MSNBC, the network has had a rough few months, and I'm wondering whether a series of embarrassing episodes is more than a coincidence.

FACT SHEET: Strengthening the Federal Background Check System to Keep Guns out of Potentially Dangerous Hands  —  Today, the Administration is announcing two new executive actions that will help strengthen the federal background check system and keep guns out of the wrong hands.