The revelation comes in a letter to the U.S. Senate that reveals new facts about the secretive body.

By Conor Friedersdorf, The Atlantic, July 30, 2013

The Honorable Reggie B. Walton, the judge who presides over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, has sent the U.S. Senate a letter that describes in unprecedented detail how it functions. The letter is a response to questions posed by Senators Chuck Grassley and Patrick Leahy [.....]

By Elise Viebeck & Molly K. Hooper, The Hill, July 30, 2013

The Republican civil war on ObamaCare funding is intensifying.

The battle pits powerful rank-and-file freshmen such as Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) against veteran Washington players, including Karl Rove, Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) and Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.).

Cole told The Hill it would be “political suicide” for his party to get behind a strategy from Rubio, Cruz and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), adding that it could cost House Republicans their majority.

Many in the Tea Party are urging GOP leaders not to pass any government funding measure that pays for the implementation of ObamaCare [....]

The verdict is otherwise mixed:

"A military judge on Tuesday found Pfc. Bradley Manning not guilty of “aiding the enemy” for his release of hundreds of thousands of military and diplomatic documents to WikiLeaks. But she convicted him of multiple counts of violating the Espionage Act, stealing government property and other charges that could result in a maximum sentence of 136 years."

By Pam Belluck, New York Times, July 30, 2013

For some people with severe mental illness, life is a cycle of hospitalization, skipped medication, decline and then rehospitalization. They may deny they have psychiatric disorders, refuse treatment and cascade into out-of-control behavior that can be threatening to themselves or others.

Now, a study has found that a controversial program that orders these patients to receive treatment when they are not hospitalized has had positive results. Patients were much less likely to end up back in psychiatric hospitals and were arrested less often. Use of outpatient treatment significantly increased, as did refills of medication. Costs to the mental health system and Medicaid of caring for these patients dropped by half or more.

The study evaluated the program run by New York State, known as Kendra’s Law because it was enacted after Kendra Webdale was pushed to her death on the New York City subway tracks by a man with untreated schizophrenia in 1999. Forty-four other states have some form of Kendra’s Law, but New York’s is by far the most developed because the state has invested significant resources into paying for it, experts say.

From the start, Kendra’s Law has had staunch defenders and detractors. But the new analysis, led by researchers at Duke University and published in The American Journal of Psychiatry, joins a series of studies that suggest the program can be helpful for patients who, while they constitute only a small number of the people with mental illness, are some of the most difficult and expensive to care for [.....]

Because General Zod didn't run...

By Ariel Levy, The New Yorker, for the Aug. 5, 2013 issue and online

After high-school football stars (in Steubenville, OH) were accused of rape, online vigilantes ("Anonymous") demanded that justice be served. Was it?

Well, that is significant.

Update - I thought I would add my comments since one of the Michaels was nice enough to spotlight my post. What really stood out to me about this news was that the Pope was so off the cuff and direct about his renouncing homophobia.

There's no big announcement or talking about weighing both sides - he just says "Who am I to judge?" That is from the anointed leader of the largest, and by definition most conservative, sect of Christianity. He represents one billion people.

This is amazing and it may reflect the average person's modern views on sexuality. He could possibly have taken the air out of the anti-gay marriage balloon on a global scale.

This is terrific writing and analysis.

By Yasser Rizq, Translated from Al-Masry Al-Youm (Egypt) by Al Monitor, July 25, 2013. Home page lede: The editor-in-chief of Al-Masry Al-Youm provides perspective on Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and the lead-up to the ouster of Egyptian President.                                                              

I don't recall ever having hesitated before writing something as much as I have now. [....]

I first met Defense Minister Maj. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi 28 months ago, a few weeks after the Jan. 25 revolution. At the time, he was director of military intelligence. I met him during a special meeting that also included three senior leaders from the armed forces and three prominent intellectuals [....]

During the meeting, talks focused on the secrets and details of the army's role in supporting the Jan. 25 revolution. [....]

That day we came out of the meeting enthralled by the personality of this young leader. He was calm, cultured, religious, level-headed, articulate and full of pride for Egyptian nationalism and the deep-rooted military establishment. 

Later, I learned that this young leader was the first member of the armed forces to predict the popular revolution against the regime of former President Hosni Mubarak. He wrote a report that included his position regarding the repercussions of the events, which [in his view] would lead to a popular uprising that would oust the regime. He submitted the report to Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi in early April 2010. Tantawi asked him: "At that time, what do you think we should do?" He replied: "We will support the people's uprising and will not fire on a single citizen."

In his report, Sisi predicted that [....]

Reuters, July 27, 2013

TRIPOLI — Libya's prime minister said he would reshuffle the cabinet and reorganize the government to cope with the "urgent" situation in the country following killings in the eastern city of Benghazi that sparked violent demonstrations.

Hundreds took to the streets overnight to denounce the assassination of a prominent political activist and critic of the Muslim Brotherhood, Abdelsalam al-Mosmary, who was shot dead on Friday after leaving a mosque in Benghazi. The demonstrations turned violent, and on Saturday protesters attacked the Benghazi and Tripoli offices of the Muslim Brotherhood's political party and the headquarters of a liberal political coalition in the capital.
 
Mosmary, one of the first activists to take to the streets in Libya's February 2011 uprising, was an outspoken opponent of the Brotherhood, whose Islamist political wing is the second biggest party in Libya's General National Congress (GNC) [....]

The American economy, ever-adapting to an evolving global marketplace, is leaving many folks behind.  There are many metrics that bear this out, among them the widening gap between the wealthiest and poorest Americans. 

These workers are taking matters into their own hands--with one day strikes--in the finest tradition of the workers who gave the rest of us the weekend, overtime pay, and an end to child labor.