“Remember when Obama said the NSA wasn’t “actually abusing” its powers?”
He lied.

So the NSA has, in fact, been “listening in on people’s phone calls.”
Obama said that wasn’t supposed to happen because it would be “against the orders of the FISC.” So why didn’t the judges on the court catch these abuses?
In another story broken by The Post today, the chief of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court admits he doesn’t actually have the capability to investigate the compliance record of NSA surveillance programs…

More at Instapundit: “So the NSA ‘accidentally’ wiretapped the DC area code in an election year when illegal NSA surveillance was an issue.”

Manufacturing News:

Hundreds of major American corporations are shipping thousands of jobs overseas, according to an analysis of Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) filings made to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration on behalf of the displaced workers.

WaPo;

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), another member of the House Intelligence Committee, said the biggest challenge has been figuring out exactly what questions to ask. “Sometimes you wonder if you’re missing big things that you shouldn’t be missing,” Schiff said. The task is made harder, he said, because members must leave their briefing materials in the committee offices in the Capitol basement, where each member’s documents are kept in three-ring binders labeled “Top Secret.”
“The members have to maintain their own notes and their own follow-up and keep the issues very much in their own minds,” he said.
Similar concerns have come from some Republicans, including Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. of Wisconsin, a key author of the law authorizing the bulk data surveillance who has in recent weeks become a critic. He said classified briefings for lawmakers were a “rope-a-dope operation” designed to silence “those who are on the trail of something that isn’t right” because rules restrict their ability to speak with other members and the public.

NSA Firing 90% of Its Sysadmins

Lavabit goes down;

Now in the midst of an escalating fight from the federal government aimed at cracking down on encrypted communications, one of the last free and secure services has thrown in the towel under mysterious circumstances.
“I have been forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly ten years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit. After significant soul searching, I have decided to suspend operations,” owner and operator Ladar Levison of Dallas, Texas wrote in the statement. “I wish that I could legally share with you the events that led to my decision. I cannot.”
“I feel you deserve to know what’s going on–the First Amendment is supposed to guarantee me the freedom to speak out in situations like this. Unfortunately, Congress has passed laws that say otherwise,” wrote Levison. “As things currently stand, I cannot share my experiences over the last six weeks, even though I have twice made the appropriate requests.”

Nice country. What a shame that something happened to it.
(h/t soundofmusak)

Mark Steyn;

Following the seven armed undercover agents required to confront a female college student in last month’s sparkling-water stand-off and the 13 armed officers needed to take down a baby deer called Giggles, in Cook County the other day five-to-seven police officers showed up at the Victory Centre senior living facility to tase, fire at, and kill a 95-year-old man for refusing to take his medication…

Forward.

Via Kevin B., who notes “1984 wasn’t a warning; it was a playbook”.

Don’t like how high debt-to-GDP figures are? Revise ’em. Unhappy at the post-‘recovery’ growth rates? Revise ’em. Disappointed at the pace of economic improvement in the last decade or two compared to the rest of the world? Revise ’em. This week “we are essentially rewriting economic history” as the BEA is set to revise GDP data from as far back as 1929.

Sarah Palin was right about death panels! Yeaarrggh!

IRS watchdog reviewing claims of improper audit of Tea Party farmer