Today's Headlines and Commentary

Things are unraveling fast in Ukraine. Street clashes between police and demonstrators, dozens of deaths, and hardening political positions make for the lead story in today’s major newspapers.

Secretary of State John Kerry will threaten sanctions against Ukraine, reports CNN, and BBC tells us that the European Union, in an emergency meeting on the situation today, will do the same.

Sectarian violence and geopolitical tensions continue to spill into Lebanon as two suicide bombers blew themselves up near an Iranian cultural center, killing at least four and wounding many more. The Abdullah Azzam Brigades claimed the attacks were retaliation for Iran’s and Hezbollah’s support for the Assad regime. The Associated Press has the story.

The U.S. is still reluctant to use force in Syria. Tell us something we don’t know, Reuters. Meanwhile, Syrian rebels are pushing the Obama administration to provide them with more weapons.

Late Tuesday, Turkish President Abdullah Gul signed a law giving the central government far greater powers to block websites and monitor individual internet activity. Although Gul claims to have extracted a promise from the government to amend pieces of the law, the move was still met with widespread opposition and was seen by analysts as an attempt to shore up his own political situation. The law comes into effect as Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s hold on power continues to be threatened by ongoing corruption investigations and public suspicion.

For the first time in its thirteen year existence, Guantanamo Bay will accept day visits from some inmates’ family members. As the Southern Command will not allow families to stay on the outpost itself, the ICRC will be have to find local islands willing to host the families. Carol Rosenberg of the Miami Herald has the story.

The Wall Street Journal has an extensive story on Target’s recent cybersecurity breach and how its CEO, Gregg Steinhafel, chose to manage the fallout. The article emphasizes Steinhafel’s decision to be even more transparent than the law required, potentially overstating the number of customers affected by the breach.

The Washington Post reports that the Department of Homeland Security is seeking to have a private company establish a national license plate tracking system. The system would collect location data on millions of cars, and would be checked by law enforcement seeking specific individuals. As expected, the plan has raised concerns from the ACLU and privacy advocates.

AT&T has released information on the scope of national security data requests it received in the first half of 2013---fewer than 1,000 requests. The Journal compares the data to that released by Verizon, and compares both to the far larger number of requests and subpoenas the companies receive from standard law enforcement.

It’s not just government drones that are raising privacy concerns and thorny legal questions. In Hartford, a local journalist is suing the police for forbidding his use of a drone to record images of a car wreck.

The political landscape of surveillance “could transform the politics of national security,” explains the AP.

Josh Gerstein of Politico, Ellen Nakashima of the Post, and Greta Brawner of C-SPAN interviewed David Medine, the chairman of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, on how it would assess the effectiveness of the 702 program---which, unlike the 215 program---is aimed at collecting intelligence on more than terrorism, and therefore lies outside the PCLOB’s mandate. The video is below.

Two separate roadside bombs killed six Afghan soldiers and three civilians yesterday.

Adam Gadahn, Al Qaeda’s media guru, could be one of the U.S. citizens the administration is thinking about targeting with a drone. ABC News has the story.

And, in 2011, NSA and DHS sent “cease and desist” letters to a libertarian purveyor of parody merchandise who mocked these security agencies with mugs and t-shirts saying, among other things, “Spying On You Since 1952”---it’s Today’s Moment of Zen.