USA Today: "Kathleen Sebelius is on the hot seat as the Obama administration battles to rebound from a problem-plagued rollout of the Affordable Care Act, but friends of the embattled Health and Human Services secretary say it's a mistake to count her out."
Politico previews today’s committee hearing: “Marilyn Tavenner, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, will appear before the House Ways and Means Committee, the first time that lawmakers will have a chance to question an official involved in the botched rollout of the president’s signature domestic achievement. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius testifies before a separate panel on Wednesday.”
The L.A. Times: “Beyond the widely publicized problems with the federal website, low-tech challenges also are complicating that part of the drive to sell the program — even in California, where the state website is running more smoothly and officials are fully behind the push.”
The L.A. Times: “The White House and State Department signed off on surveillance targeting phone conversations of friendly foreign leaders, current and former U.S. intelligence officials said Monday, pushing back against assertions that President Obama and his aides were unaware of the high-level eavesdropping.”
Washington Post: "In the midst of the controversy over U.S. surveillance this summer, top intelligence officials held a briefing for President Obama at the White House — one that would provide him with a broad inventory of programs being carried out by the National Security Agency. Some of those programs, including the collection of e-mails and other communications from overseas, had already been disclosed because of leaks from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. But Obama was also informed of at least one program whose scope surprised him: 'head of state collection.'"
Wall Street Journal: "Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.), an ally of the Obama administration and one of the National Security Agency’s strongest defenders on Capitol Hill, harshly criticized the agency on Monday and said her committee will initiate a 'major review into all intelligence-collection programs.'"
When Dick Cheney is defending your spying policy…
