Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said he'll allow a vote on an overhaul of U.S. surveillance programs, The Hill reports, meaning the Senate is expected to vote this week on the USA FREEDOM Act, which gives the National Security Agency (NSA) six months to change its bulk-record collection methods. But, in The Christian Science Monitor, Rachel Brand of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board shares concerns over losing Section 215, calling it "an essential investigative tool." Separately, Bryan Cunningham writes for Politico about the trend toward new spying powers in the EU while the U.S. scales back. And Edward Snowden is the focus of a cover story in The New York Times as disagreements continue over the NSA documents he leaked. "The rest of the documents have been used as a kind of intelligence porn for the rest of the world—'Oooh, look at what NSA is doing,'" former NSA General Counsel Stewart Baker said.
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