Why Was the NSA Tracking Porn Habits?

The latest Edward Snowden leak reveals the National Security Agency was collecting information on online sexual activity to disgrace “radicalizers”; right-winger Dinesh D’Souza tweeted an appallingly racist comment regarding Thanksgiving, Trayvon Martin and President Obama; meanwhile, it appears the bacteria in your gut shapes your brain. These discoveries and more below.

On a regular basis, Truthdig brings you the news items and odds and ends that have found their way to Larry Gross, director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. A specialist in media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies.

NSA Spied On Porn Habits As Part Of Plan To Discredit ‘Radicalizers’ The National Security Agency has been gathering records of online sexual activity and evidence of visits to pornographic websites as part of a proposed plan to harm the reputations of those whom the agency believes are radicalizing others through incendiary speeches, according to a top-secret NSA document.

Fine Print: Report Surprises with ‘Ugly Deal’ on Iran Insights can come from unexpected places.

At The Miami Herald, Maybe Newsroom Place Still Matters When The Miami Herald left its home on Biscayne Bay, many in the newsroom were wistful.

Right-wing Author and Filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza Sets Off Twitter Storm with Outrageously Racist Tweet The man who brought the world “2016: Obama’s America” tries and fails to be funny on Twitter.

The Neuroscience of the Gut Strange but true: the brain is shaped by bacteria in the digestive tract.

Spain’s Housing Activists Scale Up Squatter Movement What makes a movement turn into a landlord?

The Evolving Role of the Oxford English Dictionary Look for a topical expression in the Oxford English Dictionary and you may find it is older than you think.

The FBI Files on Being and Nothingness From 1945 onwards, J Edgar Hoover’s FBI spied on Camus and Sartre. The investigation soon turned into a philosophical inquiry…

Former Likud Minister Bashes Own Party for Pushing Apartheid Legislation Former cabinet minister Dan Meridor harshly criticized his past colleagues from the Likud faction for pushing legislation that discriminates against Israeli Arabs and the refugees, claiming they are trying to establish an apartheid state.

How David Hockney Became the World’s Foremost iPad Painter It’s mind-boggling to look at paintings from the 14th and 15th centuries and think that artists like Leonardo da Vinci created such vibrant portraits using nothing more than a free hand and the naked eye—when just 100 years before, two-point perspective was unknown.

Qatar 2022 World Cup Stadium Looks Like A Vagina, Everyone Giggles It’s pretty hard to miss that the Al-Wakrah sports stadium bears a pretty close resemblance to, well, a vagina: a majestic, modern, white vagina capable of holding more than 40,000 people, nonetheless.

BRICS Lessons in (Un)sustainable Urbanisation What is to be done, in the wake of Warsaw climate summit’s conclusive failure to cap emissions last weekend?

Japanese Prime Minister And Obama Want Japan Able To Wage War After the end of World War II, the Japanese constitution, written in part by the United States for the defeated Japanese nation, rejected war as a solution for conflict.