Today's Headlines and Commentary

Several brewing storms before the weekend: The controversy over the NDAA continues to generate friction between the administration and Congress. According to the Washington Post and the Politico, President Obama has threatened to veto the bill over the controversial detention provisions. Tarek Mehanna's trial is also heating up. The Boston Globe reports that the highest-profile witness to testify at Mehanna's trial yesterday said that Mehanna told him he wanted to fight U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Things really aren't looking great for him. The Times has reports on the controversy surrounding Pakistan's ambassador to the U.S., who is accused of writing a memo asking the U.S. for help to deal with an alleged Pakistani military coup over the death of bin Laden. The Post further details the deep fissure between "Pakistan's powerful army and its civilian governemnt," and the Associated Press has more. In other news, the Legal Times blog informs us that the D.C. Circuit is examining the first narco-terrorism case on claims that "the evidence in the case was insufficient to support the charges." The defendant, an Afghan by the name of Khan Mohammed, "allegedly provided proceeds of a drug transaction to a person amid a planned attack against an airfield where U.S. military personnel were stationed." He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison in 2008; the Department of Justice press release is here. A U.S. District Court judge has ordered that the FBI "pay the legal fees of Muslim activist groups that sued the federal agency for access to its files," says the Associated Press. Turns out, the FBI lied about their existence. CBS News provides an account of "the explosive growth of the detainee population at Bagram, [which] has largely escaped international or domestic scrutiny." The piece mentions a report by Human Rights First's Daphne Eviatar, entitled "Detained and Denied in Afghanistan: How to make U.S. Detention Comply with the Law," available here. And, in non-news that, somehow, made news, this is your Moment of Zen. For more interesting law and security-related articles, follow us on Twitter, and visit the Georgetown Center on National Security and the Law’s Security Law Brief as well as the Fordham Law Center on National Security’s Morning Brief. Feel free to email me noteworthy articles I may have missed at singh.lawfare@gmail.com.