• Karl Frisch of Bullfight Strategies calls in at 9am ET / 6am PT to give us his impressions of the NSA data mining controversy

• Michael Tomasky of The Daily Beast calls in at 10:30am ET / 7:30am PT to talk about the NSA and Edward Snowden

• Alleged NSA leaker Edward Snowden claimed yesterday to have evidence that the U.S. government has been hacking into Chinese computer networks since at least 2009 – an effort he said is part of the tens of thousands of hacking operations American cyber spies have launched around the world.

• Phone records obtained by the government through a secret surveillance program disclosed last week helped to prevent “dozens” of terrorist acts, Gen. Keith Alexander, the director of the National Security Agency, told a Senate hearing on Wednesday.

• FEMA has denied additional aid tied to deadly explosions at a Texas fertilizer plant, a decision ripped Wednesday by local and state officials who accused President Barack Obama of having “gone against his word.”

• Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) said he was taken out of context Wednesday and tried to clarify his controversial comment from a committee markup earlier in the day, when he said the “incidents of rape resulting in pregnancy are very low.”