TV News LIES

The NSA leaker, who is living in exile, will appear by teleconference on Monday during the interactive portion of the annual Texas festival. He joins fellow wanted man Julian Assange, who is also speaking remotely at SXSW Interactive.

NSA leaker Edward Snowden will be on hand for an interview at South by Southwest Monday, but federal agents won't have anyone to arrest for espionage.

South by Southwest announced today that Snowden -- who is living in exile in Russia after his famous leak of countless documents detailing NSA surveillance -- will speak during the "Interactive" portion of the annual Austin, Texas, festival Monday at 11 a.m. Central by satellite. He will be in conversation with Christopher Soghoian, the American Civil Liberties Union's principal technologist.

In a nondescript industrial estate in El Segundo, a boxy suburb in south-west Los Angeles just a mile or two from LAX international airport, 20 people wait in a windowless canteen for a ceremony to begin. Outside, the sun is shining on an unseasonably warm February day; inside, the only light comes from the glare of halogen bulbs.

There is a strange mix of accents – predominantly American, but smatterings of Swedish, Russian, Spanish and Portuguese can be heard around the room, as men and women (but mostly men) chat over pepperoni pizza and 75-cent vending machine soda. In the corner, an Asteroids arcade machine blares out tinny music and flashing lights.

The National Endowment for Democracy, a central part of Ronald Reagan’s propaganda war against the Soviet Union three decades ago, has evolved into a $100 million U.S. government-financed slush fund that generally supports a neocon agenda often at cross-purposes with the Obama administration’s foreign policy.

NED is one reason why there is so much confusion about the administration’s policies toward attempted ousters of democratically elected leaders in Ukraine and Venezuela. Some of the non-government organizations (or NGOs) supporting these rebellions trace back to NED and its U.S. government money, even as Secretary of State John Kerry and other senior officials insist the U.S. is not behind these insurrections.

Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted announced Tuesday he is cutting early voting on Sundays and weekday evenings, dealing another blow to the voting rights effort in the nation’s most pivotal swing state.

Husted’s change would spell doom for a voting method that’s popular among African-Americans in Ohio and elsewhere. Many churches and community groups lead “Souls to the Polls” drives after church on the Sunday before the election.

A cybersecurity firm said on Tuesday that it uncovered stolen credentials from some 360 million accounts that are available for sale on cyber black markets, though it is unsure where they came from or what they can be used to access.

The discovery could represent more of a risk to consumers and companies than stolen credit card data because of the chance the sets of user names and passwords could open the door to online bank accounts, corporate networks, health records and virtually any other type of computer system.

U.S. and Canadian officials say they are reviewing relations with Uganda because of a new law they say violates human rights by cracking down on homosexuals.

The development comes one day after Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands said they would hold back millions of dollars in aid to Uganda to protest the law, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement Monday the United States is reviewing its relationship with Uganda "to ensure that all dimensions of our engagement, including assistance programs, uphold our anti-discrimination policies and principles and reflect our values."