Wikipedia is dark.

Mozilla will be dark during the day.

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Wikipedia will go dark tomorrow on the day of protest against SOPA.

Google will place a protest link on its home page.

“We oppose these bills because there are smart, targeted ways to shut down foreign rogue websites without asking American companies to censor the Internet,” Samantha Smith, a Google spokeswoman, said in an e-mail today.

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It's official. The Senate, by a vote of 86-13, has passed the $662 billion NDAA, which was passed by the House yesterday.

The bill now goes to President Obama to sign, and his advisers are no longer recommending a veto over the detainee provisions.

You can read the detainee provisions here.

There's still time to contact your Senator and ask to vote for the Mark Udall Amendment to the Defense Authorization Act. (Background here.)

After passing two of the many Amendments (Menendez amend #1414 and Leahy Leahy amend #1072 )and confirming Christopher Droney as a judge on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, the Senate recessed until tomorrow.

Sen. Mark Udall will make a floor statement tomorrow on the Amendment. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has scheduled a procedural vote on the Defense Bill for sometime Wednesday.

Today, FBI Director Robert Mueller sent a letter to the Senate objecting to the detainee provisions in the bill.

The provisions of the Affordable Care Act intended to provide affordable long term care assistance have been scrapped. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius (correctly in my view) says it wouldn't be economically viable. Premiums would be too high, healthy people and young people wouldn't enroll.

There are no plans to revamp it. It certainly was not an entitlement:

It would have been financed with premiums paid by workers, through voluntary payroll deductions, with no federal subsidy.

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The House tonight passed the Protect Life Act. The vote was 251 to 172. Only 15 of the "aye" votes were Democrat. 170 Democrats and 2 Republicans voted against the bill. Who were the bad apples? You can view the vote here or here.

The bill is H.R. 358, Protect Life Act. [More...]

Remember the big deal Attorney General Eric Holder made of the Administration's increased proposed funding for Prisoner Re-Entry programs? And Holder's touting the inauguratiion of a cabinet level "Reentry Council"? And how proud Obama and Holder were of the amounts in the 2012 proposed $28.2 billion Department of Justice Budget requested for Second Chance Act and reentry programs ?

The Budget provides $187 million in prisoner re-entry and jail diversion programs, including $100 million for the Second Chance Act programs and $57 million for drug, mental health, and other problem-solving courts.

Would you believe that yesterday, the Senate Appropriations Committee zapped the funding for prisoner reentry programs entirely, saying the money was needed for the Bureau of Prisons? It actually gave BOP an increase, to $6.6 billion. [More...]

BTD's EDITORIAL NOTE - This post is written by my law firm colleague, Philip Furgang, a noted New York patent law practitioner. Philip is the author of the forthcoming book, "Patent Prosecution" (Oxford University Press.) The views expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of TalkLeft.

The future of America lies in its ability to be creative — to “out think” the rest of the world. Come up with a great idea and you can become rich. You can build a business that will create many jobs. And there is a system in place to protect inventors, the patent system. Think of those who have done it: Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, the Wright Brothers, and many, many more. That system, the system which made it all possible for the US to lead the world, a system in place since 1789, the system is about to be changed to discourage creativity, and to hobble the independent inventor. Large corporations have mounted a large lobbying campaign, spending huge sums of money, to get the so-called “America Invents Act” through Congress. They must be stopped. [More . . ]

The House of Representatives has passed the deficit reduction bill. The vote: 269 to 161.

The Senate will vote tomorrow.

Kudos to Colorado Congresswoman Diana DeGette for voting against the bill. Same for Dennis Kucinich, Barney Frank, Bobby Scott, John Conyers, Charlie Rangel and Zoe Lofgran.

Nancy Pelosi voted for the bill.

Via CBS News:

President Obama on Friday signed a certification of Congress' repeal of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy banning gay men and women from serving openly in the military, setting the stage for the Clinton-era policy to be formally abolished on September 20, 2011. The policy will not be formally abolished until September 20 because the legislation passed by Congress late last year requires a 60-day waiting period between the certification by Mr. Obama and military leaders and full repeal.

...Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen also certified that the military was prepared for repeal to be implemented.

Via NORML:

Today, a bi-partisan group of representatives introduced the first federal bill since 1937 aimed at ending marijuana prohibition. To coincide with the bill’s introduction NORML is launching a new public service announcement featuring NORML Advisory Board member, country music icon, and cannabis enthusiast Willie Nelson. In the video below, Willie calls on you to support this important legislation and to contact your elected officials and encourage them to do the same.

Major props to Colorado Rep. Jared Polis for co-sponsoring the bill introduced today. It's called Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2011 and was introduced by Barney Frank and Ron Paul. [More...]

Rep. Ron Wyden and others have introduced the Geolocation Privacy and Surveillance Act (H.R. 2168, available here) requiring cops to get a warrant based on probable cause to track your location via your cell phone or other device.

The ACLU explains:

The danger that unregulated location tracking poses to American’s privacy is real, immediate and universal. Because of the prevalence of mobile phones in modern society, every American is carrying a portable tracking device, one that can be used to reveal their current and past location. These devices store our every move. Whether it is a visit to a therapist or liquor store, church or gun range, many individuals’ locations will be available either in real time or months later.

Because of the sensitivity and invasiveness of these records, law enforcement agents should always be required to obtain a warrant and show probable cause, no matter the technology employed or the age of the records.

The bill needs additional sponsors, so please contact your Representatives in Congress and ask them to sign on. [More...]