View video on NY Times site.
By Laura Poitras, New York Times
It took me a few days to work up the nerve to phone William Binney. As someone already a “target” of the United States government, I found it difficult not to worry about the chain of unintended consequences I might unleash by calling Mr. Binney, a 32-year veteran of the National Security Agency turned whistle-blower. He picked up. I nervously explained I was a documentary filmmaker and wanted to speak to him. To my surprise he replied: “I’m tired of my government harassing me and violating the Constitution. Yes, I’ll talk to you.”

Two weeks later, driving past the headquarters of the N.S.A. in Maryland, outside Washington, Mr. Binney described details about Stellar Wind, the N.S.A.’s top-secret domestic spying program begun after 9/11, which was so controversial that it nearly caused top Justice Department officials to resign in protest, in 2004.
“The decision must have been made in September 2001,” Mr. Binney told me and the cinematographer Kirsten Johnson. “That’s when the equipment started coming in.” In this Op-Doc, Mr. Binney explains how the program he created for foreign intelligence gathering was turned inward on this country. He resigned over this in 2001 and began speaking out publicly in the last year. He is among a group of N.S.A. whistle-blowers, including Thomas A. Drake, who have each risked everything — their freedom, livelihoods and personal relationships — to warn Americans about the dangers of N.S.A. domestic spying.
To those who understand state surveillance as an abstraction, I will try to describe a little about how it has affected me. The United States apparently placed me on a “watch-list” in 2006 after I completed a film about the Iraq war. I have been detained at the border more than 40 times. Once, in 2011, when I was stopped at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York and asserted my First Amendment right not to answer questions about my work, the border agent replied, “If you don’t answer our questions, we’ll find our answers on your electronics.”’ As a filmmaker and journalist entrusted to protect the people who share information with me, it is becoming increasingly difficult for me to work in the United States. Although I take every effort to secure my material, I know the N.S.A. has technical abilities that are nearly impossible to defend against if you are targeted.
The 2008 amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which oversees the N.S.A. activities, are up for renewal in December. Two members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Senators Ron Wyden of Oregon and Mark Udall of Colorado, both Democrats, are trying to revise the amendments to insure greater privacy protections. They have been warning about “secret interpretations” of laws and backdoor “loopholes” that allow the government to collect our private communications. Thirteen senators have signed a letter expressing concern about a “loophole” in the law that permits the collection of United States data. The A.C.L.U. and other groups have also challenged the constitutionality of the law, and the Supreme Court will hear arguments in that case on Oct. 29.
Laura Poitras is a documentary filmmaker who has been nominated for an Academy Award and whose work was exhibited in the 2012 Whitney Biennial. She is working on a trilogy of films about post-9/11 America. This Op-Doc is adapted from a work in progress to be released in 2013.
This video is part of a series by independent filmmakers who have received grants from the BRITDOC Foundation and the Sundance Institute. 
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/23/opinion/the-national-security-agencys-domestic-spying-program.html

SAN FRANCISCO -- A school district in California's Central Valley is putting teens' health at risk by failing to provide students with information about condoms and contraception, two parents and a coalition of groups said in a lawsuit filed Tuesday over the district's sex education program.
The lawsuit is the first of its kind in California since the passage of a 2003 law requiring that sexual health education in public schools be comprehensive and medically accurate, the American Civil Liberties Union said.
"The sex ed in Clovis high schools violates state law and gives inaccurate, biased information to students," said Phyllida Burlingame, Reproductive Justice Policy Director at the ACLU of Northern California.
"Schools should teach teens about building healthy relationships, the benefits of delaying sexual activity, and accurate information about condoms and birth control. That's what state law requires and that's what meets the needs of teens," she said.
Instead, according to the lawsuit, the school district teaches students that all people, even adults, should avoid sexual activity until they are married.
"Our kids need complete, accurate information to help them protect themselves against STDs and unintended pregnancy. That's information they'll need at whatever point in their life they become sexually active," said Aubree Smith, a plaintiff in the suit and mother of a 17-year-old daughter at Clovis High School.
The lawsuit against the Clovis Unified School District was filed in Fresno County Superior Court by the California District of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Gay-Straight Alliance Network. The ACLU is representing the groups and the two parents.
In a statement, district spokeswoman Kelly Avants said the school district was reviewing the suit.
"It appears from an initial review that the concern raised in this lawsuit stems from a question of differing interpretations of the depth and breadth of a school district's obligation to cover detailed sexual content in its family life-sex education materials," the statement said.
"The District notes that some of the information contained in the suit does not accurately describe existing procedures and practices in Clovis Unified related to parent notification," the statement said.
The school district operates more than 40 schools, with more than 39,000 students from Clovis and surrounding Fresno County communities enrolled for the 2012-2013 school year, according to its website.