Softball: New England Patriot Coach Bill Belichick denied in a press conference this morning that he had anything to with the under inflation of balls in Sunday’s division championship against Indianapolis. “In my entire coaching career, I have never talked …

Nation: A federal judge in New York ruled that the NSA’s surveillance of phone calls is legal and vital to defense against terrorism. Federal Judge William Pauley threw out a petition by the American Civil Liberties Union. He wrote that, …

Pussy Riot: Two members of the Russian punk bank Pussy Riot just released from prison said they still oppose President Vladimir Putin. In a Moscow press conference, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova said, “We still want to do what we said in our …

School Shoot: A Colorado high school student who took a shotgun to school yesterday to hunt a teacher, ended up wounding two students before killing himself. It happened at Arapahoe High School in suburban Denver, just a few miles from …

Travel: It’s snowing in western New York and Pennsylvania as holiday travelers hit the road. Snow fell in Atlanta, but mostly it’s raining along the Atlantic coast and the I-95 corridor, the east coast artery from Florida to Maine that …

Friends: The Obama administration gave a shifty denial to German Chancellor Angela Merkel about monitoring her personal cell phone, according to the NY Times. National Security Advisor Susan Rice said the monitoring was not “currently” happening, but didn’t say it …

 Mystery: A 33-year-old West Hollywood man has died of meningitis, raising alarms that a quick and deadly disease might be stalking gay men. Brett Shaad was described as fit and healthy only days before he died. At least 22 cases …

National: Newtown school shooter Adam Lanza fired 154 rounds in five minutes, killing 20 children and six adults last December, Connecticut officials say. Lanza used 30-round magazines for his assault rifle and a stockpile of 1600 rounds was found in …

World: An indoor pyrotechnic display ran out of control, setting off a fire in a Brazilian nightclub that has killed at least 245 people, many of them university students. A similar fire in Rhode Island in 2003 killed 100. As …

World: The situation at a remote gas facility in the Algerian desert is still uncertain and unresolved. As many as 650 people escaped after the attack by Islamist militants, authorities say, but an undisclosed number is still being held hostage. …