Barry and Frankie, American president and Roman Catholic pontiff, had a nice long meeting! It was at the Vatican! They talked about poverty! (They both like to talk about that) Maybe they talked about birth control! (Barry would rather not talk much about that.) It doesn't really matter!

This might matter. Maybe. The president has finally proposed formally doing away with bulk phone data collection by the National Security Agency—nearly a year after Edward Snowden's leaks first revealed the practice. Obama says his spies should ask the government's secret surveillance court for permission every time it wants to suck up data it used to collect by fiat.

The ease Russia's feeling in surging over its border with Crimea, and maybe even other parts of Ukraine, could have been heightened by years of American troop cuts. Hawks worry that NATO, once a much-feared bulwark against Ivan's unchecked aggression, has become a hollow shell of itself.

Northwestern University football players have won a watershed victory for the labor movement. A regional director for the National Labor Relations Board has ruled they aren't students or vassals or serfs to be treated as their university pleases. They're employees, according to the NLRB, with all rights included.

The Egyptian general who deposed the country's elected Islamist president several months ago is doing exactly what everyone thought he would do when he led the coup: Abdel Fatah al-Sisi is going to run for the job himself.

A state senator in California has been accused of leading a double life as a San Francisco gangster. Leland Yee, known for his stances for gun control, has been charged with helping set up weapons deals alongside a man nicknamed "Shrimp Boy."

The state of Connecticut, as soon as the ink from its governor's signature dries, will have a $10.10 minimum wage—vaulting it ahead of Washington and Oregon for the highest in the nation.

Democrats in DC are trying to force a vote on immigration reform. It's not going to work. But it will put a modest amount of heat on Republicans.

Chris Christie maybe was personally told about the pain-in-the-ass lane closings at the George Washington Bridge while they were happening—despite his claims that he knew nothing about it until well after.

Fewer people are missing in the aftermath of Washington state's calamitous mudslide than previously thought. The number's been brought down to 90 from 176, even as the actual death count continues to go up.

Doctors are mucking around with real-life suspended animation. In case you weren't convinced that the future is now.

TIME TRAVEL NEXT! TIME TRAVEL NEXT! J'INSISTE!