Ding, dong, the wicked NSA witch is ...

Nowhere near dead, but scrambling and resetting a bit after some of its phone metadata snooping powers were not renewed by midnight Sunday night.

The New York Times reports the Senate will start at it again later today. It notes both the effort of Rand Paul and the miscalculation of Mitch The Turtle McConnell as major factors.

As noted, this isn't that big of a hit. The Justice Department will likely get current investigations grandfathered, and find other workarounds. How much limitations a new bill put on the NSA will be of interest, as will how much McConnell tries to get the House bill largely neutered.

Meanwhile, Dear Leader's team, under "oxymoron," has engaged in mass grandstanding to decry grandstanding on this issue.

We'll probably wind up with something halfway between the current Patriot Act and what the House wanted to cut out, along with NSA cheating.

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And, in a sidebar note, Huckleberry J. Butchmeup, D-SC, is going to make official his presidential bid. Perry, as I knew he would, has more.