Vox Sentences: One of the biggest hacks of the federal government ever

Hacked by Chinese

Xi Jinping is not amused. (Feng Li/Getty Images)

• The Obama administration has announced one of the biggest-ever breaches of data on federal employees, affecting at least four million current and former personnel.

  [NYT / David Sanger and Julie Hirschfeld Davis]

• The government believes that Chinese hackers are responsible, which would make this the second time the Office of Personnel Management has been hit by Chinese hackers in the past year.

  [Vox / Timothy B. Lee]

• Data obtained includes employees' "job assignments, performance ratings and training."

  [Washington Post / Ellen Nakashima]

• It also "appeared to involve Social Security numbers and other 'personal identifying information,' which led the personnel office to tell current and former federal employees that they could request free credit reports to make sure that their identities had not been stolen."

  [NYT / David Sanger and Julie Hirschfeld Davis]

• The Chinese attack last July was meant to obtain information on which employees were applying for security clearances.

  [The Verge / Colin Lecher]

• Chinese hacking of US government and business is believed to be very widespread, with former NSA director Michael McConnell saying that "The Chinese have penetrated every major corporation of any consequence in the United States."

  [CNN / Jose Pagliery]

News from the south, sire, Rick the Ruler has returned!

These are Rick Perry's announcement thumbs. (Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)

• Rick Perry officially announced he's running for president again.

  [NYT / Manny Fernandez]

• Andrew Prokop and Tez Clark have a great rundown of his stands on the issues.

  [Vox / Andrew Prokop and Tez Clark]

• His most notable proposal during the 2012 campaign was a tax plan that combined the complexity of the current system with the regressivity and huge gains for the rich of a flat tax system.

  [Tax Policy Center / Howard Gleckman]

• Perhaps Perry's most memorable moment last election cycle came in a November 2011 debate, when he couldn't remember the third federal agency he wanted to abolish (he got Education and Commerce and forgot Energy).

  [Vox / Timothy B. Lee]

• Perry withdrew from the race on January 19, 2012, after finishing fifth in New Hampshire. He then endorsed Newt Gingrich.

  [NYT / Jeff Zeleny and Michael Shear]

• Compared to other governors running, like Jeb Bush or Scott Walker, Perry has a much more compelling economic record.

  [Vox / Matt Yglesias]

• Perry's campaigns in Texas were among the most innovative ever in their use of experimental political science.

  [Washington Post / Ezra Klein]

• According to RealClearPolitics, Perry is in 11th place in New Hampshire (2.5 percent) and Iowa (3.3 percent), and 10th place nationally (2.7 percent).

  [RealClearPolitics]

Greece is a flat circle update

Visual metaphors! (Milos Bicanski/Getty Images)

• Greece has given it and its European lenders more time to work out a debt deal by invoking an obscure IMF provision.

  [NYT / Niki Kitsantonis]

• The option lets Greece defer payments to the IMF into a single sum to be paid at the end of the month; it hasn't been used by any country since Zambia in the '70s.

• Leftist Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras has been under pressure within his party, Syriza, to withhold IMF payment, a demand this move implicitly rejects.

  [FT / Kerin Hope and Peter Spiegel]

• While Greece's less-austere budget proposals and its lenders' more cut-heavy ones had appeared to be converging, the bundling suggests that negotiations may have faltered.

  [Politico EU / Zeke Turner and Matthew Karnitschnig]

• Tsipras is addressing parliament tomorrow on the state of talks.

Misc.

• An exclusive interview with Eric Snowden, a 70-year-old sculptor in New Paltz.

  [The Daily Dot / Kevin Collier]

• Washing your dishes by hand is actually worse, environmentally, than just using a dish washer.

  [Washington Post / Chris Mooney]

• Meet the NBA Babies All-Star Team.

  [NY Mag / Jessica Roy]

• John Edwards got third in 2008. But his ideas won.

  [Washington Post / Jim Tankersley]

• Porn stars discuss sex more freely than most people, but there's one thing they rarely talk about with each other: what they're getting paid.

  [New Statesman / Stoya]

Verbatim

• "Maverick is kind of a jerk. Iceman is totally right about him. In fact, Iceman is right about almost everything."

  [Medium / Tim Carmody]

• "Who the fuck can criticize a guy who donated $400 million to his alma mater?!"

  [Anonymous hedge fund manager via Business Insider / Julia La Roche]

• "Well, it's not nation-building. We are assisting them in building their nation."

  [Marco Rubio via Vox / Max Fisher]

• "Yeah, I let a child drown to death, but I brought some beer."

  [Philosophy Bro / Tommy Maranges]

• "When the speeches were done, Wynton Marsalis struck up 'Happy Birthday.' It was the only time he has ever played the song, Marsalis later said, when nobody sang along."

  [Vanity Fair / Sarah Ellison]

Song of the Day

• Iggy Pop, "China Girl"

  [YouTube]