"After spending a lot of time this spring thinking about my NFL future, I have made a decision to retire," wrote the eight-times Pro Bowl linebacker and Defensive Player of the Year in 2005 who will turn 35 this week.

"Although I could continue playing, I'm not sure I would bring a level of performance or passion that's up to my standards. When considering this, along with the fact that I could retire after a 13-year career wearing only one jersey for such a storied franchise, my decision became pretty clear."

A sure tackler in the middle of the defense, Urlacher lost his quickness last season because of a knee injury and he struggled to find suitors in free agency this offseason after he could not come to contract terms with Chicago.

Four times named a first-team All Pro, Urlacher was the latest in a line of brilliant middle linebackers for the defensive-minded Bears, following in the footsteps of Hall of Famer Dick Butkus and Mike Singletary.

"I'm proud to say I gave all of you everything I had every time I took the field. I will miss the game, but I leave it with no regrets," Urlacher said.

Taken with the ninth pick of the first round in the 2000 NFL Draft out of the University of New Mexico, former college safety Urlacher racked up tackles while also flaunting the ability to cover tight ends deep downfield with his speed and athleticism.

A highlight of Urlacher's career was his 2007 trip to the Super Bowl, where the Bears fell to the Indianapolis Colts and Peyton Manning.

(Reporting by Larry Fine in New York,; Editing by Gene Cherry)

SAN JOSE, Calif. - President Obama today dismissed the "hype" surrounding his administration's secret surveillance of Americans' phone records and the nation's Internet activity and defended the programs as key to protecting national security.

"Nobody is listening to your telephone calls," the president told reporters in his first public comments since the programs were disclosed.

"They are not looking at people's names, and they're not looking at content. But by sifting through this so-called metadata, they may identify potential leads with respect to folks who might engage in terrorism," he said.

If the intelligence community wants to listen to a phone call, Obama said, they need approval from a federal judge.

The president also said that data being collected on emails and Internet activity is targeted at foreign nationals and not U.S. citizens.

Related:

Obama stressed that members of Congress have repeatedly been informed of these programs.

"The programs that have been discussed over the last couple days in the press are secret in the sense that they're classified, but they're not secret in the sense that when it comes to telephone calls, every member of Congress has been briefed on this program," he said.

"The relevant intelligence committees are fully briefed on these programs. These are programs that have been authorized by broad, bipartisan majorities repeatedly since 2006. And so I think at the outset, it's important to understand that your duly elected representatives have been consistently informed on exactly what we're doing," he added.

Obama said that he welcomes the debate that has been sparked by the recent revelations.

"One of the things that we're going to have to discuss and debate is how [we're]striking this balance between the need to keep the American people safe and our concerns about privacy, because there are some trade-offs involved. And I welcome this debate. And I think it's healthy for our democracy. I think it's a sign of maturity," he said.

"It's important to recognize that you can't have a hundred percent security and also then have a hundred percent privacy and zero inconvenience. You know, we're going to have to make some choices as a society," he said.

Related:

What he does not welcome, however, are national security leaks.

"There's a reason why these programs are classified," he said. "There is a suggestion that somehow any classified program is a quote-unquote 'secret' program, which means it's somehow suspicious. But the fact of the matter is, in our modern history there are a whole range of programs that have been classified."

"If every step that we're taking to try to prevent a terrorist act is on the front page of the newspapers or on television, then presumably the people who are trying to do us harm are going to be able to get around our preventive measures. That's why these things are classified," he said.

MIAMI (Reuters) - Tony Parker weaved his way across court, slipped and stumbled and almost fumbled the ball, got to his feet and banked in a jump shot that sealed the Spurs' win over Miami.

That remarkable scrambling play, with time ticking down and the shot clock on its last tick, was "the longest 24 seconds" of LeBron James's career.

"It was tough. Tony did everything wrong and he did everything right in the same possession," said the Heat's James.

"He stumbled two or three times, he fell over but he got up and went under my arm. I got a great contest and he even double-pumped it and barely got it off.

"That was the longest 24 seconds that I have been part of."

Parker's basket was a dagger in Miami's heart.

Trailing by just two and eagerly awaiting the ball, Miami would have had five seconds to tie or win the game had the Frenchman missed with his desperation jumper.

Instead it bounced once off the glass, once, twice off the rim, before falling through the basket to give the Spurs a 92-88 win in Game One of the NBA Finals.

"It felt forever. It was a crazy play," said Parker.

"I thought I lost the ball three or four times and it didn't work out like I wanted it to. At the end I was just trying to get a shot up. It felt good when it left my hand and I was happy it went in."

While the game will be remembered for Parker's improvisation and scrambling at the death, he also led the Spurs with 21 points on 9-for-19 shooting.

Miami put James on Parker in the fourth quarter as they sought to limit the damage done by the fleet-footed Frenchman.

"I knew he was coming. Obviously a lot of NBA teams, they put bigger guys on me. So I just have to keep playing my game and trust my team mates.

"The whole game they were trapping me, trapping pickandrolls. So I was just trying to be patient.

"I think that is the key for me in this series - to be patient and choose my moments when to be aggressive. In the fourth quarter I tried to be more aggressive, obviously, because it's money time," he said.

(Editing by Peter Rutherford)

Australian climatologists have published a study that compared results from five global research groups, each of which used different modeling approaches to develop future wave-climate scenarios.

Their : "We find an agreed projected decrease in annual mean significant wave height over 25.8% of the global ocean area." Translation, as succinctly put by , "Surfing is going to suck for a quarter of the world."

Federal officials on Monday asked justices to reinstate John Dennis Apel's trespass convictions.

Apel had been banned from Vandenberg Air Force Base for previous protesting activities, so he set up in a designated protest area on a highway that passes through the base. The military owns the highway but grants the state and Santa Barbara County an easement so the public can use it.

Military officials say since Apel had been banned from the base, he also could not use the protest area. Federal appeals judges overturned his conviction, saying since the military does not have exclusive right of possession to the highway, Apel's trespass conviction had to be dismissed.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Supreme Court justices appeared divided on Monday as they considered a challenge to a law requiring non-profit organizations to adopt an anti-prostitution policy in order to obtain federal funding for HIV/AIDS programs abroad.

Several justices voiced concerns that the law imposes unconstitutional limits on freedom of speech, but others indicated the government had a right to direct how its money should be spent.

The 2003 law bars funding for non-governmental organizations that work on HIV/AIDS prevention but do not have a policy opposing prostitution and sex trafficking.

The Alliance for Open Society International and Pathfinder International - NGOs that receive funding for overseas HIV/AIDS prevention - sued in 2005, citing the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech.

The organizations challenging the provision do not want to take a stand on prostitution. They say the law interferes with their work providing advice and counseling to prostitutes about the risks of HIV infection.

The non-profit world is divided, with 46 groups, many of which focus on women's rights, supporting the law.

The groups obtained an injunction in 2006 that has prevented the policy from being enforced ever since.

Justice Elena Kagan is recused, most likely due to her previous role as solicitor general in the Obama administration, meaning only eight justices are presiding over the case.

At least three indicated they had concerns about the law, with Justice Samuel Alito the most outspoken.

He signaled discomfort with the general concept of the government having a broad right to direct groups it is funding on what they can and cannot say.

"It seems to me like quite a dangerous proposition," he said. Alito questioned whether, for example, the government could impose similar conditions to funding for higher education.

FIRST AMENDMENT QUESTIONS

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg focused on a move made by the Bush administration, later amended by the Obama administration, to resolve some of the First Amendment questions. The government has said that NGOs could set up affiliate groups to receive the funding without the parent organization having to announce a position on prostitution.

Ginsburg said that approach may not solve the problem because it's "no simple thing" for an NGO to set up a new organization in another country. She said that requiring this extra step is "quite an arduous" burden to place on NGOs.

Taking another line of attack, Justice Sonia Sotomayor questioned whether the law restricted an NGO's ability to "stay true to its own beliefs."

Other justices, while not wholeheartedly endorsing the government's argument in defense of the law, did not appear to feel that there was a problem in general with Congress attaching conditions on funding.

Justice Stephen Breyer said there were "dozens and dozens" of examples in which the government gave funding to groups because they shared the same goals. "Otherwise, they wouldn't be in the program," he said.

Chief Justice John Roberts said the government is "just picking out who is an appropriate partner."

Under a barrage of questioning from the justices, David Bowker, the NGOs' attorney, seemed momentarily stumped by one of Roberts' questions.

The chief justice asked whether, during the period in which South Africa was racially segregated, the U.S. government could have limited funding for public health programs to NGOs that were opposed to the policy, known as apartheid.

After a lengthy pause, Bowker conceded the question was tougher than the one posed in his case, but that it would still be impermissible for the government to make decisions on that basis.

The case is Agency for International Development v. Alliance for Open Society International, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 12-19.

(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Howard Goller and Bill Trott)

Charity organizers say monetary donations are far more flexible and useful, and many organizations are expected to see an infusion of cash donations after a benefit concert Wednesday night in Oklahoma City that featured country music stars with Oklahoma ties, including Blake Shelton, Miranda Lambert, Vince Gill and Reba McEntire.

At the Abundant Life Church in Moore, just a few blocks from the Plaza Towers Elementary School where seven children died in the May 20 tornado, Sunday school classrooms are overflowing with donated clothes and other used items.

"I don't want to come across at all like we don't appreciate people's generosity, because we do," said Norma Clanton, a longtime church member who is helping coordinate volunteer efforts at the church. "To be honest, we've had very few people that have even come and looked at clothes.

"The people who have lost their homes, many of them aren't even in a permanent dwelling. They don't have room for a closet full of clothes or anything like that."

The American Red Cross says it's not equipped to handle a large influx of donations like household items which take time and money to sort, process and transport. Officials with major relief organizations encourage people to send money instead.

"We spend that money locally to help energize the local economy ... and it allows us to spend it on items we need," said Salvation Army spokeswoman Jennifer Dodd.

Organizations helping displaced residents are expected to see an influx of cash from the "Healing in the Heartland: Relief Benefit Concert" at the Chesapeake Energy Arena in downtown Oklahoma City that was held Wednesday. The money goes directly to the United Way of Central Oklahoma, which will distribute funding agencies helping in relief and recovery efforts for those affected by the May 20 tornado, said Karla Bradshaw, a spokeswoman for the United Way of Central Oklahoma.

"Those are the ones that are dealing right now with the immediate needs," Bradshaw said.

People who lined up outside the arena in heavy rain before the telethon said they were happy to have an opportunity to help their neighbors and enjoy a night of country music.

"I told my husband I wanted to help, and what better way than to do something fun too," said 29-year-old Kara McCarthy of Oklahoma City, who attended the concert with a friend.

Shelton, a native of Ada, kicked off the concert with a version of his song "God Gave Me You."

The televised event also included recorded video pleas from Oklahoma native Garth Brooks and his wife, Trisha Yearwood, Moore native Toby Keith, Ellen Degeneres and Jay Leno.

"I'm here tonight with some of my closest friends from Oklahoma and beyond," Shelton told the sold-out crowd before the concert began. "It's going to be awesome. We're doing a TV show so we can raise as much money as humanly possible."

Donations have poured in to Oklahoma since two major tornadoes ripped through the state last week, killing 26 people and affecting nearly 4,000 homes, businesses and other buildings in five counties. Twenty-four people, including 10 children, were killed in the May 20 tornado that hit the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore.

In just the first three days after the tornado hit Moore, the Red Cross reported raising about $15 million in donations and pledges for its response to the Oklahoma tornados, including about $3.8 million in pledges from text donations.

The Salvation Army reported Tuesday afternoon it already has raised more than $5 million in monetary donations, as well as in-kind food donations from numerous corporations.

Before Wednesday night's concert, the United Way of Central Oklahoma reported raising $3 million for tornado relief, and the governor also asked the charity to administer an additional $2 million from a separate Oklahoma Strong disaster fund, said Debby Hampton, president and CEO of United Way of Central Oklahoma.

Dodd, with the Salvation Army, said many people are holding clothing drives to help benefit local residents, but that can pose problems for charities and other groups that might not have the room to store the items.

"Just the logistics of shipping a hundred pounds of clothing from across the country, it's terribly expensive and then you have to worry if you have space on the ground," Dodd said.

Ken Sterns, who spent years researching the best and most effective charities for his book, "With Charity for All," said donating to reputable, well-established charities also helps victims of the next disaster.

"I think most charity experts recommend giving cash donations, but I also tell people that in fact the most valuable contributions are not the contributions made after the fact, but contributions that allow charities, especially disaster relief organizations, to prepare for helping the victims of the next disaster," Sterns said. "We don't know who they are. We don't have a face on them. But we know they are coming."

___

Sean Murphy can be reached at www.twitter.com/apseanmurphy

Smith won a Super Bowl with the New York Giants in 2008 as part of a career that also included stints with the Philadelphia Eagles and the St. Louis Rams. The Buccaneers signed him as a free agent last month.

Drafted by New York in the second round in 2007, Smith had his best season in 2009, setting a Giants single-season record with 107 receptions, second-most in the NFL that year.

During the past three years, knee injuries limited Smith to playing in only 27 of 48 games.

(Reporting by Larry Fine in New York; Editing by Frank Pingue)

Pelosi Set to Star in Another Election

Former and perhaps future House speaker Nancy Pelosi is at the center of both President Obama's push to win a Democratic House majority and the House GOP's drive to block him.

Piling on the praise at a , Obama called Pelosi "tough as nails," "a great politician," a great leader," and "a great friend." He said he could not have a better partner than her and could not be prouder of her and "could not be more anxious and eager to have her back as speaker of the House."

A different Pelosi turns up in posts on the House Republican campaign committee blog , raising money for a "," and failing to land a prime recruit (proof that "running on thein 2014 is too toxic to overcome").

Afound that half the country has an unfavorable opinion of Pelosi, compared with 32 percent favorable. House Republicans fare , but they won't be cutting her a break. She's a proven fundraiser for both sides.

Jill Lawrence

OBAMA TO NOMINATE COMEY TO LEAD FBI. President Obama will nominate former Justice Department official James Comey, a Republican, to serve as FBI director, The New York Times reports. Comey reportedly was selected over White House counterterrorism adviser Lisa Monaco, whose former role at the DOJ had led to concerns that Republicans would raise the issue of the Benghazi attacks during the confirmation process. Comey, who served as acting attorney general in 2004 while then-AG John Ashcroft recuperated from surgery, clashed with White House counsel Alberto Gonzales and Chief of Staff Andrew Card over the reauthorization of a warrantless wiretapping program.

LETTER TO OBAMA MAY CONTAIN RICIN, BEARS SHREVEPORT POSTMARK. A letter addressed to President Obama that may have been contaminated with ricin also shares a Shreveport, La., postmark with two ricin-tainted letters containing threats to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, CBS News reports. Secret Service spokesperson Edwin Donovan said that the bureau's joint terrorism task force is handling the investigation. The two letters referencing Bloomberg, postmarked May 20, "contained a pink-orange, oily substance, and each letter threatened bodily harm against the mayor and made references to his stance on gun control."

MEDIA ORGANIZATIONS DECLINE HOLDER INVITE OVER OFF-THE-RECORD STATUS. Several media organizations have said that they will not meet with Attorney General Eric Holder to discuss the Justice Department's monitoring of journalists as part of its leak investigations, The Hill reports. The New York Times, the Associated Press, The Huffington Post, and CNN issued separate statements explaining their objections to the off-the-record meeting. "We will not be attending the session at DOJ," said New York Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson in a statement. "It isn't appropriate for us to attend an off-the-record meeting with the Attorney General. Our Washington bureau is aggressively covering the department's handling of leak investigations at this time."

McCAIN: SYRIAN VISIT 'VERY MOVING,' REBELS WANT U.S. TO ARM THEM. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., discussed his Monday visit to Syria in an appearance Wednesday on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360. "It was a very moving experience to meet these fighters who have been struggling now for over two years," McCain said. McCain said that the rebels want the United States to supply them with weapons in the conflict against Assad. "Their message was, to be frank with you: They do not understand," he said. "They do not understand why we won't help them."

GOOGLE CHAIR IS POURING 'MILLIONS' INTO PROGRESSIVE BIG DATA. Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt is pouring "several million" dollars into creating a digital analytics firm made up of Obama for America alums. The new consultancy, Civis Analytics, is being headed up by 30-year-old Dan Wagner and will be based in Chicago, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. "The plan is to bring the same Big Data expertise that guided the most expensive presidential campaign in history to companies and nonprofits," Joshua Green writes.

WASHINGTON-BASED SERIES BY 'DOONESBURY' CARTOONIST TO AIR ON AMAZON. Amazon Studios has green-lighted production on Alpha House, an original series from Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau focusing on four Republican senators sharing a Capitol Hill row house. The company will produce 13 episodes to air in 2013 and early 2014. Bloomberg's Jonathan Alter, an executive producer on the series, said that Netflix's House of Cards improved the chances for Alpha House. "It helped introduce people to the idea of watching online television, and especially online television about politics," said Alter. The show stars John Goodman, Clark Johnson, Matt Malloy, and Mark Consuelos, while Bill Murray has a cameo in the pilot.

REID'S RAZOR-THIN MARGIN ON 'NUCLEAR OPTION.' Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., may have the votes to reform the filibuster, a "nuclear option" to which he has alluded in the fight over judicial nominations, The Atlantic Wire's Philip Bump writes. According to , Reid has just 51 votes, meaning that if a single Democrat defects, he could be forced to ask Vice President Biden to cast the tiebreaking vote, a rare and controversial moveand one Biden has never made. Still, Bump writes, the battle over the filibuster may not happen. "[I]f Reid loses even one more vote, the idea becomes either unwinnable or politically much more fraught. It's a move of last resortbut that may be where Democrats consider themselves."

D.C. REGION LARGELY UNTOUCHED BY BUDGET SEQUESTRATION. The Washington metropolitan area has yet to show significant adverse effects from sequestration, The Washington Post reports. The region has added 40,000 jobs in the past few months, whilereleased Wednesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicated that unemployment remained steady at 5.3 percent. "I think the sequestration isn't going to be quite as bad as a lot of people had feared, at least in terms of direct job losses," said Moody's Analytics associate analyst James Bohnaker. "The reason for that is that people were already planning for this last year." Still, with federal employees subject to unpaid furloughs, the region may yet feel the impact of the cuts.

BRIEFING ON SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE TRUST FUND REPORT. A host of Cabinet officials, including Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Acting Labor Secretary Seth Harris, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Marilyn Tavenner, along with Acting Commissioner of Social Security and trustee Carolyn Colvin and public trustees Charles Blahous and Robert Reischauer hold a media briefing on the release of the annual reports from the boards of trustees for the Social Security and Medicare trust funds.

BIDEN TO HOLD PRESS CONFERENCE IN BRAZIL. Vice President Joe Biden will meet with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and will later deliver statements to the media from Brasilia.

WHITE HOUSE TO HOLD 'GEEK' GOOGLE+ HANGOUT. The White House holds a "We the Geeks" Google+ Hangout, beginning at 2 p.m., to discuss asteroid identification, characterization, resource utilization, and hazard mitigation.

"I've never understood the allure of putting your name on a building that was built with taxpayers' money." Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C. ()

COMEY AND MUELLER: A FRIENDSHIP FORGED OVER A SHARED HISTORY. As James Comey is likely be named by President Obama as the person to take over the reins of the FBI from current director Bob Mueller, The Washingtonian details the rise of the two men through the D.C. intelligence community, how they formed a friendship, and their role in controversy surrounding the reauthorization of the Terrorist Surveillance Program, and in particular Stellar Wind, an NSA wiretapping code. In an intense showdown narrated here, Mueller, who was the point person for negotiations with the White House, Comey, Ashcroft, and other senior officials at the FBI and Justice Department, were prepared to resign over the administration's push to reauthorize the program.

STUDY: IMMIGRANTS A NET POSITIVE FOR MEDICARE. The logic behind the argument that immigrants are a drain on resources may seem soundmany are low-skilled and face a steep cultural learning curvebut a recent study suggests the exact opposite, National Journal's Niraj Chokshi reports. Between 2002 and 2009, immigrantscitizens or notcontributed $115 billion more to Medicare than they used, according to a new study in Health Affairs, the reputable health policy journal. The U.S.-born, on the other hand, generated a $28 billion deficit. Immigrants, it turns out, may be helping to delay a budget reckoning.

Carney declined to comment on a Washington Post report that Chinese hackers had gained access to designs of more than two dozen major U.S. weapons systems.

He said cyber issues were a key concern for the United States and raised at every level of meetings between U.S. and Chinese counterparts.

(Reporting by Steve Holland; Writing by Jeff Mason; Editing by Mohammad Zargham)