Your Government, on Twitter

Despite budget cuts, economic woes, and nonstop political wrangling -- and often because of all that -- government personnel continue to churn out a torrent of messages on Twitter.

From President Obama's first-ever Twitter town hall to the popular @NASA, it's a federal buzzfest on the 5 1/2-year-old social network. Government folks, particularly in the executive and legislative branches, tweet a bread basket of interactive news and information, some of which actually may be useful to your law practice.

Cue @whitehouse. While most executive office tweets contain information you know if you have a smartphone or a pulse (examples below), recently the administration has been hosting "Office Hours" -- real-time afternoon chats with Twitter followers.