NPR Story
4:00 am
Tue March 6, 2012

First Responders Trained In Animal Rescues

First responders never know what they'll find when they get called to an accident site. Sometimes crews have to rescue dairy cows from collapsed barns, evacuate horses during wildfires or move pigs off the highway after an accident. These first responders often don't have the proper training to handle large animals.

NPR Story
4:00 am
Tue March 6, 2012

Pigweed: A Genetic Diverse Monster

NPR's Dan Charles has been looking into the problem of weeds that America's most widely used weed-killer won't kill anymore. It's a sneak preview of a story that will air later this week.

Presidential Race
2:57 am
Tue March 6, 2012

Obama Campaign Ramps Up Efforts Early In Virginia

Credit Jewel Samad / AFP/Getty Images
President Barack Obama speaks to students at Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale, Virginia, on February 13, 2012. Obama's campaign is ramping up efforts in Virginia in what is sure to be a battleground state in the general election.

While Republican candidates continue to slug it out for their party's White House nomination, President Obama is getting a head start on the general election.

Obama's grassroots campaign is already hard at work with volunteers hosting house parties and staffing phone banks to find and mobilize the president's supporters. The campaign has opened five offices in Virginia, and that's not counting the basement of Sue Langley's house in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Vienna, where more than a dozen volunteers assembled this past weekend.

Read more
The Salt
2:56 am
Tue March 6, 2012

Most Of Us Just Can't Taste The Nuances In High-Priced Wines

Credit iStockphoto.com
Research suggests that most of us don't or can't taste the subtleties of fine wines.

Have you ever splurged on a highly rated bottle of Burgundy or pinot noir, only to wonder whether a $10 or $15 bottle of red would have been just as good? The answer may depend on your biology.

A new study by researchers at Penn State finds that when it comes to appreciating the subtleties of wine, experts can taste things many of us can't. "What we found is that the fundamental taste ability of an expert is different," says John Hayes of Penn State.

Read more
Media
2:56 am
Tue March 6, 2012

Rush To Judgment: Advertisers Flee Limbaugh's Show

An increasing number of corporations have announced that they will no longer advertise on the show of the undisputed king of political radio talk, Rush Limbaugh, in the wake of caustic and sexually charged comments he made about a Georgetown Law student.

An apology over the weekend failed to quell the controversy, as both corporations and conservative commentators denounced Limbaugh's latest provocative remarks. It is far from his first such episode. Part of Limbaugh's appeal involves getting listeners to tune in to hear just what shibboleth-bursting thing he'll say next.

Read more
Business
2:55 am
Tue March 6, 2012

Let A Stranger Drive Your Car? More Owners Say 'Yes'

Credit Charla Bear for NPR
Stanford graduate student Katie Hagey rents her 2002 BMW to strangers through the peer-to-peer car sharing service Wheelz.

It would be difficult for some people to let a stranger drive off with one of their most valuable possessions. But not for Stanford graduate student Katie Hagey.

Hagey is one of a growing number of individual car owners who have started renting their wheels to people they don't know through car-sharing startup companies resembling the better-known Zipcar.

Read more
Around the Nation
12:01 am
Tue March 6, 2012

As Elkhart's Electric Dreams Fizzle, RVs Come Back

Elkhart, Ind., is known as the RV capital of the world. The city suffered badly when the recession hit and demand for recreational vehicles all but screeched to a halt. That's when local and state leaders started looking for ways to bolster the area's manufacturing industry.

The unemployment rate in the city along the Michigan border eventually soared to 20 percent — the highest in the nation at the time.

Read more
Middle East
12:01 am
Tue March 6, 2012

Obama, Netanyahu Differ On Timeline Of Iran Strike

Credit Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's annual policy conference on Monday in Washington, D.C. He said he would never let his "people live in the shadow of annihilation."

In several hours of talks, President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seemed to have different timelines and red lines on the issue of Iran's nuclear program: Obama said he prefers diplomacy and pressure; the Israeli leader made clear his country reserves the right to attack pre-emptively, saying Israel must remain master of its fate.

Read more
Middle East
12:01 am
Tue March 6, 2012

From The Outside, Doctor Mobilizes Aid For Syrians

At a cafe in Turkey, near the border with Syria, Dr. Monzer Yazji steps out of his car in the parking lot and encounters a man with a bandaged left hand.

Yazji, a Syrian who now works in the U.S., examines Abu Hamad, a fellow Syrian who has fled the fighting in his homeland.

The doctor, a tall man with glasses and a trim graying beard, is becoming well-known among Syrian activists. Yazji has been periodically leaving his thriving practice in the Rio Grande Valley in southern Texas to coordinate emergency medical aid for Syria.

Read more

Pages