Education
1:17 pm
Tue June 26, 2012

What's Driving College Costs Higher

Credit iStockphoto.com

Originally published on Wed June 27, 2012 10:47 am

Just days before student loan rates are set to double for millions of Americans, President Obama and congressional leaders haven't reached an agreement on legislation to keep those rates at 3.4 percent.

The debate reflects the growing concern over the debt burden many take on to get a college education. About two-thirds of bachelor's degree recipients borrow money to attend college, and collectively, student debt has topped $1 trillion.

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The Two-Way
12:51 pm
Tue June 26, 2012

Issa: Executive Privilege Implies White House 'Fast And Furious' Involvement

Credit Tim Sloan / AFP/Getty Images
This December 7, 2010 file photo shows U.S. Republican Representative Darrell Issa of California, chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Originally published on Tue June 26, 2012 4:24 pm

In a seven-page letter (pdf) to President Obama, Rep. Darrell Issa, the Republican chair of the House oversight committee, says that President Obama's claim of executive privilege implies high level involvement the "Fast and Furious" scandal.

Fast and Furious is the failed gunrunning operation that sold weapons to drug cartels in Mexico. One of the victims of one of those guns was U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who was gunned down in Arizona.

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Credit Dario Lopez Mills

Lourdes Garcia-Navarro is an NPR international correspondent.

From her base in Israel, Garcia-Navarro reports on stories happening throughout the Middle East. She was one of the first reporters to enter Libya after the 2011 Arab Spring uprising began and spent months painting a deep and vivid portrait of a country at war. Often at great personal risk, Garcia-Navarro captured history in the making with stunning insight, courage and humanity.

For her work covering the Arab Spring, Garcia-Navarro was awarded a 2011 George Foster Peabody Award, a Lowell Thomas Award from the Overseas Press Club, and an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Alliance for Women and the Media's Gracie Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement.

Before her assignment to Jerusalem began in 2009, Garcia-Navarro served for more than a year as NPR News' Baghdad Bureau Chief and before that three years as NPR's foreign correspondent in Mexico City, reporting from that region as well as on special assignments abroad.

Garcia-Navarro got her start in journalism as a freelancer with the BBC World Service and Voice of America, reporting from Cuba, Syria, Panama and Europe. She later became a producer for Associated Press Television News before transitioning to AP Radio. While there, Garcia-Navarro covered post-Sept. 11 events in Afghanistan and developments in Jerusalem. In 2002, she began a two-year reporting stint based in Iraq.

In addition to the Murrow award, Garcia-Navarro was honored with the 2006 Daniel Schorr Journalism Prize for a two-part series "Migrants' Job Search Empties Mexican Community." She contributed to NPR News reporting on Iraq, which was recognized with a 2005 Peabody Award and a 2007 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton.

Garcia-Navarro holds a Bachelor of Science degree in International Relations from Georgetown University and an Master of Arts degree in journalism from City University in London.

World
12:32 pm
Tue June 26, 2012

Arab-Jewish Tensions Creep Into 'Peace Village'

Originally published on Tue June 26, 2012 10:28 pm

The Israeli village of Neve Shalom was founded decades ago as a place where Arabs and Jews could coexist in the volatile Middle East. The area has weathered regional wars and uprisings, but earlier this month, vandals targeted it and spray-painted anti-Arab epithets on the school's walls.

"We discovered first of all that a number of tires had been punctured, and then we noticed the damage at the school, slogans painted on the walls saying 'Death to the Arabs,' " says Howard Shippin, a longtime resident of Neve Shalom village. "Of course it's very disturbing."

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The Salt
12:07 pm
Tue June 26, 2012

Why Protesting Postal Workers Chose A Hunger Strike

Credit Mark Wilson / Getty Images
Postal workers and activists make signs for their hunger strike in front of the Rayburn House Office building in Washington, D.C.

Despite reports that a bit of starvation is just what the doctor ordered, a few of the postal workers expressing their dismay at Congress with a hunger strike are a little nervous.

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Middle East
11:33 am
Tue June 26, 2012

Are Women Worried About New Egyptian President?

Originally published on Tue June 26, 2012 12:55 pm

Transcript

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

I'm Michel Martin and this is TELL ME MORE from NPR News. Coming up, we look at another significant decision from the Supreme Court that might have been overshadowed by the ruling on immigration enforcement. The justices said life sentences without parole for juvenile offenders is cruel and unusual punishment. We'll talk with law professor Paul Butler about what that means for young people behind bars in this country.

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The Two-Way
11:09 am
Tue June 26, 2012

If News Corp. Splits Its Businesses, Many Investors Would Be Pleased

Originally published on Wed June 27, 2012 8:15 am

With a simple statement saying that "it is considering a restructuring to separate its business into two distinct publicly traded companies," News Corp. this morning confirmed the thrust of a story reported by its own Wall Street Journal, NPR's David Folkenflik tells us.

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Shots - Health Blog
10:00 am
Tue June 26, 2012

Convenience And Efficiency Fuel Boom In Retail Clinics

Credit Mike Derer / AP
Shanda Johnson, right, a nurse practitioner, interviews patient Bill Gilligan at a MinuteClinic at the CVS drug store in North Brunswick, N.J.

Originally published on Tue June 26, 2012 11:27 am

For years, there's been a debate about how walk-in clinics at stores fit into the health care mix. Are they an adequate substitute for a visit to the doctor?

Through it all, the number of clinics has kept growing, numbering 1,355 at the beginning of 2012, a 10.4 percent annual increase, according to consultants Merchant Medicine.

MinuteClinic, a division of CVS Caremark and the largest clinic operator by far, is on track to nearly double the number of clinics it operates to 1,000 by 2016.

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The Two-Way
9:36 am
Tue June 26, 2012

Home Prices Tick Up, Housing Market Recovery May Be Strengthening

Credit Spencer Platt / Getty Images
This "For Sale" sign was hanging outside a home in Brooklyn, N.Y., earlier this month.

Originally published on Tue June 26, 2012 9:42 am

Home prices rose in nearly all major U.S. cities in April from March, according to the latest S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices report.

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The Two-Way
9:03 am
Tue June 26, 2012

Turkey Warns Syria It May Respond Militarily If Provoked; Tensions Escalate

Credit Adem Altan / AFP/Getty Images
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan earlier today in Ankara.

"Any military element that approaches the Turkish border from Syria and poses a security risk and danger will be regarded as a threat and treated as a military target," Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told his nation today.

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