Minnesota Public Radio Stories

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  6:55 a.m.
• Cop actions top complaints at RNC listening session
  The RNC ended three weeks ago, and tensions are still running high in St. Paul. More than 150 people packed the City Council chambers last night for a community hearing.7:20 a.m.
• Regional transpo plan calls for less pavement, some bus and rail
  The 2030 Transportation Policy Plan also encourages more people to live closer to where they work.7:25 a.m.
• From Manhattan to Minneapolis, film festival keeps growing
  The Manhattan Short Film Festival started as a community event in New York City, but the 9/11 attacks changed the festival and its mission.7:55 a.m.
• Future Tense with Jon Gordon
  Elite mathematicians are tracking our lives. Why that's good, and bad.8:20 a.m.
• Viewing the debates as theater
  Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama says he is planning to participate in Friday night's scheduled debate despite a call by Republican nominee John McCain to postpone the meeting because of the nation's financial crisis.8:25 a.m.

National Public Radio Stories

• Technology Helps NHL Scout Draft Picks
  Wondering whether you've got the hand-eye coordination to be the next Wayne Gretsky? The NHL is using computer simulation to find out. SensAble Technologies Inc., uses a real hockey stick and a virtual puck to measure how smoothly you can move around the ice and get the puck to the goal. The NHL is using the test to scout — it could get you on a team — if you don't break anything. Or maybe if you do.
• Permit Revoked For Pistol-Packing Soccer Mom
  Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin became famous as a hockey mom who knew how to shoot. She could probably trade stories with a woman in Lebanon, Pa., Meleanie Hain had a permit to carry a concealed weapon. But she allegedly had it in plain sight at her daughter's soccer games. Other parents complained, and officials revoked her permit. We do not have word if the referees at her daughter's games were especially careful.
• Ornate Yemeni Knives Mark Status, Masculinity
  Known as "jambiya," the knives can cost hundreds of dollars or more, and are handcrafted by artisans with a long history of knife-making. They are the ultimate status symbol in the Arab nation.
• VP Nominees Vie Over Foreign Policy
  While John McCain and Barack Obama are dealing with the economy, the vice presidential nominees have been talking about foreign policy. Republican Sarah Palin has been meeting world leaders in New York. Democrat Joe Biden spoke Wednesday in Cincinnati about his in-depth knowledge of foreign policy.
• Finding Alternatives To Bailout Proposal
  President Bush, the Treasury secretary and the Fed chairman have all suggested we have no choice: One way or another, they've said, the economy is in danger without a $700 billion bailout of the financial services industry. But the original bailout plan is changing in Congress, and outside economists have suggested different approaches.
• McCain Challenges Obama To Delay First Debate
  Republican presidential nominee John McCain made a surprising gesture Wednesday by temporarily suspending his campaign to help work on the bailout plan. The Arizona senator also proposed delaying Friday's first presidential debate with Barack Obama.
• Lower Oil Prices Catch Billionaire Off Guard
  Oil magnate T. Boone Pickens is taking a beating financially. The slump in the price of oil has cost his hedge funds around $1 billion this year. His investors lost most of that money. Pickens' personal losses are estimated at $270 million. This isn't the kind of result you'd expect from a guy who's written a book called The First Billion is the Hardest.
• Average Joe: Why Should I Bail Out Wall Street?
  Most Americans pay their mortgages on time and did not directly contribute to what is being called the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. The idea that taxpayers might foot the bill for bailing out Wall Street investment banks for bad bets makes them furious. Paul Bayne of Annapolis, Md., says, "I feel like we're bailing out people who were either greedy or dumb."
• Rice Meets Russian Counterpart Amid Tension
  Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice held her first meeting Wednesday with Russia's foreign minister since Moscow's invasion of Georgia. But the relationship between the U.S. and Russia remains tense.
• Obama, McCain To Meet With Bush On Economy
  The presidential hopefuls accepted Bush's invitation to discuss the $700 billion rescue proposal for Wall Street with him and congressional leaders on Thursday. The meeting follows a topsy-turvy day that left the election's first debate in limbo.
• Congress Readies Checkbook For Automakers
  Lawmakers in the House have approved $25 billion in loans for the auto industry. The loans are intended to help the industry retool old plants and develop advanced batteries and hybrid vehicles. The result is expected to be a more extensive lineup of hybrids, new plug-in electric cars and more fuel-efficient engines. The measure is part of a larger spending bill that the Senate could vote on as early as this week.
• Bush Warns Of Crisis As Congress Deliberates
  President Bush cautioned that the country faces a severe economic crisis. The speech from the White House East Room Wednesday night, followed a second day of hearings on Capitol Hill with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. Some lawmakers are pushing the White House to accept a smaller bailout of $150 billion.
• Chinese Milk Worker: Complaints Ignored For Years
  Milk contaminated with the industrial chemical melamine has sickened more than 50,000 children in China in recent weeks. But the practice of adulterating milk seems to have started far earlier than is being reported — and one whistle-blower has been trying to expose the dirty secrets of China's milk industry.
• Help, I Can't Find The 'Any' Key
  The technology staffing firm Robert Half Technology asked more than a thousand IT executives what are the most baffling questions posed to their computer help desks. They include a query from a computer user who thought the CD-ROM drive was a drink holder and called to ask, "How do I get my computer's coffee-cup holder to come out again?"
• Actor Robert Wagner: Life And Romance
  Robert Wagner has made movies with Spencer Tracy and played Number Two in the Austin Powers films. In the memoir Pieces of My Heart, Wagner details two winding paths: his career and his love life.

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