Morning Edition

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RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. Good morning. I'm Renee Montagne.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

And I'm Steve Inskeep. Mexico is considering changes to its collaboration with the United States in the war on drugs. That was the news at the top of the story in the Washington Post. But for many of us, some information further down in the article was more revealing because the article detailed just how deep and broad the U.S.-Mexico collaboration is.

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Good morning. I'm Renee Montagne. There's a baby boom in Los Giles, Spain consisting of one. Baby Inara arrived three weeks ago. It's the first child to be born there in 45 years. At last count, the village had about 60 residents, all aging. But the first-time parents of Inara had moved back to the village to raise their child near grandparents. Now thinkspain.com reports nearly everyone in town has held her. So it really does take a village. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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Good morning, I'm Steve Inskeep.

Once Louisville won the NCAA men's basketball title, there was only one thing for Rick Pitino to do. He promised his players that if they won, he'd get a tattoo. We do not know if Pitino had second thoughts in the final seconds of the win over Michigan, but now the coach has done it. A Louisville spokesman tweeted a photo of the 60-year-old coach's back. It is now marked with the team record, 35-and-five, along with a blood-red letter L.

Across the country, state budgets are back in the black after years of belt-tightening and spending cuts. From California to Florida, in nearly every state, the economic recovery has produced a surge in tax revenue.

For governors and state legislators, that's produced a new question: how to spend the money.

The past three years have not been easy ones for elected officials. Nearly every state requires them to produce a balanced budget. And with declining revenue from sales, property and income taxes, that has meant big spending cuts.

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NPR's business news starts with massive layoffs in Greece.

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INSKEEP: Greek lawmakers approved emergency plans to cut 15,000 government jobs by the end of next year. They have to do that in order to receive more European Union bailout funds.

The Greek parliament approved a measure in a vote on Sunday. Their new law will overturn what had been a constitutional guarantee for public sector workers to have a permanent position for life.

Attorneys, visitors, employees and inmates have been reviewing jails on the website Yelp. They offer opinions on everything from cleanliness to guard uniforms to abuse and corruption.

Roughly one in four cellphone towers in the path of Hurricane Sandy went out of service. It was a frustrating and potentially dangerous experience for customers without a landline to fall back on. Now, local officials and communications experts are pushing providers to improve their performance during natural disasters.

Lori McCaskill lives in Brooklyn, and when Sandy hit last October, her Verizon cell service went out. She couldn't work. She couldn't check in with family and friends. Her sister was due to have a baby any day.

All parents are bound to disagree, argue or even raise their voices with each other.

But psychologists say parents can minimize the negative impact of their arguments on their children. It's just a matter of using a few simple techniques to turn down the heat and repair the damage after it's over.

Psychologist Suzanne Phillips at Long Island University says one of the most important things for parents to remember when they're on the verge of a big argument is not to involve the child.

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Accelerating economic growth is at the top of NPR's business news.

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INSKEEP: U.S. economic growth regained speed in the first quarter of this year, although not as much as economists had hoped. The Gross Domestic Product grew at an annual rate of 2.5 percent. Consumer spending is up and home construction rose, but government spending fell and tax increases, as well as federal budget cuts, are expected to slow economic growth later in the year. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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NPR's business news starts with Samsung ringing up sales.

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INSKEEP: Samsung said this morning its first quarter profit is at a record high - net profit surged 42 percent. The company has now seen six straight quarters of growth, thanks to strong smartphone sales. Tomorrow, it's launching a new smartphone in the United States - the Galaxy S4 - which is aimed at taking on Apple's iPhone. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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Good morning, I'm Steve Inskeep with congratulations to Bill Clinton. The president, whose campaign theme was "Don't Stop Thinking About Tomorrow," caught up with Twitter. TV host Stephen Colbert made him a fake Twitter account, and then Clinton began using a real one. He's posted a few messages, including one saying he's enjoying Twitter so far. Where else can you hear from Bill Gates, Paul Pierce, John McCain, Ellen DeGeneres and Usher in one day? Hashtag: #Thisisgreat.

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Good morning. I'm Renee Montagne. Alexander Graham Bell came up with one of the world's most important acoustical devices, but his own voice had been lost until now. The Smithsonian has found the inventor's voice on a wax disc from 1885. Listen closely.

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ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL: Here is my voice. Alexander Graham Bell.

MONTAGNE: Alexander Graham Bell. That old recording was brought to life with digital technology. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Renee Montagne.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

And I'm Steve Inskeep.

Now that automatic spending cuts are causing wider pain, Congress has begun finding ways to adjust some of them.

MONTAGNE: Today the House is expected to take up a bill the Senate has already approved. It's called the Reducing Flight Delays Act of 2013, and it comes after a week of flight delays and outrage from members of Congress, linked to the furloughs the FAA air traffic controllers.

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It's MORNING EDITION, from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.

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And I'm Renee Montagne. A frantic search for survivors continues near Dhaka, Bangladesh, where an eight-story building collapsed two days ago. The building mostly housed garment factories that make low-cost clothing for Western customers.

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Spain has lived through years of punishing budget cuts and austerity. This morning, its government unveiled a new economic plan which eased budget targets but acknowledged that recovery was still a long way off. Thousands took to the streets in Madrid overnight, protesting the country's past measures and tax hikes that have left many without jobs.

Lauren Frayer reports from Madrid.

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The president's appearance at that memorial service came on the same day he joined with all his living predecessors. He met with Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, whose presidential library was dedicated in Texas.

A photograph sent out on Twitter, incidentally by former President Clinton, shows the five men in a circle, chatting. Three Democrats joined two Republicans on a day when political differences were overlooked.

Here's NPR national political correspondent Don Gonyea.

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It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

And I'm Renee Montagne.

Nearly 10,000 mourners gathered yesterday to honor the men who died fighting a fire in a fertilizer plant in Texas. They packed the basketball arena on the campus of Baylor University in Waco. At least 14 people died when that fire led to an explosion in the little town of West - which is just north of Waco.

NPR's Wade Goodwyn reports.

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And on this Friday, our last word in business comes in the form of a toast - to the Boston Beer Company, the maker of brews including Samuel Adams.

Seventy employees were on the route of the Boston Marathon last week when the bombs exploded.

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Coffee runs through the veins of Latin America. As economically and culturally ubiquitous as it is throughout the continent, it's only natural that it would also be a constant theme in Latin American music. But coffee, present throughout Latin song, is rarely just about a cup of joe: the drink and its colors and flavors are often used as a way to discuss sociopolitical realities.

I recently got a tour of the Spangler Candy Co., a family-owned firm in Bryan, Ohio. The company makes 10 million Dum Dums lollipops there every day, and it has a whole separate building where it stores the sugar — enough to fill eight Olympic-size swimming pools.

The CEO, Kirk Vashaw, says he wants to expand the factory and make even more candy there. There's just one thing he needs.

"Let us buy sugar on the free market," he says.

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President Obama travels to another memorial today, this one in the Texas town of West. It is to remember those killed last week when a fertilizer plant exploded there. Yesterday, some of those living in homes closest to the plant were allowed back for the first time. NPR's Wade Goodwyn was there.

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Good morning. I'm Renee Montagne. Minnesota's Mall of America is home to some 500 stores, a theme park and now some 72,000 ladybugs. Third graders released them inside the shopping center this week. Ladybugs protect the mall's 30,000 plants by eating aphids. Some mall-goers worried the bugs might descend on the food court, but a spokesman says the mall has released the ladybugs for years, and there's been no ladybug takeover yet. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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Good morning, I'm Steve Inskeep with news of a changing retail environment.

We've told you of a plan to let states collect sales tax from online retailers. Now we're on the way to an online bar. Vermont lawmakers are considering a bill to let brewers ship their beer directly to consumers. This proposal faces the concern that underage drinkers might order beer but wineries already do this. If the measure should pass, you could order a six-pack or maybe a keg by UPS.

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This does not happen very often. This morning all five living presidents, past and present, are in the same place at the same time.

The occasion is the dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Center on the campus of Southern Methodist University.

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The design committee for this presidential library had a former librarian as its chairperson, former First Lady Laura Bush. She told our colleague David Greene she studied the libraries of presidents past.

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Air travelers are growing less and less happy. Automatic budget cuts are now leading to hundreds of flight delays, about half of all delayed flights this week.

NPR's Tamara Keith reports.

TAMARA KEITH, BYLINE: Up until this point, the effects of the sequester have been scattered and hard to pin down: hiring freezes, delayed park openings. But then the furloughs of air traffic controllers the Federal Aviation Administration had been threatening for months hit and, bam, the sequester got real, real fast.