The Two-Way
8:05 am
Mon August 29, 2011

Consumer Spending Rebounds; Obama Chooses New Economic Adviser

Consumer spending rose 0.8 percent in July from June, the Bureau of Economic Analysis just reported. The increase came as personal income rose 0.3 percent.

Spending had dipped 0.1 percent in June from May. That had raised concerns about whether consumers — who buy about 70 percent of all goods and services — might pull an already weak economy down further.

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The Two-Way
7:55 am
Mon August 29, 2011

What's Got Folks Talking? Beyonce's Baby Bump

Credit Kevin Winter / Getty Images
Beyonce during her performace Sunday.

Our pal Linda Holmes over at Monkey See knows much more about these types of things than we do, but we do want to take a quick break from natural disasters and other heavy news to note that megastar Beyonce Knowles apparently stole the show at Sunday's MTV Video Music Awards by cleverly revealing to the word that she and Jay-Z are expecting a child.

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It's All Politics
7:15 am
Mon August 29, 2011

Powell Isn't Sure He'll Support Obama In 2012 Race

Credit Chris Usher / CBS News via Getty Images
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell during his appearance Sunday on CBS News' Face the Nation.

Originally published on Mon August 29, 2011 7:19 am

It was a big story when former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a Republican, endorsed Democrat Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign.

So it's news that this weekend on CBS-TV's Face the Nation, Powell said he hasn't decided if he will vote for the president in 2012.

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The Two-Way
7:15 am
Mon August 29, 2011

Powell: Cheney's Taking 'Cheap Shots'

Credit Chris Usher / CBS News via Getty Images
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell during his appearance Sunday on CBS News' Face the Nation.

Originally published on Mon August 29, 2011 7:55 am

Colin Powell isn't a fan of Dick Cheney's new memoir.

On CBS News' Face the Nation this weekend, former Bush administration secretary of state Powell said that Bush-era vice president Cheney takes some "cheap shots" and "overshot the runway" in the book that goes on sale this week.

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The Two-Way
6:45 am
Mon August 29, 2011

New Leader Set In Japan; Gadhafi Still On Run

Good morning.

Residents from North Carolina up through New England are beginning the long process of recovering from Hurricane Irene, which we followed through the weekend and earlier today.

We'll keep an eye out for more stories about the storm and its aftermath. Meanwhile, other major news of the day includes:

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Around the Nation
6:26 am
Mon August 29, 2011

School Superintendent Gives Himself A Big Pay Cut

Larry Powell is superintendent of 325 schools in Fresno County, Calif. Powell is giving back $800,000 over the next three years. He wants to preserve education programs from budget cuts. He'll work his final three years before retirement making less than a starting teacher's salary.

Around the Nation
6:20 am
Mon August 29, 2011

Baltimore's Mayor Inadvertently Wakes Up The City

Some Baltimore residents were getting robocalls from the mayor around 4 a.m. Saturday reminding them that Hurricane Irene was on the way. The city's automatic phone calls were supposed to stop by 9 p.m. Friday, but a glitch kept them going through the night.

The Two-Way
6:15 am
Mon August 29, 2011

Irene: Not A Monster, But Lots Of Damage

Credit Sandy Macys / AP
Flooding Sunday in Waitsfield, Vt.

Originally published on Mon August 29, 2011 6:27 am

Hurricane Irene is gone, but she won't be forgotten anytime soon.

As NPR's Larry Abramson said today on Morning Edition, "Irene did not turn out to be the storm of the century" and many beach towns "were stunned by how lucky they were."

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Jon Hamilton is a correspondent for NPR's Science Desk. Currently he focuses on neuroscience, health risks, and extreme weather.

Following the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Hamilton was part of NPR's team of science reporters and editors who went to Japan to cover the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant.

Hamilton contributed several pieces to the Science Desk series "The Human Edge," which looked at what makes people the most versatile and powerful species on Earth. His reporting explained how humans use stories, how the highly evolved human brain is made from primitive parts, and what autism reveals about humans social brains.

In 2009, Hamilton received the Michael E. DeBakey Journalism Award for his piece on the neuroscience behind treating autism.

Before joining NPR in 1998, Hamilton was a media fellow with the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation studying health policy issues. He reported on states that have improved their Medicaid programs for the poor by enrolling beneficiaries in private HMOs.

From 1995-1997, Hamilton wrote on health and medical topics as a freelance writer, after having been a medical reporter for both The Commercial Appeal and Physician's Weekly.

Hamilton graduated with honors from Oberlin College in Ohio with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English. As a student, he was the editor of the Oberlin Review student newspaper. He earned his master's degree in journalism from Columbia University, where he graduated with honors During his time at Columbia, Hamilton was awarded the Baker Prize for magazine writing and earned a Sherwood traveling fellowship.

Cokie Roberts a Morning Edition contributor.

At NPR she previously served as the congressional correspondent for more than 10 years. In addition to her work for NPR, Roberts is a political commentator for ABC News, providing analysis for all network news programming.

From 1996-2002 she and Sam Donaldson co-anchored the weekly ABC interview program This Week. In her more than forty years in broadcasting, she has won countless awards, including three Emmys. She has been inducted into the Broadcasting and Cable Hall of Fame, and was cited by the American Women in Radio and Television as one of the fifty greatest women in the history of broadcasting.

In addition to her appearances on the airwaves, Roberts, along with her husband, Steven V. Roberts, writes a weekly column syndicated in newspapers around the country by United Media. The Roberts are also contributing editors to USA Weekend Magazine, and together they wrote From this Day Forward, an account of their more than 40 year marriage and other marriages in American history. The book immediately went onto The New York Times bestseller list, following Roberts' number one bestseller, We Are Our Mothers' Daughters, an account of women's roles and relationships throughout American history. Roberts histories of women in America's founding era --Founding Mothers, published in 2004 and Ladies of Liberty in 2008, also became instant bestsellers.

Cokie Roberts holds more than twenty honorary degrees, serves on the boards of several non-profit institutions and on the President's Commission on Service and Civic Participation. This year the Library of Congress named her a "Living Legend," one of the very few Americans to have attained that honor. She is the mother of two and grandmother of six.

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