National News from NPR

One year ago Camden, N.J., Mayor Dana Redd went through with massive layoffs, including slashing nearly half the city's police force. A year after the layoffs, life has not gotten easier in the crime-ridden city, leading some families to consider moving out.

Audie Cornish speaks with Jeffrey Gettleman, East Africa bureau chief for the New York Times, about escalating violence in South Sudan.

The U.S. Supreme Court has given an Alabama death row inmate another chance to fight his execution. By a 7-to-2 vote, the court ruled Wednesday that convicted murderer Cory Maples, "through no fault of his own," was denied the right to appeal because he was abandoned by his lawyers.

Maples was convicted in 1997 of murdering two friends and was sentenced to death. There is no doubt that he committed the crime; the doubt is whether he could have avoided the death penalty if he had been properly represented at trial.

The Transportation Security Administration now says security screeners at Kennedy Airport in New York were wrong when they asked two elderly women to show them medical devices that were under their clothing.

In a letter sent to state Sen. Michael Gianaris and acquired by the New York Daily News, the Department of Homeland Security said that there was no evidence the two women were strip-searched, as they claimed, but that their agents did go further than they should have.

Advocates for the mandatory use of condoms in the production of porn films moved a step closer to victory in Los Angeles.

The city council there voted 9-1 in favor of an ordinance that would require use of condoms to protect performers from sexually transmitted diseases.

Under the new rule, filmmakers wouldn't get a permit to make a movie unless they comply with the condom requirement. The measure is expected to be signed into law, the Los Angeles Times reports.

Actor Mark Wahlberg, in a new interview with Men's Journal, talks about what he thinks would have happened if he had been on one of the planes hijacked on Sept. 11, 2001:

The U.S. House of Representatives will likely vote today to disapprove of raising the debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion. If you remember, the last time a vote of this kind went down, it was a dramatic showdown that rattled markets and was cited as one of the prime reasons S&P downgraded the United States' debt rating.

Today's vote however will be symbolic. The debt ceiling will likely be raised no matter how Congress votes.

Our Newscast desk spoke to NPR's Andrea Seabrook, who explained the vote like this:

Five days after a cruise liner slammed into rocks off Italy's Tuscan coast, the country is gripped by the contrasting profiles of two key figures in the drama — the captain charged with abandoning ship and the captain who demanded he get back onboard.

For many Italians, the accident has become a metaphor for a country that sees itself mired in economic and moral decline.

Francesco Schettino, the disgraced captain of the 1,000-foot-long floating palace known as the Costa Concordia, is under house arrest on suspicion of multiple manslaughter, shipwreck and abandoning ship.

We saw stories earlier this week about a man who was lost for two nights in Mount Rainier National Park over the weekend, but survived in part because he burned the money he was carrying to keep warm as a blizzard blew through the area.

But a critical question wasn't answered until today. — how much money went up in flames?

Countering Mitt Romney's announcement that he paid 15 percent in taxes, Newt Gingrich said his bill came to 31 percent, more than most Americans pay and closer to the top rate of 35 percent.

The AP reports that Gingrich was careful not to criticize Romney for paying a lower tax rate than most Americans.

"My goal is not to raise Mitt Romney's taxes, but to let everyone pay Romney's rate," he said according to the AP.