The Salt
6:40 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

Dirty Spuds? Alleged Potato Cartel Accused Of Price Fixing

Credit iStockphoto.com
Clearly, he's as surprised by the allegations as the rest of us.

Originally published on Tue June 18, 2013 4:09 pm

Editor's Note: Many of you noted that the price for a 10-pound bag of potatoes cited in the lawsuit seems ridiculously high. So we look into the matter further — you can read what we found in this follow-up post.

High-tech spying with satellites. Intimidation. Price fixing.

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Hobbies
5:56 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

You've never seen Frisbee like this...

Credit The Flying Aces

On June 20th, the Flying Aces will entertain a Kalamazoo Public Library audience with Frisbee tricks. Their presentation also includes a history of the flying discs and information about the newest techniques and products.

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Credit Robert Dodge

Trey Graham edits and produces arts and entertainment content for NPR's Digital Media division, where among other things he's helped launch the Monkey See pop-culture blog and NPR's expanded Web-only movies coverage. He also helps manage the Web presence for Fresh Air from WHYY.

Outside NPR, Graham has been a lead theater critic at the Washington City Paper, D.C.'s alternative weekly newspaper, since 1995, which means he's seen a good deal of superb theater and a great deal of schlock. He's still stage-struck enough to believe that the former makes up for the latter.

Graham began his career as a writer and editor at The Washington Blade; his subsequent tenure at USA Today included a stint as the newspaper's music and theater editor. A past fellow at both the O'Neill Critics Institute and the NEA Arts Journalism Institute in Theater and Musical Theater, Graham won the George Jean Nathan Award for distinguished drama criticism in December 2004.

Graham is also a regular panelist on Around Town, the venerable arts roundtable program on Washington PBS affiliate WETA-TV, and the author of the theater section of the newest Time Out Guide to the nation's capital. He's written about books, travel, movies and the arts for publications including The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Born in New Orleans (during Mardi Gras, no less) and raised in South Carolina, Graham has lived in Washington, D.C., since 1990 ­ except for a couple of years in Zimbabwe, which turned out to be way more fun than a politically perilous, economically disastrous situation has any right being.

Next to Normal
5:37 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

Next to Normal at Farmers Alley Theatre examines issues around mental health

Credit Farmers Alley Theatre
Michelle Duffy and Trey Ellett

  • Report by WMUK's Gordon Evans

This past winter, What A Do Theater in Battle Creek staged the award-winning play Next to Normal. Now Farmers Alley Theatre in Kalamazoo is trying their hand at it with two Broadway actors playing lead roles.

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Shots - Health News
5:37 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

The Human Voice May Not Spark Pleasure In Children With Autism

Credit Rich Pedroncelli / AP
Instructional assistant Jessica Reeder touches her nose to get Jacob Day, 3, who has autism, to focus his attention on her during a therapy session in April 2007.

Originally published on Tue June 18, 2013 11:31 am

The human voice appears to trigger pleasure circuits in the brains of typical kids, but not children with autism, a Stanford University team reports. The finding could explain why many children with autism seem indifferent to spoken words.

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5:36 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

Richland, Schoolcraft number one in DUI arrests

Lead in text: 
Those cities had the most drunk driving arrests per police officer in the state 2012.
RELATED: Search tool shows DUI arrest details and police rankings in your area. RICHLAND, MI - On paper, seven police officers made 127 arrests for drunken driving last year in the Kalamazoo County villages of Richland and Schoolcraft. But in reality, Schoolcraft Police Chief Bryan Campbell and Richland Police Chief Jeff Mattioli say three officers - Matt Britton in Schoolcraft and Sgt.
5:34 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

Congress says Michigan 'misusing' food stamp program

Lead in text: 
Michigan could see cuts in the program as Congress debates whether citizens are abusing food stamps.
WASHINGTON - The number of Americans relying on food stamps has soared to historic levels, and Michigan has seen a bigger increase than most states. Almost one in five Michigan households -18 percent - received food stamps at some point in 2011, compared with 13 percent nationwide.
Monkey See
5:26 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

Teens Find The Right Tools For Their Social-Media Jobs

Credit Anatoliy Babiy / iStockphoto.com
When you need to illustrate a story about proliferating social-media platforms, it's good to know that an enterprising stock photographer has probably thought about it already.

Originally published on Mon June 17, 2013 5:45 pm

Once upon a time, it was MySpace. (Huh. Turns out you can still link to it.) Then Facebook happened. And Twitter. And beyond those two dominant social-media platforms, there are a host of other, newer options for staying in touch and letting the digital universe get a look at your life. And for certain kinds of sharing, some of those other options make more sense to tech-savvy teens than the Big Two do.

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Code Switch
5:12 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

How Do You Teach The Civil Rights Movement?

Credit Jim Bourdier / AP
A protestor is carried away from a demonstration in Jacksonville 50 years ago.

Originally published on Mon June 17, 2013 9:37 pm

Note: As part of NPR's series on the summer of 1963, reporter Cory Turner headed to Jackson, Miss. to take a look at how folks are teaching the Civil Rights movement to kids who weren't a part of it — and making the lessons stick.

Much has changed in the past 50 years, since the height of the Civil Rights movement. But how do you teach the Civil Rights to kids who haven't ever experienced it? In Jackson, Miss., Fannie Lou Hamer Institute's Summer Youth Workshop tackles that question.

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Middle East
4:26 pm
Mon June 17, 2013

New Iranian President Known As The 'Diplomat Sheikh'

Originally published on Mon June 17, 2013 5:45 pm

Transcript

ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST:

This is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Robert Siegel.

MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:

And I'm Melissa Block.

Today, the new president of Iran vowed to follow the path of moderation and justice, not extremism. Hasan Rowhani talked of enhancing mutual trust between Iran and other countries. That marks a stark change in rhetoric from that of outgoing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Rowhani campaigned as a reformist. He's also a cleric and Iran's former chief nuclear negotiator, who became known as the Diplomat Sheikh.

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