Audio for this story from All Things Considered will be available at approximately 7:00 p.m. ET.
December 13, 2012
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]]>On 'Fiscal Cliff,' Majority Of Public Sides With Democrats, Pew Poll Says
President Obama, with House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) behind him, delivering his State of the Union address last January.
As the end-of-year tax increases and spending cuts known as the "fiscal cliff" near, "Democrats are in a strong position with the public," the Pew Research Center reports.
A new national poll Pew released this morning shows that:
— "When it comes to the reaching an agreement to avoid the fiscal cliff, 55% say Obama is making a serious effort to work with Republicans. But just 32% say Republican leaders are making a serious effort to work with Obama on a deficit deal."
— President Obama's "first post-reelection job approval rating has risen to 55%, up five points since July and 11 points since the start of the year. Obama's job rating is markedly higher than George W. Bush's first job measure (48%) after he won reelection in 2004."
— "By a 53% to 33% margin, the public sees the Republican Party, rather than the Democratic Party, as 'more extreme in its positions.' Democrats, on the other hand, are seen as "more willing to work with leaders from the other party" by roughly two-to-one (53% vs. 27%)."
The national survey of 1,503 adults was conducted Dec. 5-9. Pew says that "900 respondents were interviewed on a landline telephone, and 603 were interviewed on a cell phone, including 300 who had no landline telephone." The margin of error on results from the full survey is +/- 2.9 percentage points.
The results echo those of a survey Pew did for The Washington Post in late November and earlier in December. In that poll, 53 percent of those surveyed said Republicans would be "more to blame" if there's no agreement reached to avoid going over the so-called cliff. Twenty-nine percent said Obama would be to blame.
Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Research Center, is due to speak with All Things Considered this afternoon about the latest poll results. We'll add the broadcast-version of that conversation to the top of this post later. Click here to find an NPR station that broadcasts or streams the show.
Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
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]]>It's ScuttleButton Time!
... And, it's the last ScuttleButton for 2012.
ScuttleButton, of course, is that once-a-week waste of time exercise in which each Monday or Tuesday (or, as they call today, "Thursday") I put up a vertical display of buttons on this site. Your job is to simply take one word (or concept) per button, add 'em up, and, hopefully, you will arrive at a famous name or a familiar expression. (And seriously, by familiar, I mean it's something that more than one person on Earth would recognize.)
For years, a correct answer chosen at random would get his or her name posted in this column, an incredible honor in itself. Now the stakes are even higher. Thanks to the efforts of the folks at Talk of the Nation, that person also hears their name mentioned on the Wednesday show (by me) and receives a Political Junkie t-shirt in the bargain. Is this a great country or what?
You can't use the comments box at the bottom of the page for your answer. Send submission (plus your name and city/state — you won't win without that) to politicaljunkie@npr.org.
(Why do people keep forgetting to include their name and city/state?)
And, by adding your name to the Political Junkie mailing list, you will be among the first on your block to receive notice about the column and the puzzle. Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org. Or you can make sure to get an automatic RSS feed whenever a new Junkie post goes up by clicking here.
Good luck!
By the way, I always announce the winner on Wednesday's Junkie segment on TOTN. But with it now less than a week until the next show, your window for getting your answer in is smaller.
Here are the buttons used and the answer to last week's puzzle:
I'm a Voter Too! — Worn by someone who apparently is also a voter.
Anna Eshoo for Congress — A Democrat from California, she was first elected in 1992.
Impeach 1/2 of LBJ — The idea behind this button: they like President Johnson's domestic policy but hate his Vietnam War policy.
picture button of 3 men, including LBJ — The other two, on this North Dakota 1964 coattail button, are Sen. Quentin Burdick and Gov. William Guy. All three Democrats won in N.D. that year.
So, when you combine Too + Anna + Half + Men, you may just very well end up with ...
Two and a Half Men. The popular CBS program that is, by some accounts, very funny and very dirty. Or at least it was when Charlie Sheen was on it, before he self-destructed. .
The winner, chosen completely at random, is ... Seth Denney of Danville, Iowa. Seth gets not only the coveted Political Junkie t-shirt — but the Official No Prize Button as well!
And don't forget to check out this week's Political Junkie column, which focuses on the surprise decision by South Carolina's Jim DeMint to leave the Senate, and the guessing game on his successor. Click here to read the column.
Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
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]]>Sales Soar In Gaza Of Fragrance Named For Rocket Fired At Israel
Bottles of M75 on sale at a shop in Gaza City. The fragrance is named for the rockets fired from Gaza into Israel.
Before anyone else does, we'll make the "I love the smell of napalm in the morning" reference that comes to mind when you read this:
"Sales of a citrus-scented perfume marketed in Gaza have soared since it was named in honor of the rockets that Palestinians shot at Israel during a war last month, the manufacturer said." (Reuters)
The scent — there's one for men and another for women — is named M75. It's marketed by a Gaza company called Stay Stylish. The marketing director, who wanted only to be known as Shadi, tells CNN that in Gaza, M75 "means a period of happiness, or the feeling of victory, and the use of the perfume is an expression of happiness as well."
During eight days of fighting last month involving rockets fired from Hamas-controlled territory and air strikes by Israeli forces on Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, more than 150 people were killed in Gaza and at least five people were killed in Israel.
(H/T to NPR's Philip Reeves.)
Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
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]]>One Photo, 126 Frames, 2 Billion Leaves, 247 Feet
Cloaked in the snows of California's Sierra Nevada, the 3,200-year-old giant sequoia called the President rises 247 feet. Two other sequoias have wider trunks, but none has a larger crown, say the scientists who climbed it. The figure at top seems taller than the other climbers because he's standing forward on one of the great limbs.
Those numbers represent this giant sequoia. Oh, also: The tree is more than three millennia old, and contains about "54,000 cubic feet of wood and bark," according to National Geographic magazine.
A few years ago, photographer Michael Nichols photographed a 300-foot giant in California's Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. The magazine's December issue has a follow-up: a huge tear-out of the "President," a snowy monolith in the Sierra Nevadas.
"It's not quite the largest tree on Earth," the magazine article reads. "It's the second largest. Recent research by scientist Steve Sillett of Humboldt State University and his colleagues has confirmed that the President ranks number two among all big trees that have ever been measured — and Sillett's team has measured quite a few."
The giant sequoia is a snow tree, says scientist Steve Sillett, adapted for long winters in the Sierra Nevada. But it's a fire tree, too. Thick bark protects it from burning in lightning-caused fires, which open cones and clear the understory, allowing saplings to find light and prosper.
Sillett and his team are carefully measuring trees like the President by climbing them — and they're making interesting discoveries in doing so.
What they have found, the article explains, is that despite popular belief, sequoias continue to grow rapidly even in old age. In fact, the yearly output of wood produced by a tree like the President is greater than that of younger trees. This research might overturn the long-standing premise that "has justified countless management decisions in favor of short-rotation forestry," the article reads.
There's more over at National Geographic — including a video about how the photograph was made and more photos.
Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
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]]>10 Artists You Should Have Known In 2012
Stasia Irons of THEESatisfaction performs at an All Songs Considered party at KEXP on August 20, 2012.
It's hard to keep track of new artists these days. Anyone with a credit card can start a Bandcamp page, and there are only so many hours in the day you can listen to music.
In an effort to make it a littler easier on you, we asked some colleagues around the country to share their favorite new discoveries of 2012, bands that made a real dent in their communities. Here are the artists you should have known in 2012.
10 Artists You Should Have Known In 2012
Lord Huron
L.A.'s Ben Schneider.
The sweeping majesty of Lord Huron's Lonesome Dreams makes a compelling case for rushing right out the door, and leaving the mundane routine of everyday life in search of love. "Run away with me, it'll all make sense" urges Ben Schneider, singing of a life brimming with possibilities. "We're going to leave tonight, by the light of the moon." If only we could accept this romantic invitation, but at least we have this album of brilliant atmospheric folk to take us on a fantastic journey of sorts, if only in our minds for a moment. --Jason Bentley, KCRW music director in Santa Monica, Calif.
THEEsatisfaction
THEESatisfaction's Catherine Harris-White and Stasia Irons.
Stasia Irons and Catherine Harris-White started out in living rooms, performed after-hours in an Eritrean restaurant, pressed their self-consciously weird souls to CDR; over four short years they rose to prominence in Seattle, and were eventually able to quit pushing shopping carts at Costco. Back in February, on Sub Pop Records, they dropped the album they'd been promising for years. awE naturalE is a deep, epic jazz poem that synthesizes and refracts several distinct phases of Black light, and more than lives up to the expectations. This year alone they saw the U.S., Europe, Australia and Iceland over the course of eight or nine tours. THEESatisfaction has had a major 2012 and promises more this next cycle, alone together or alongside key collaborators like Shabazz Palaces. --Larry Mizell Jr., host of KEXP "Street Sounds" in Seattle
Poliça
Poliça lead singer Channy Leaneagh.
What started a side project has exploded into a full-time career for Channy Leaneagh and her bandmates in bedroom R&B project Poliça. The quartet converged in the studio over a few humid Minneapolis summer days last year and emerged with a fire-and-ice sound that binds organic elements (dual drums, punchy basslines) with more alienating aspects like manipulated vocals and undulating and robotic laptop beats. Leaneagh is unabashed in her use of Auto-Tune and bends the effect to her will, letting just enough of her lyrics slip through the chromatics to reveal the deep sorrow and loss that inspired their debut, Give You the Ghost. It's an album that resonated immediately with a local fanbase already familiar with the band member's previous projects (producer Ryan Olson's Gayngs, Leaneagh's Roma di Luna); their mesmerizing live shows ignited a national spark at SXSW and have kept them on the road touring the U.S. and Europe ever since. -- Andrea Swensson, 89.3 The Current in the Twin Cities
John Fullbright
Oklahoma's John Fullbright.
There is so much flavor on John Fullbright's debut, From the Ground Up, it could please folks accustomed to anything from soul to folk, to indie pop. It's not every day a new artist shows up out of the red Oklahoma dirt — Woody Guthrie's hometown, to be exact — and earns comparisons to great songwriters like Townes Van Zandt and Randy Newman, but Fullbright's music makes sense in such lofty company. His songs toss around themes of god and lust and faith and doubt like they're all dirty shirts that have been worn for too long. Take "Jericho." Its gospel organ and dark, slogging rhythm support lyrics about searching for something — be it love or forgiveness, truth or transcendence. Everything here is on even ground — the profound as important as the profane. For Fullbright even the road to glory must be built from the ground up. --Kim Ruehl, FolkAlley.com
Savoir Adore
Savoir Adore's Deidre Muro and Paul Hammer.
Savoir Adore's Deidre Muro and Paul Hammer sculpt exuberant synth-pop spun from fantasy concepts — their partially Kickstarter-built sophomore album, Our Nature, is a concept album loosely involving unrequited, otherworldly lovers surreptitiously meeting by riverbanks and wooded glens. But longtime friends Muro and Hammer — and their three bandmates — intuitively sharpen their dreamy dialogues with wiry, earthy hooks and defiant dance beats: the result is an ingenious marriage of esoteric artistry and easy accessibility. Tracks like "Regalia," a percussive collision of the Cocteau Twins and the Spice Girls or the sweet, early-morning sunbeam of "Dreamers" are perfect pop manna. While conjuring such gems might come easily to Savoir Adore, what is inexplicably harder is getting these DIY-determined New Yorkers the effusive attention they deserve. --Kara Manning, content editor at WFUV's The Alternate Side in New York City
Aaron & The Spell
Philadelphia's Aaron Brown.
Finding one of Philly's best new artists is no easy task. Recently the city has seen a resurgence in creative energy with bands like Dr. Dog, War On Drugs, Work Drugs, Lushlife and Strand of Oaks representing the City of Brotherly Love. While there's no shortage of fantastic new bands from various genres, we decided to look to soul music for one of our best new artists. From The Sound Of Philadelphia to the Roots, Philly has always been steeped in soul. Singer-songwriter Aaron Brown is an exciting new name to add to the lineage of the city's expressive and emotionally intense soul singers. His self-released his album, Sing, recorded with some Philly scene up-and-comers backing him up and performing as The Spell, is an excellent new addition to the musical landscape. --Bruce Warren, WXPN program director in Philadelphia
Graham Dechter
Los Angeles jazz guitarist Graham Dechter.
Graham Dechter is a talented young guitarist who started composing music at a young age (he's the child of professional musicians & music educators). He focused early on classical-based composition until high school, when a jazz teacher told him that improvisation was "composition in real time." The jazz light bulb switched on brightly, and within a few years, he was laying down grooves with the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra. His playing and arranging skills are precise, lean, accessible and hooky. He plays with soulfulness and with experience seemingly beyond his years. --Nick Francis, Jazz24.org music director
Radiation City
From left, Radiation City's Cameron Spies, Lizzy Ellison, Randy Bemrose, Patti King and Matt Rafferty.
Our adoration for Radiation City actually dates back to 2011 — their impossibly catchy song "The Color of Industry" was our first introduction to the band midway through 2011. Infusing old-school soul and girl-group sounds with modern day indie pop, it was the most upbeat number amongst an impressively well-polished collection of slow burners on the quintet's debut The Hands That Take You. Earlier this year, the band followed with the Cool Nightmare EP, Lizzy Ellison's captivating voice presiding over a kind of bossa nova fever dream with one sparse composition often running into the next. The group impressed repeatedly on stages throughout the year, whether delivering a complexly reworked version of one of their songs or a note-perfect take on Etta James staple "At Last." All reasons to say Radiation City is Portland's best new band. Their sophomore release will be out in early 2013 on Tender Loving Empire. --Jeremy Petersen, opbmusic.org in Portland
Pedro Moraes
Brazilian guitarist and composer Pedro Moraes.
Guitarist and singer Pedro Moraes is a great introduction to Rio de Janeiro's adventurous music scene. At turns rocking and lyrical, Moraes demonstrates his ability to mine Brazil's rich musical veins and turn traditional rhythms and forms on their heads. Like Jason Moran, Lionel Loueke and other roots-minded jazz musicians, Moraes finds surprising ways to embrace his past and carry it into the future. On January 14, Moraes hosts a showcase of "explorative" music in New York at (le) Poisson Rouge, with groups led by Ivo Senra, Elisa Cassini, Sergio Krakowski, Mauricio Zottarelli and Gabriel Santiago. Since many of these musicians are rarely heard outside of Brazil — or even outside of Lapa, Rio's hot bohemian neighborhood — this will be a rare chance to hear some of Brazil's most fertile musical imaginations at work. --Tim Wilkins, WBGO's The Jazz Bee
Shakey Graves
Alejandro Rose-Garcia is only slightly less well known than his nom de guerre "Shakey Graves," but those in the know feel like they're in on a very special secret. This Austin native (and talented actor — you may have caught him in his recurring role in Friday Night Lights) is fast developing a reputation as the city's most astonishing one man show. His lo-fi recordings can only approximate his intense, haunting live shows, where he's as likely to be playing to his rapidly growing circle of fans from one of Austin's larger venues as from a front porch stage or an impromptu midnight showcase at a highway underpass. Shakey Graves is more than just a stage name for a seriously talented flatpicker and songwriter: thanks to his unique blues-infused flatpicking style, a voice that can flicker from a fragile whisper to a startling howl and a pocketful of hook-heavy original songs, Shakey Graves is becoming an antifolk phenomenon even in a city weary of "next big things". Unclassifiably original. And frighteningly good. --David Brown, KUT in Austin
Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
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]]>No Alarm Sounded When The West Virginia Pipeline Exploded
Investigators examine a 20-foot long section of gas pipeline found more than 40 feet from the rupture site north of Charleston, W. Va.
When the 20-inch gas pipeline next to Interstate 77 in West Virginia first ruptured on Tuesday, nobody at pipeline operator, Columbia Gas Transmission, knew it.
Now, the National Transportation Safety Board is trying to find out why. NTSB member Robert Sumwalt says no warning went off in the operating company's control center in nearby Charleston, so investigators are going there to interview staffers and review data.
The explosion shut down the freeway and leveled at least four homes. No one was killed or badly injured.
A fireball over Interstate 77 after a gas line ruptured in Sissonville, W. Va. on Tuesday, Dec. 11.
It's unclear how CGT learned of the disaster. CGT's parent company, NiSource Gas Transmission and Storage, reports the explosion occurred just before 1 P.M. Sumwalt says there were no reports of a gas odor and no 911 calls were placed ahead of the blast.
Federal officials are also examining a 20-foot hunk of the pipe flung off by the force of the blast; they're going to take undamaged pipe sections near the breach for comparison and analysis.
There was a gas explosion in about the same region in 2002, Sumwalt acknowledged, but no link has been determined to this event. He was firm during a press briefing that no information would be released until it was verified - he noted that before NTSB investigators came to the scene north of Charleston, they were incorrectly told by the company that the pipe was larger than it turned out to be.
Searching is still treacherous at the site. When NTSB officials went to the pipe breach, they had to take along gas detectors and couldn't use their cameras or phones, because of the danger of sparks. However, I-77 remains open to travelers.
Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
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