NPR News

The debate over coronary bypass surgery versus stenting goes back decades.

Studies have been inconclusive, but doctors and patients have voted with their feet in favor of the less-invasive procedure — clearing clogged arteries and propping them open with tiny scaffolds called stents.

U.S. doctors do at least two stenting procedures these days for every coronary bypass operation.

The Justice Department's 'systematic concealment" of evidence that might have helped the late Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, defend himself in a corruption case will get a fresh airing Wednesday, when special prosecutor Henry Schuelke offers Senate testimony about his blistering 500-page report.

He's due to be before the Senate Judiciary Committee at 10 a.m. ET.

Home prices fell in most major metropolitan areas again in January, according to the widely watched S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices report.

There are fresh fears about the infiltration of Afghan security forces by anti-government and anti-American insurgents after the discovery of 10 or 11 (depending on the media report) suicide vests inside the headquarters of that country's defense ministry and the arrest of more than a dozen soldiers.

The way Colin Cooper sees it, people are willing to drive miles out of their way to save a few bucks on gas. Why wouldn't they do the same for health care?

So the CEO of Eastford, Conn.-based Whitcraft, an aerospace component manufacturer, figures his 500 employees will probably be willing to go to a hospital, radiology practice or lab recommended by their health plan if they can take home an extra $50 or $100 for doing so.

In the process, he hopes his company will trim its health care costs.

Supreme Court oral arguments on the Affordable Care Act entered their second day Tuesday, with the justices moving from the technicalities of the first day to exploring the legal issues at the heart of whether the law is constitutional or not.

While this morning's Miami Herald concludes that emerging details about Trayvon Martin's life paint "a complicated portrait" of a boy with "a spotty school record," anyone who has guided their child through the teenage years may be more likely to see a fairly typical kid who had some brushes with authority and lots of dreams about the future.

It took a while, but guards at Canada's Glenbow Museum finally noticed a new acquisition in the gallery: An oil painting of a semi-nude woman. An anonymous note said the donor's late father did the painting and had always wanted his work in a museum.

On Day Two of three days focused on the health care overhaul law, the Supreme Court this morning will get to the heart of the arguments over the legislation's constitutionality, NPR's Nina Totenberg reported on Morning Edition and at the Shots blog.

As she says:

Transcript

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

"A spokesman for U.N. envoy Kofi Annan says Syria has accepted his plan to end the bloodshed in the country," The Associated Press reports.

Ahmad Fawzi said the news came in a letter from President Bashar Assad's government to Annan, the former U.N. secretary general who has been trying to broker an end to the Assad regime's crackdown on dissent — which the U.N. estimates has led to the deaths of more than 8,000 people in the past year.

Apple CEO Tim Cook has flown in to China to meet with government leaders. He's trying to work out issues ranging from trademark concerns to treatment of local factory workers who make Apple products.

Hanoi, Hue, Danang and Saigon, were city names that were stamped on the American psyche a half-century ago, when the U.S. waged war in Vietnam. The once war-torn, Southeast Asian nation has made great strides to leave its troubled past behind.

Lawmakers in the House are expected to vote on a jobs act Tuesday. Part of the legislation would allow the public to make investments in start-up companies and small businesses. These companies could raise money online or through social networks. The bill would lift SEC regulations that restrict soliciting investors.

The Pennsylvania capital Harrisburg is more than $300 million in debt. The budget is controlled by a state-appointed custodian. City and law enforcement services are under strain and residents worry violent crime may be growing.

The walls, furniture and detailing of artist Frank Buckley's apartment in Dublin, Ireland, are made from bricks of shredded euros. He estimates each brick contains up to 50,000 euros worth. He got the materials for free from the country's central bank.

At the Supreme Court, lawyers and justices will continue to spar over the new health care law. Tuesday's debate will center on whether the requirement that everyone carry health insurance — the individual mandate at the heart of the law — is constitutional.

More than 50 international leaders wrapped up talks Tuesday in Seoul, South Korea, on what needs to be done to secure vulnerable stockpiles of plutonium and highly enriched uranium. President Obama hosted the first such summit two years ago. He praised the achievements since then, but said much more needs to be done.

Libertarians say it's like watching dear friends in an ugly divorce, as the billionaire Koch brothers try to take control of the highly regarded Cato Institute. The head of Cato says the Kochs are out to politicize the think tank.

Pope Benedict is in Cuba, Latin America's least Catholic country. He arrived Monday in Santiago, where Cuba's revolution began in 1953. He urged Cubans to seek unity and overcome their divisions, but his message wasn't especially political.

Transcript

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Now, let's turn to another case where legal questions are swirling. In Sanford, Florida, and across the country yesterday, thousands of people held rallies yesterday demanding the same thing - the arrest of George Zimmerman. Zimmerman is the neighborhood watch volunteer who last month shot and killed a black teenager named Trayvon Martin. As NPR's Greg Allen reports, city officials in Sanford say the case is now out of their hands.

Groups within the Occupy Wall Street movement are trying to overhaul the banking system and even dream of creating a new kind of bank.

Occupy isn't in the headlines so much these days, but work continues behind the scenes. The Alternative Banking Group of Occupy Wall Street meets weekly in different places. Members are older than some might think — in their 30s, 40s and 50s — and many work or formerly worked in the financial industry.

There has been a subtle shift taking place in the intelligence community in recent months.

Intelligence and law enforcement officials say analysts and experts who have been tracking al-Qaida for more than a decade have been quietly reassigned. Some are being moved completely out of al-Qaida units. Others are being asked to spend less time watching al-Qaida and more time tracking more traditional foes — like state-sponsored terrorists.

The U.S. Supreme Court gets to the heart of the health care arguments Tuesday. Almost exactly two years after Congress passed the Obama health care overhaul, the justices are hearing legal arguments testing the constitutionality of the so-called health care mandate — so-called because those words actually do not appear in the law.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court hears its second day of testimony about the Affordable Care Act. At issue is a central tenet of that law: whether it's legal to require individuals to purchase health care.

But apart from the legal debate, there are questions about the economics of the mandate. Some — like Peggy Bodner of Portland, Ore. — worry it may be difficult to find the money to pay for health insurance, even with government subsidies.

A quick update on the Decorah Bald Eagle cam that we've been keeping track of and became quite the sensation last year.

As U.S. Supreme Court justices opened their historic three-day hearing of arguments on President Obama's health care plan, hundreds of protesters from across the country flocked outside the court singing, chanting and arguing with one another.

Supporters and opponents of the law engaged in a sing-song call-and-response debate just in front of the court's towering marble steps.

"We love Obamacare!" shouted supporters.

"No, we don't!" responded members of the Tea Party Patriots, one of the most vocal and disapproving groups of the law present at the court Monday.