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All Things Considered

Monday - Friday, 3:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. on KUOW
Melissa Block and Robert Siegel

Hear KUOW and NPR award-winning hosts and reporters from around the globe present some of the nation's best reporting  of the day's events, interviews, analysis and reviews on All Things Considered.

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Sports
3:26 pm
Wed January 2, 2013

Game, Set And Match: U.S. Tennis Tournaments Move Abroad

Credit Danny Moloshok / AP
Pete Sampras returns a forehand against Russia's Marat Safin during an exhibition tennis match at the L.A. Tennis Open tournament in 2009. The tournament, which has been around for decades, is now relocating to Colombia as America's dominance in the sport declines and global appeal surges.
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Originally published on Thu January 3, 2013 4:16 am

Throughout most of its 86 years, Los Angeles' premier tennis tournament attracted the biggest names in the game. But over the years, stars stopped coming, and so did fans.

Now the Farmers Classic, which has been in L.A. since 1927, is headed to Bogota after it was bought by a Colombian sports marketing and entertainment company.

"There's a big hole in my heart. And believe me, this is something we didn't see coming, I'll be honest," says Bob Kramer, longtime tournament director of the Farmers Classic.

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Science
1:50 pm
Wed January 2, 2013

'Stand Your Ground' Linked To Increase In Homicides

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Credit Joe Burbank / AP
George Zimmerman (left) and his attorney appear in court for a bond hearing in June. Zimmerman's case sparked a nationwide debate about so-called "stand your ground" laws.
Credit Alyson Hurt, Adam Cole & David Schultz/NPR
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Originally published on Thu January 3, 2013 7:54 am

If a stranger attacks you inside your own home, the law has always permitted you to defend yourself. On the other hand, if an altercation breaks out in public, the law requires you to try to retreat. At least, that's what it used to do.

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Middle East
12:58 pm
Wed January 2, 2013

On Multiple Fronts, Russian Jews Reshape Israel

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Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Russian-speaking Israelis mingle at the Soho nightclub in Tel Aviv. The club caters to the Russian-speaking immigrant community, featuring hired dancers and extravagant decorations rarely seen in informal Israel.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
People gather for a Russian folk music festival in northern Israel in May. About 2,000 immigrants from the former Soviet Union attended the two-day festival, singing Russian standards, barbecuing and drinking vodka.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Children of immigrants from the former Soviet Union attend a ballet class in Lod, central Israel. Some prominent ballet dancers left the former Soviet Union for Israel, forming ballet schools and continuing a dance culture highly regarded in their countries of origin.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Immigrants from the former Soviet Union practice sword-fighting in full knight armor at a public park in Ramat Gan, central Israel. Medieval combat simulation is popular in ex-Soviet countries, and some immigrants have continued the hobby in Israel.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Russian-speaking Israeli immigrants train at a boxing club in Ashdod, a southern Israeli city heavily populated by immigrants from the former Soviet Union.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
A choir practices in a government-funded elderly care facility catering to Russian-speaking immigrants in Ashdod. The choir sings Russian standards and Israeli folk songs translated into Russian.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Canned sardines are served at a family dinner at the home of Moldovan immigrant Puma Rotner in Ashdod. Rotner left her native city of Bendery in Moldova in 2006, bringing her dishes and silverware to Israel.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Bella Perlin (center) and Avraham Shapiro (left), Belarusian immigrants, eat breakfast at their home in Hadera, northern Israel. They moved to Israel in 1991 at the height of the wave of immigration from the former Soviet Union.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Alexandra Bahman, who immigrated to Israel from Moldova in 2006, sits in her bedroom with her cat in Ashdod. Bahman left Moldova with the carpet and photos that now decorate her bedroom walls.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Two immigrants from the Ural region of the former Soviet Union rinse off after bathing in the Mediterranean Sea on an early December morning in Tel Aviv. Many Soviet immigrants gather at the beach for a traditional winter dip, the closest substitute to the freezing waters of the former Soviet Union.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Acrobats wait in a dressing room before their show at L'Chaim, a Russian restaurant in Ashdod. Many circus performers in Israel emigrated from the former Soviet Union, and acrobatic shows are a unique feature of Russian restaurants in Israel.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
People attend a 2011 New Year's party catering to the upper crust of Israel's Russian-speaking immigrant community, in Tel Aviv.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
An employee of the Mizra pork factory poses with a pig's head in a refrigerated warehouse in Kibbutz Mizra, northern Israel. The million-strong Soviet immigrant community has increased customer demand for pork in the country, a nonkosher food rarely eaten by Israeli Jews.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Russian-speaking Israelis mingle at the Soho nightclub in Tel Aviv. The club caters to the Russian-speaking immigrant community, featuring hired dancers and extravagant decorations rarely seen in informal Israel.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
Gymnasts from Russian-speaking immigrant families warm up at a gymnastics competition organized for Israel's immigrant community, in the southern resort city of Eilat. Most of Israel's Olympic gymnasts are immigrants from the former Soviet Union.
Credit Oded Balilty / AP
A waiter serves traditional Russian food at a seaside restaurant in Ashdod, a southern Israeli city heavily populated by immigrants from the former Soviet Union.
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Originally published on Sun January 6, 2013 5:54 am

Many signs are in the Cyrillic alphabet. The men and women sitting in the cafes are speaking Russian. The shops sell vodka, black bread, pickled herring and Russian-brewed Baltika beer. You have to pinch yourself to remember where you are.

This scene, with all its echoes of the former Soviet Union, is not in St. Petersburg or Vladivostok, or anywhere else in that vast sweep of bleak northern lands. It is in Ashdod, Israel, a palm-lined, pastel-colored port city that sprawls along the mild shores of the Mediterranean.

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National Security
12:34 pm
Wed January 2, 2013

At $130 Million A Plane, Critics Question The Cost Of The F-35

Credit Roslan Rahman / AFP/Getty Images
Visitors look at a Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jet at the Singapore Airshow in 2010. The cost of the plane keeps on rising and is now $130 million or more per plane, depending on the model.
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Originally published on Wed January 2, 2013 4:51 pm

Second of two parts

In a mile-long building on the edge of Fort Worth, Texas, an assembly line is taking shape to build the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Lockheed Martin, which got the contract to build the jet back in 2001, is slowly cranking up production. It's hard to keep a plane current, when it takes so many years to develop.

But Lockheed's Kevin McCormack says the F-35 is designed to change as technology evolves.

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Shots - Health News
12:04 pm
Wed January 2, 2013

Drug Fulfills Promise Of Research Into Cystic Fibrosis Gene

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Credit Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc.
Kalydeco is one of the first drugs that is effective at combating the root causes of a genetic disease.
Credit Jeffrey Sauger
Emily Schaller suffers from cystic fibrosis. New treatments that target the genetic basis of her disease allow her to live an active, healthy life.
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Originally published on Wed January 2, 2013 4:53 pm

The promise of genetic medicine is beginning to be fulfilled, but it's been a long, hard slog.

Take the story of Kalydeco. It's designed to treat people with a lung disease called cystic fibrosis. While not quite a cure, the drug is extremely effective for some CF patients.

But the success of Kalydeco has been more than two decades in the making.

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Asia
8:01 am
Wed January 2, 2013

The Tony Soprano of Karachi: Gangster Or Politician?

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Credit Dina Temple-Raston
Baloch has been the most powerful figure in Karachi's Lyari neighborhood since 2009. His armed men control the area, and police stay away. He's shown here at his home.
Credit Dina Temple-Raston
Uzair Baloch is known as the don of Karachi's Lyari Town slum. He is pictured here at his home.
Credit Akhtar Soomro / Reuters/Landov
Uzair Baloch (center), 32, controls an impoverished section of Karachi and commands a large armed force. He is routinely described as a gangster, though he calls himself a politician and a social worker. He's shown here at a rally in Karachi in November 2011.
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Originally published on Wed January 2, 2013 4:56 pm

Gangsters have been part of life in Karachi, Pakistan's largest city, for decades. And nowhere is their rule more notorious than in the slums of Lyari, a dusty warren of low-slung tenement houses in the south central part of Karachi.

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Around the Nation
1:55 pm
Tue January 1, 2013

2013's New Laws Govern Driverless Cars, Employee Passwords

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Originally published on Tue January 8, 2013 11:19 am

Transcript

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Audie Cornish. New laws go into effect across the country today and we're going to look at a few of them that all struggle with the same problem, how to keep up with technology. We're going to hear about three of them now from Jon Kuhl of the National Conference of State Legislatures. The first deals with that perplexing new phenomenon, driverless cars.

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Shots - Health News
1:24 pm
Tue January 1, 2013

What The Health Law Will Bring In 2013

Credit iStockphoto.com
The majority of what happens on Jan. 1, 2013, is tax increases and cuts in tax deductions to pay for the changes coming in 2014.
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Originally published on Tue January 8, 2013 11:19 am

Most of the really big changes made by the 2010 health law don't start for another year. That includes things like a ban on restricting pre-existing conditions, and required insurance coverage for most Americans. But Jan. 1, 2013, will nevertheless mark some major changes.

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NPR Story
1:07 pm
Tue January 1, 2013

'Cliff' Deal Would End Payroll Tax Holiday

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Originally published on Tue January 8, 2013 11:19 am

Transcript

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

In covering this debate, much has been made of income tax rates and where exactly they should be raised. But one fact has gotten far less notice. Starting today, payroll taxes are going up two percentage points for nearly all American workers. NPR's John Ydstie joins us to talk about it. And John, this means lower take-home pay for a lot of workers starting very soon.

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It's All Politics
12:58 pm
Tue January 1, 2013

Tea Party Texan Cruz Gives GOP Hope In Hunt For Hispanic Votes

Credit David J. Phillip / AP
Sen.-elect Ted Cruz of Texas answers a question from a television reporter on Nov. 6 in Houston.
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Originally published on Tue January 8, 2013 11:19 am

Sen.-elect Ted Cruz of Texas is a bright young Hispanic star who will be sworn in this week in Washington. The Republican Party nationally hopes Cruz will be part of the solution to its growing problem luring Hispanic voters.

Almost nobody had heard of Cruz when he began his campaign for the U.S. Senate. But when he stepped in front of a microphone, he could light up a room in a way that made the other Republican candidates seem lifeless.

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