NPR News

If President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner's closed-door meetings aimed at solving the fiscal cliff crisis trouble anyone, you'd expect it to be the open-government watchdogs who routinely bark their outrage at public officials who work overtime to avoid public scrutiny.

Schools across the nation are adding security or assessing their safety procedures after the shooting deaths of 20 first-graders and six teachers or administrators at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., on Friday.

Host Michel Martin continues the conversation on America's gun culture. She speaks with author Paul Barrett, journalist Craig Whitney and psychiatrist Carl Bell.

Transcript

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

This is TELL ME MORE from NPR News. I'm Michel Martin. Later in the program we are going to revisit a story that caught our attention about poverty in a place that often seems overlooked. We'll hear about a young woman in the Rust Belt trying to figure out a path to a better life.

If a good voice is genetic, it's likely Barbra Streisand got hers from her mother. Streisand's mother was too shy to ever perform professionally, but she had a lyric soprano and would sing at bar mitzvahs in their Brooklyn neighborhood when Streisand was a girl.

It's hard to eat just one potato chip. The salt, the fat, the crunch — no wonder we mindlessly munch away, especially if we're parked in front of the TV.

So is there something better for children to snack on in the afternoon, especially if we're looking to limit their calories? It turns out that the combination of cheese and raw veggies like broccoli, carrots and sliced peppers may be the best option from both a nutrient standpoint and a satiety one.

As new pieces of information come in about Friday's mass shooting at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., which left 20 children and six adults dead, we'll post them here.

The day began, just after 10 a.m. ET, with Connecticut State Police Lt. J. Paul Vance telling reporters that most of the emerging evidence is "too difficult to discuss ... I'm not going to lie to you."

Update at 6:49 p.m. ET. Dogs Try To Comfort Students.

Saying that her choice understands the business sector and is the "right U.S. senator for our state and our country," South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley named Republican Rep. Tim Scott to replace the retiring Sen. Jim DeMint (also a Republican) at a noontime news conference today.

After asking those gathered at the state capitol to pause for a moment of silence to honor the victims of Friday's shootings in Newtown, Conn., Scott said he's honored and excited "for many, many reasons."

Good morning.

Our early headlines, as you would expect, were about Friday's mass murder at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.:

-- Funerals Begin In Newtown, Investigation Continues.

The tragedy in Newtown, Conn., touches people in many different ways. On Morning Edition and at WNYC.org, the station's Brigid Bergin tells the story of Kyle Mangieri, a 7th grade social studies teacher at a school in nearby Fairfield, Conn.