NPR 2009-07-15

In her first day of questioning, Supreme 1 Court nominee 2 Sonia Sotomayor explained controversial statement she has made about the role of race and ethnicity playing in judging. She rejected accusation 3 she allows her background to influence her decisions. NPR's Ari Shapiro reports.

Most of the controversy 4 surrounding Sotomayor involves statements she has made off the bench. At the top of the list is something she has said in speeches to student groups and elsewhere that a wise Latino woman would make better decisions than a white man who has not had the same experience. Sotomayor told senators, "I was trying to inspire them to believe that their life experiences would enrich the legal system, because different life experiences and backgrounds always do. I don't think that there is a quarrel with that in our society." She said judges must scrutinize 5 and acknowledge the way their life experiences affect their perception of a case in order to make a final decision based on the facts and the law. Ari Shapiro, NPR News, Washington.

President Obama traveled to Michigan today where he told an audience at a community college there that lost auto 6 industry jobs will not be coming back. President also said new jobs will require additional training and in many cases post-high school education. Speaking at Macomb Community College in Warren, Michigan, the president also said in terms of the jobless rate, things are likely to get worse before they get better. "The unemployment rate is approaching 10 percent here in Michigan. It's about five points higher. And, you know, new jobs reports are going to be coming out, and we're going to see continuing job loss, even as the economy is beginning to stabilize 7." The President is pushing a plan to provide 12 billion dollars to community colleges which his administration says could help an additional five million Americans earn degrees and certificates over the next decade.

A surge in car purchases and higher prices at the gas pump last month help spur the biggest rise in retail 8 sales since January. Wholesale 9 prices were also up, NPR's Scott Newman reports.

The two reports--retail sales issued by the Commerce Department and wholesale prices by Labor--offered some hope that the recession was slowing, if not bottoming out. Both measures exceeded analysts 10’ expectations. Cautious consumers were apparently 11 lured 12 back to showrooms by promotional deals and mid-year discounts, with auto sales contributing to a 0.6% increase in overall retail sales for the month. Meanwhile, there was a 1.8% jump in the Producer Price Index which tracks the costs of goods before they reach store shelves. The gain was twice what analysts had expected and could reverse a 12-month downward trend. The Fed and many private economists 13 predict the recession will end later this year, but many Americans don't seem so convinced.  Consumer confidence dipped again in June after a three-month uptick. Scott Newman, NPR News, Washington.

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 27 points to end the day at 8, 359.

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Treasury 14 Secretary Timothy Geithner on a trip that includes stopovers in the Mid-East reached out to Gulf 15 Arab leaders today, saying the US has what he called a special responsibility to help steer 16 the world through the current global recession. Geithner who is seeking to reassure 17 some of the US’s top creditors 18 said the recession may be showing some signs of easing. And he said US still welcomes their businesses as the country works to deal with the situation. Geithner told Saudi Arabian business leaders the global trade also shows signs of expanding again.

National Transportation Safety Board investigators 19 say a fatal Massachusetts trolley 20 crash could have been prevented if the Boston transit 21 system had been installed automated 22 train control technologies. From member station WBUR in Boston Megna Chakravarti reports.

The NTSB concluded that one trolley operator died when her train sped through a red stop signal and rammed 23 into another stationary 24 train near suburban 25 Boston station in May, 2008. Acting 26 Chairman Mark Rosenker wondered why the Massachusetts Bay transit authority has automated train control systems on some of its lines but not the green line where the crash occurred. "Why would the green line not have everything possible that is going to prevent the accidents from happening? I don't understand that as an operator." The transit authority began testing collision prevention technologies on the green line after the crash. NTSB investigators also suggested that the trolley operator had suffered from an undiagnosed sleep disorder 27 that may have caused her to ignore the red stop signal. For NPR News, I'm Megna Chakravarti in Boston.

Crude oil futures 28 prices fell 17 cents a barrel today, ending the session at $59.52 a barrel in New York.