NPR 2010-05-07

The closing bell on Wall Street after quite an afternoon, markets are recovering some losses after stocks took a brief nosedive at one point. The Dow plunged 1 nearly 1,000 points before gaining ground. We see at last check, the Dow was down now more than 350 points at 10,550. NASDAQ down 83 at 2,320. NPR's economic correspondent Chris Arnold is in Boston, tracking the markets'tumultuous afternoon. Chris, what's been going on?

Hi, Lakshmi. Well, basically, we've been watching a classic panic selling take over the market today. At one point, like you said, the Dow was down around 1,000 points. It quickly plunged down there in just a matter of minutes. That was a little bit for 3 p.m. and then it came roaring back up 700 points. And it's been bouncing around, you know, 100 or 200 points up and down ever since. As you said, it closed around 350. And what we're seeing here is that there's been a 14-month rally so far since the financial implosion 2. And stocks have been going up and what we're seeing now is a major correction.

Apparently 3 what's playing out on Wall Street though is tied to escalating 4 tension over the debt crisis in Greece, right?

That is one of the things. Yeah. They saw this turmoil 5 in Greece and people rioting in the street and that makes people nervous. There's also a big jobs report coming out tomorrow. There might be some worries about that. There's also some speculation 6 that some computer errors might be involved here in sparking this, but the New York Stock Exchange is so far saying that there were not any system errors.

OK, thank you, Chris. NPR's Chris Arnold joining us from Boston.

Going back to that story on Greece's debt crisis. Outrage 7 over the country's austerity measures is generating protests involving tens of thousands of people and that has led to violence. Some demonstrators clashed with police prompting them to fire tear gas. Three people died yesterday after getting trapped in a burning bank that, authorities say, rioters set on fire.

Attorney General Eric Holder 8 told a panel of senators today that the suspect in last weekend's attempted car bombing of New York City's Times Square was questioned extensively before being read the Miranda warning. NPR's David Welna reports.

It was Attorney General Holder's first appearance before Congress since Monday's arrest of Pakistani-born US citizen Faisal Shahzad, the prime suspect in the Times Square bombing attempt. Holder told a Senate standing 9 panel that Shahzad provided interrogators with what Holder called a very substantial amount of information before his Miranda rights were read to him. That prompted this from Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy.

"Did that in any way hinder your investigation 10?"

"No, it did not. As we have seen in prior investigations 11, the giving of Miranda warnings has not deterred 12 people from talking to us. And Mr. Shahzad is, in fact, continuing to cooperate with us."

Holder also defended trying suspected terrorists in civilian 13 courts.

This is NPR.

A group of married gay couples and widows were in federal court today, arguing for federal recognition of their marriages. As NPR's Tovia Smith tells us, they're challenging the federal Defense 14 of Marriage Act as unconstitutional.

Plaintiffs say this is not a "right to marry" case. They already won that battle in Massachusetts and are already married. Rather, it's about whether the federal government has to provide them benefits on taxes or social security, for example, that other married couples get. The federal government has traditionally yielded to states' definitions of who is married. And now, Kathy Bush and Mary Ritchie who married in 2004 say the government can't just ignore some marriages while recognizing others.

"A marriage is a marriage. Massachusetts provided us with a marriage license 15. And that's all we're asking for is to be treated like every other married couple."

The Obama administration opposes DOMA and government lawyers in court began and ended by saying they see the law as discriminatory, but they say that doesn't mean it's unconstitutional. Tovia Smith, NPR News, Boston.

Two people are dead as a result of yesterday's explosion at a missile and aviation research site in Alabama. Officials of Redstone Arsenal 16 near Huntsville say the contract workers died last night after suffering burns from the explosion. A spokeswoman says the accident happened Wednesday morning as workers were removing some materials from rockets.

Productivity grew at an annual rate of 3.6% in the first months of the year in the US. Unit labor 17 costs dropped at an annual rate of 1.6%.

Recapping our top story. US stocks tumbled nearly 1,000 points today before gaining ground. At last check, the Dow was down more than 300 points.