NPR 2012-03-29

 The US Supreme 1 Court is expected to rule by June on the fate of the nation's sweeping 2 health care law after hearing three days of arguments. It's really anyone's guess how the court will lean. Paul Clement 3, the lawyer for the 26 states seeking to have the entire Patient Protection and Affordable 4 Care Act tossed out, gave this overview 5 of the last few days.

 
“Today the issues were what the issue of severability, which is really just lawyers speak for whether or not if the individual mandate 6 is unconstitutional, the entirety of the statue must fall. And then the third issue, the last of these issues that was discussed this afternoon with the question of Medicaid expansion, and whether or not that which really has a huge economic impact on the states was something that violates basic principles of federalism.”
 
Of course at the center of the argument is the mandate. For health care coverage 7, some justices question whether parts of the law could still be salvaged 8, even if the mandate were invalidated. 
 
Protests continue in various forms for Trayvon Martin's shooter to be arrested. Martin was the unarmed teenager killed by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman last month in central Florida. Well, today the boy's father, Tracy Martin, spoke 9 with host Michel Martin of NPR's “Tell Me More” about his ordeal 10.
 
“...losing a child in general because we, as parents, feel as though we’re guardians 11 of our kids, and we don't plan to bury our kids unexpectedly like this.
 
The shooter, George Zimmerman, maintains the shooting was self-defense.
 
Amateur recording 12 purportedly 13 captures punishing bombardment in Homs, Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad toured heavily shelled neighborhoods just one day earlier. Members of the uprising say it's further proof Assad's not serious about following through with a peace plan proposed by UN envoy 14 Kofi Annan, but the Syrian government is still pledging to commit. And in, perhaps, another incentive 15 for Syria to commit to negotiated peace, the Iranian government says it supports Annan's plan and may host the former UN chief next week. We have the latest from NPR's Peter Kenyon.
 
The state-run IRNA news agency quoted Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi as saying Tehran endorses 16 Annan's proposal, calling for the Syrian army to withdraw from cities and a halt to violence without demanding that President Bashar al-Assad necessarily cede 17 power. Salehi said the Syrian situation requires patience, warning against any swift action that might, in his words, create a power vacuum that could have very damaging consequences for the region. Separately, Damascus preemptively rejected any initiative regarding Syria that might emerge from the Arab League meeting in Baghdad. Peter Kenyon, NPR News, Beirut.
 
Before the close on Wall Street, the Dow was down 86 points at 13,112; NASDAQ off 16 at 3,104; and the S&P500 down nine at 1,404.
 
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The JetBlue captain whose erratic 18 behavior prompted an emergence 19 landing yesterday is now suspended. The airline characterized the incident as (a) “medical situation,” offering few other details about what prompted Clayton Osbon's rants 20 about threats in a post-9/11 world. This came just two weeks after a similar outburst by an American Airlines flight attendant. 
 
The US airline industry has dropped a lawsuit 21 against the European Union. NPR's Brian Naylor reports the airlines are urging the Obama administration to block a carbon trading program the EU implemented 22 this year.
 
The airline trade group, Airlines for America, says the lawsuit has served its purpose by bringing to light what the group calls an exorbitant 23 money grab. The airlines contend the EU does not have the right to unilaterally impose the carbon trading program, which is aimed at reducing emissions 24 of greenhouse gases by jetliners flying to Europe. The EU program requires airlines to buy permits on a carbon trading market. The airlines want the Obama administration, which has expressed its oppositions 25 to the program, to challenge the EU through the International Civil Aviation Organization. China and India are also on record against the EU's carbon market. Brian Naylor, NPR News, Washington.
 
Pope Benedict XVI’s widely anticipated visit to Cuba is now winding 26 down. Today he presided over open-air Mass attended by hundreds of thousands of Roman Catholics in the shrine 27 of the Cuban revolution just as John Paul II had done 14 years earlier for Cubans, including then leader Fidel Castro. Benedict met with Castro today with whom he was expected to raise a number of issues, such as human rights and religious freedom on the communist island nation.