NPR 2009-06-19

From NPR News in Washington, I'm Jack 1 Speer.

Lawmakers are digging into details of President Obama's plan to overhaul 2 financial regulation today. Treasury 3 Secretary Timothy Geithner was on Capitol Hill answering questions about the plan. NPR's Scott Horsley reports.

Geithner told the Senate Banking 4 Committee the administration's plan doesn't try to fix every shortcoming in the financial rule book, but only those core issues that contributed to the economic meltdown. New York Democrat 5 Charles Schumer says he likes much of what the administration is proposing, but he complains the plan would still leave too many different agencies regulating banks. Schumer would prefer to see that job combined under a single roof.

"The whole is greater than the sum of its parts when it comes to the symphony orchestra or the New York Giants. But with our patchwork 6 system of banking regulation, the whole is less."

Geithner concedes the regulatory proposal is neither elegant nor neat. But he said it’s more important to have smart financial rules than a simple organizational chart. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.

The senate on a 91 to five vote has approved the bill that provides $106 billion in funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Emergency spending bill contains $80 billion to fund ongoing 7 operations in the two countries, while with funds for a variety of other purposes including foreign aid, pandemic flu preparation and a billion dollars to fund a 'cash for clunkers' program, the government wants to institute to promote the purchase of more fuel-efficient vehicles. The measure now goes to President Obama for his signature.

Attorney General Eric Holder 8 says he wants to expand convicts' access to DNA 9 evidence. That statement came the same day the Supreme 10 Court issued a ruling limiting access to such material. More from NPR's Ari Shapiro.

The court ruled five to four against an Alaskan man who is in prison for sexual assault. He wanted to run DNA tests on some of the evidence used to convict him. He offered to pay and said such tests would prove his innocence 11. The justices said the constitution does not give the man the right to such evidence. Attorney General Eric Holder responded "Simply because a course of action is constitutional does not make it wise". He noted 12 that in 2004, the federal government expanded DNA access and set aside money for states to do the same. Many states took advantage of that offer, but not all of them. In a statement, Holder said: "I hope that in light of today's decision, all levels of government will follow the federal government's lead by working to expand access to DNA evidence." Ari Shapiro, NPR News, Washington.

Some good news in terms of the weekly jobless numbers while initial jobless claims rose slightly, the government says the overall number of people on the unemployment rolls actually came down for the first time since January. Labor 13 Department reports the number of people collecting unemployment benefits fell by 148,000 to 6.69 million.

On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 58 points to close at 8,555. The NASDAQ was down a fraction. The S&P 500 closed up seven points today.

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The pilot of a Continental 14 Airline's flight from Brussels to Newark who died over the Atlantic Ocean today appears to have suffered a heart attack. That is according to a doctor who examined him. Dr. Julien Struyven says he tried to revive the pilot, but was unable to. The 60-year-old Newark-based pilot had more than 30 years with the airline.  The jet landed without incident with two co-pilots at the controls. The 247 passengers aboard the plane were not told of the pilot's death.

NASA is making its first moon shot in more than a decade. Two unmanned probes are now headed to the moon after blasting off from Cape 16 Canaveral, Florida today. NPR's Nell Greenfieldboyce has more.

“3.2.1. Main engine ignition and lift-off of the Atlas 17 V rocket with LRO/LCROSS, America's first step of a lasting 15 return to the moon.”

Two different lunar probes blasted off on a single rocket. If all goes well, one of the probes, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, will get to the moon in about four days. Its mission is to circle the moon for at least a year. It has instruments to let NASA make better maps of the lunar surface and scout 18 out potential landing sites for future manned missions. The other probe is designed to fly by the moon and then loop around to the earth. The plan is that in about four months, it will head back towards the moon on a collision course. It will crash into a dark, cold crater 19 that might be hiding frozen water. The impact will kick up a big plume 20 of debris 21 that scientists can then analyze 22 to see if water is really there. Nell Greenfieldboyce, NPR News.

Crude oil futures 23 up 34 cents a barrel today to close at 71.37 a barrel in New York.

I'm Jack Speer, NPR News in Washington