NPR 2012-01-18

 At least 11 people are confirmed dead and more than 20 remaining missing from a shipwreck 1 off the coast of Tuscany. Several more bodies were located today aboard the Costa Concordia, the cruise liner that struck rocks last Friday and capsized.

 
Republican presidential candidate Mitt 2 Romney says he will release his tax records, but not before his 2011 return is completed some time in April. NPR's Scott Horsley reports Romney's been under pressure by fellow Republicans to show his tax records.
 
Romney said in last night's debate he would probably release his tax returns. He's now gone further, saying he will do so, but not for three more months, by which time the primary contest could well be over. Romney acknowledges that his effective tax rate is around 15%, well below the tax rate paid by many middle-class families. That's because Romney makes most of his money from investments, which are taxed at a lower rate than ordinary income.
 
"I got a little bit of income from my book, but I gave that all away, and then I get speaker's fees from time to time, but not very much."
 
Romney has proposed even lower taxes on investment income, but only for families making less than 200,000 dollars a year. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Florence, South Carolina.
 
A grand jury in Washington has handed up an indictment 3 of an Idaho man accused of shooting at the White House last November. Details from NPR's Carrie Johnson.
 
Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez passed a brief psychiatric exam but prosecutors 4 have raised questions about whether he's mentally fit to stand trial and to help with his defense 5. A new grand jury indictment says Ortega-Hernandez took shots at the White House November 11th after weeks of escalating 6 rhetoric 7 about Mr. Obama. But the president and the first lady were out of town at the time of the incident. Ortega-Hernandez is also charged with weapons offenses 8 and trying to assault three US officers on duty that day. Authorities captured him in Pennsylvania and he's remained in federal custody 9 ever since. Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.
 
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell is in Myanmar, also known as Burma. Michael Sullivan reports McConnell says he is impressed with Myanmar's recent reforms but says more needs to be done.
 
McConnell met with President Thein Sein, the principle architect of Myanmar's rapid reforms, after meeting earlier with opposition 10 leader and democracy icon 11 Aung San Suu Kyi. Thein Sein heads the military backed government that took office less than a year ago. McConnell says he is impressed with what Myanmar has done since, including last week's release of several hundred political prisoners, but says it's not yet enough to convince the US to lift economic and political sanctions against Myanmar. Better relations between Myanmar's government and its ethnic 12 minorities is at the top of McConnell's wish list. He says the recently announced ceasefire agreement with ethnic Karen rebels is an important step in that direction. For NPR News, I'm Michael Sullivan in Bangkok.
 
At last check on Wall Street, Dow was up 98 points.
 
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As losing teams in the National Football League turn their attention to next year's draft, a new study finds racial bias 13 playing a role in how college quarterbacks are evaluated. We have details from NPR's Shankar Vedantam.
 
The study by two management professors finds that black college quarterbacks are rarely credited for their leadership skills. The researchers looked at games played by 82 white and 31 black quarterbacks. Andrew Carton and Ashleigh Rosette found that when teams headed by black quarterbacks lost games, media accounts blamed the quarterbacks for poor leadership. When the same teams won games, however, the quarterbacks were not credited for their leadership, but for their athletic 14 ability. By contrast, the study in the Academy of Management Journal found that white quarterbacks who won games got credit for their leadership. Shankar Vedantam, NPR News, Washington.
 
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich concedes the race to head off Mitt Romney's campaign could be tough if the frontrunner gets more than 40% of the vote in Saturday's primary. However, Gingrich tells CBS that he is the Republican Party's best chance at defeating President Obama in November. The Georgia Republican brands himself a solid conservative who can stand toe-to-toe with the president in debates.
 
US stocks rising on news of some improvements in Europe's debt markets and China's economy. Debt auctions 15 by Spain, Greece and Europe's bailout fund drew investor 16 support despite a credit rating downgrade. In China, economic growth slowed to 8.9% in the fourth quarter, but still not as much as analysts 17 had predicted.
 
I'm Lakshmi Singh, NPR News, Wahington.