Talk of the Nation

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NEAL CONAN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan, in Washington. In many parts of the country, coal has been king for many years, but that's changing. Ten years ago, coal fired half the U.S. electrical power plants. Now that's about a third and dropping. As coal companies switch to cheaper and cleaner natural gas, some coal companies in the east are closing mines and laying off workers.

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NEAL CONAN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan, in Washington. In 18 states and the District of Columbia, marijuana is medicine by popular vote. A lot of doctors don't see it that way. They say pot presents problems that include potency, efficacy, corruption, and of course it's still illegal under federal law.

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NEAL CONAN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan.

And now the Opinion Page. The release of millions of academic papers by Internet activist Aaron Swartz raised many questions about how much access the public should have to scholarship, questions that took on new dimensions after his suicide. At the time of his death, Swartz faced federal charges of wire fraud and violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

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NEAL CONAN, HOST:

At its best, the Web is a place for unlimited exchange of ideas. But Web-savvy news junkies have known for a long time that reader feedback can often turn nasty. Now a study in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication suggests that rude comments on articles can even change the way we interpret the news.

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IRA FLATOW, HOST:

Now for nightmare bacteria. They defy all our antibiotics, even our latest drugs. This week the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that strains of these completely drug-resistant bacteria have quadrupled in the last decade or so, and the bugs have been lurking around in hospitals, hundreds of hospitals around the nation.

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IRA FLATOW, HOST:

This is SCIENCE FRIDAY, I'm Ira Flatow. Here's some news to raise a glass to: the idea that red wine may help us live longer and healthier lives. Well, it got a new boost this week. According to a team of researchers, a compound found in the skin of grapes could be an antidote to aging by slowing down the process and even fending off disease and inflammation associated with getting old. It's the topic of a new study published this week in the journal Science.

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IRA FLATOW, HOST:

This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. By now I'm sure you've heard about the real-life nightmare of a Florida man named Jeff Bush. As he lay sleeping last week, a gaping hole opened beneath his home, swallowing him alive. His body was never found. The search has now been called off, and the sinkhole that devoured him is now his grave.

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LYNN NEARY, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Lynn Neary, in Washington. Neal Conan is away. It's an American story as old as Horatio Alger: Hard work, determination and presto, you can change your station in life. But increasingly many Americans find themselves stuck where they are on the economic ladder, that American dream just out of reach.

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LYNN NEARY, HOST:

Yesterday, Republican Senator Rand Paul, of Kentucky, filibustered the Senate floor for nearly 13 hours in protest of the administration's use of drones.

SENATOR RAND PAUL: This is not about partisanship. I have allowed the president to pick his political appointees, but I will not sit quietly and let him shred the Constitution. I cannot sit at my desk quietly and let the president say that he will kill Americans on American soil who are not actively attacking a country.