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Peanuts, flax, sprouts and avocados: It's not the menu at a health food deli, but the menu inside some barns. What's more, many farmers experimenting with these gourmet feeds are growing the ingredients themselves.

Take Russ Kremer, the Missouri pig farmer whose operation served as the inspiration for the 2011 Chipotle ad. Kremer hasn't bought commercial animal feed in 30 years. Instead, he grazes his hogs in a pasture, and grows (or buys from neighbors) grains and legumes to supplement their nutrition.

Kremer and some of the other farmers developing specialty feed say they are willing to shoulder the extra cost and time to produce it because they're turned off by conventional feed mixes. The conventional mixes are what most of the hogs in the U.S. consume, and can include commodity corn and soybeans, blood protein, animal waste and rendered fats, according to Kremer.

Kremer also runs a co-op where farmers can pool resources to mill their own feed. "We opt for grains like barley and oats as often as possible, because most corn and soy is now [genetically modified]," he says.

The scarcity of non-GMO corn and soybeans is what led hog farmers Kelley and Mark Escobedo of South Texas Heritage Pork to experiment with peanuts.

Using their own 1950s-era mill, the farmers combine peanuts, peanut hay, and oats to boost the animals' protein intake and overall health — especially important because they raise their animals without antibiotics. The resulting meat has a delicate, nutty flavor that has helped them attract a loyal customer base willing to pay a higher price for the meat. "I've never had anyone come back and say it's not worth it," says Escobedo.

She and other farmers even take custom feed requests. Case in point: One restaurant shaped a special meal around a single hog that the Escobedos fed avocados (along with the peanut-based feed) for the last 6 weeks of its life.

"The meat was soft and delicious," Escobedo recalls. "It was the most delightful dinner I've ever eaten." (Pot-fed pigs are getting similarly rave reviews in Washington state, as we've reported.)

Farmers are supplementing animal feed with other ingredients found in gourmet kitchens, too. To boost his animals' immunity, Kremer uses oregano oil. To add omega-3 fatty acids, many cattlemen are adding the superfood flax to feed. And Nigel Walker of California's Eatwell Farm not only grows his own wheat to feed his egg=-laying hens, he also sprouts the grains for added nutrition.

Even as farmers learn to market meat from animals raised on special diets, only a small percent of consumers are willing to pay extra for it. A pastured chicken fed with homegrown grains, for instance, can cost as much as $20 to 25, compared with $10 for a conventional chicken in the grocery store.

The cost to farmers, in terms of both dollars and time, also remains significant. Kremer says he can afford homegrown feed because he saves money on veterinary care since he doesn't use antibiotics. His pigs also have a higher survival rate than average (just 1 percent mortality compared to nearly 5 percent industry-wide). But his operation is also much smaller than average, so the risks are different from a large hog operation.

Jack Lazor, author of the forthcoming book The Organic Grain Grower, and owner of Butterworks Farm in Vermont, says homegrown animal feed has fundamentally transformed his farm. Lazor supplements his dairy cows' diets with homegrown grains and feeds his laying hens kelp and soybeans he grows and roasts himself, using a recipe developed by Polyface Farm's Joel Salatin. The birds gain more weight, and the eggs are yellower, but more important to Lazor is the sense of being in complete control of what he calls the "craft of farming."

"When you're feeding an animal you can tweak it one way or the other based on the herd or the season," he says. "Plus, it just adds more meaning to your life."

Last week was a wild one for China's economy.

Interest rates on the loans that banks make to one another soared to alarming levels, and lending began to freeze up. Shanghai stocks nose-dived, taking Asian markets and the Dow, briefly, with them.

Things have calmed down, but the crisis showed how China's new leaders are trying to confront threats to the health of the world's second-largest economy.

Many here see it as the first shot in a long battle to reform a once-successful economic model that is now running out of gas.

In this particular case, the People's Bank of China — the nation's central bank — wants to cut down on rampant and risky lending. So earlier this month, in a departure from the past, it refused to pump money into the system when some banks desperately needed it.

"The central bank wants to send a message," says Oliver Rui, a finance professor at the China Europe International Business School in Shanghai. "Don't take it for granted that whenever you need the money, you can easily get it."

Rui says the government was targeting midsized, state-run banks that lend into what's known as China's "shadow banking" sector.

Risky Lending

Here is an example of how shadow banking can work and why it concerns the government: A state-owned company borrows from a state-owned bank at a government-set low interest rate, maybe 5 percent.

More On China

Asia

Belly Dancing For The Dead: A Day With China's Top Mourner

If you were a track and field fan in the 1980s and '90s, three names rose above all the others — and they all belonged to one woman. Jackie Joyner-Kersee rose from East St. Louis to medal in four Olympic Games and to be named the greatest female athlete of the 20th century by Sports Illustrated.

Her name may be Kersee, but just how "cursy" is she? We've invited her to play a game called "May Thunder Blast Your Head!" Three questions about curses from around the world that we learned about on the Asylum site.

One of only a handful of a type of small bird from Asia to have been spotted in the U.K. in the past two centuries was thrilling twitchers off the northwest coast of Scotland earlier this week.

Then, tragedy struck. It flew into the blade of a wind turbine and was killed.

Needless to say, watching the little white-throated needletail fall to its death dismayed those who went to the Outer Hebrides to see it.

Dozens of twitchers ("British slang for a person who will travel long distances to spot as many hard-to-find birds as possible") had rushed to the area Wednesday after hearing from Rare Bird Alert U.K. and other spotters that the needletail was there.

"It was really beautiful when it was flying around, graceful and with such speed," John Marchant of the British Trust for Ornithology tells The Scottish Sun. "To suddenly see it fly into a turbine and fall out the sky was terrible."

"One minute it was flying in spectacular fashion," adds James Hanlon, a twitcher, in a story posted by the International Business Times. "I followed it and then watched as it flew into one of the blades of the wind turbine and vanished. My heart jumped into my mouth. We dashed over to see if it had been killed and sadly found its body on the ground. It was heartbreaking."

There were, writes enthusiast David Campbell on his Devil Birder blog, "cries of sorrow and anger from the assembled birders" when they found the bird "lying beneath the machine ... stone dead." He's posted a short video of the twitchers gathering around the bird.

According to The Scotsman, the white-throated needletail is thought to be the "world's fastest flying bird" — capable of hitting 105 mph. One hadn't been seen in the U.K. since 1991, the newspaper adds, and "a spokesman for Bird Guides said it was only the ninth recording in the U.K. since 1846."

The Australian government says the needletails breed "in Asia, from central and south-eastern Siberia and Mongolia, east to the Maritime Territories of Russia, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands and south to northern Japan and north-eastern China." They spend their non-breeding seasons "in Australasia, mainly in Australia, and occasionally in New Guinea and New Zealand, though it has been suggested that some may overwinter in parts of South-East Asia."

If you were a track and field fan in the 1980s and '90s, three names rose above all the others — and they all belonged to one woman. Jackie Joyner-Kersee rose from East St. Louis to medal in four Olympic Games and to be named the greatest female athlete of the 20th century by Sports Illustrated.

Her name may be Kersee, but just how "cursy" is she? We've invited her to play a game called "May Thunder Blast Your Head!" Three questions about curses from around the world that we learned about on the Asylum site.

The Senate's "Gang of Eight" on the immigration overhaul legislation became a gang of 68 when all was said and done Thursday.

And that number is important, especially to the senators. Supporters of the immigration bill in the Democratic-controlled Senate have said a strong bipartisan Senate vote for the legislation would put enough pressure on the House to force it to take up comprehensive legislation.

If the Senate couldn't get to 70 votes, the thinking went, nearing that mark could give an immigration overhaul unstoppable momentum in Congress.

"Make no mistake about it. The support this bill has generated here in the Senate will make it impossible to ignore," Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, the immigration bill's chief sponsor, said before the Senate approved the legislation. "I believe the support this bill will receive today in the Senate will propel it to pass the House and be placed for signature on the president's desk by the end of the year."

Unfortunately for Schumer and other supporters of comprehensive immigration legislation, there's enough recent evidence to suggest that strong bipartisan support for legislation in the Senate doesn't necessarily lead to a similar result in the House.

The farm bill, for instance, recently passed the Senate with 66 votes and was widely expected to pass the House. But it didn't. The legislation failed in a 195-to-234 vote in the House because some Republicans thought it spent too much on nutrition-assistance programs and payments to farmers.

Another recent example: The Marketplace Fairness Act, which would give states the power to collect sales taxes from online retailers just as they do from brick-and-mortar sellers, passed the Senate in May with 69 "yea" votes, including 21 Republicans. But the legislation has languished in the House for lack of enough Republican support.

So Schumer could be whistling past the graveyard of moribund legislation in claiming that the immigration legislation's strong showing in the Senate will give it traction in the the House. That body has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to ignore the Senate's work.

An irony of the recent Texas political theater: Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis' filibuster aimed at stopping anti-abortion legislation raised not only her profile but that of Republican Gov. Rick Perry.

Shortly after Davis' talkathon ran out the clock on a bill that would potentially have made abortions much harder for women in Texas to obtain after 20 weeks of pregnancy, Perry put himself back in the national headlines.

First, the 2012 presidential candidate called for a special, 30-day session of the GOP-controlled Texas Legislature during which the members will focus solely on passing the bill.

Then, on Thursday, Perry raised eyebrows with his comments to an audience at the National Right To Life's convention in Dallas.

Speaking of Davis' rise from a hardscrabble earlier life, Perry said:

"The fact is, who are we to say that children born in the worst of circumstances can't grow to have successful lives? In fact, even the woman who filibustered the Senate the other day, was born in difficult circumstances. She's the daughter of a single woman. She was a teenage mother herself. She managed to eventually graduate from Harvard Law School and serve in the Texas Senate. It's just unfortunate that she hasn't learned from own example that every life should be given the chance to fulfill its potential and that every life matters."

Last week was a wild one for China's economy.

Interest rates on the loans that banks make to one another soared to alarming levels and lending began to freeze up. Shanghai stocks nose-dived, taking Asian markets and the Dow, briefly, with them.

Things have calmed down, but the crisis showed how China's new leaders are trying to confront threats to the health of the world's second-largest economy.

Many here see it as the first shot in a long battle to reform a once-successful economic model that is now running out of gas.

In this particular case, the People's Bank of China – the nation's central bank – wants to cut down on rampant and risky lending. So earlier this month, in a departure from the past, it refused to pump money into the system when some banks desperately needed it.

"The central bank wants to send a message," says Oliver Rui, a finance professor at the China Europe International Business School in Shanghai. "Don't take it for granted that whenever you need the money, you can easily get it."

Rui says the government was targeting mid-sized, state-run banks that lend into what's known as China's "shadow banking" sector.

Risky Lending

Here is an example of how shadow banking can work and why it concerns the government: A state-owned company borrows from a state-owned bank at a government-set low interest rate, maybe 5 percent.

More On China

Asia

Belly Dancing For The Dead: A Day With China's Top Mourner

If you're looking for a deal on prescription drugs or tired of standing in line at the drugstore counter, maybe you'd be inclined to try an online pharmacy.

Perhaps you'd feel better about that choice if the site carried the name of a well-known chain, say, www.walgreen-store.com or www.c-v-s-pharmacy.com.

Well, not so fast. The Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. attorney's office in Colorado cracked down on those misleading sites, which weren't connected to their namesakes, and more than 1,600 others that the feds say are breaking the law by selling prescription drugs, some of them counterfeits.

"Illegal online pharmacies put American consumers' health at risk by selling potentially dangerous products," John Roth, director of the FDA's Office of Criminal Investigations, said in a statement. "This is an ongoing battle in the United States and abroad ...."

Many of the websites that were shut down claimed to be Canadian companies. But the FDA says that was a lie. The websites made use of bogus licenses and certifications to trick U.S. consumers, the FDA said.

The far-reaching bust is part of an international effort with a catchy, prehistoric name: Pangea VI. Pretty sure online drug sales weren't a problem back in the supercontinent's heyday.

This modern sweep was part of an International Internet Week of Action that wrapped up June 25.

The Interpol-coordinated Pangea project, now in its sixth wave, goes after sites hawking unapproved or risky drugs. Many of the them also sell drugs that legally require a prescription without actually getting one.

The FDA told one operator of many websites, including canadianfamilypharmacy.biz and cheapcanadianpharmacy.net, to stop selling drugs that violate U.S. laws. The agency's warning letter said a couple of impotence drugs being sold as "Levitra Super Force" and "Viagra Super Force" hadn't been approved by the agency. FDA also faulted the sites for selling "generic Celebrex." Problem is that Celebrex, a painkiller, is only available as a brand-name drug in this country, so a generic version is verboten.

Separately, Maine just enacted a law making it OK for residents to buy prescription drugs from other countries.

The FDA doesn't approve. "Medicine bought from foreign sources, such as from Internet sellers, from businesses that offer to buy foreign medicine for you, or during trips outside the United States, may not be safe or effective," an FDA spokesman told Shots via email in response to questions about the Maine law..

Museum Hours

Director: Jem Cohen

Genre: Drama

Running Time: 107 minutes

Unrated

With: Mary Margaret O'Hara, Bobby Sommer, Ela Piplits

Of the over 15 I've slogged through, this year's E3 Expo was, hands down, the best video game conference I've attended. The new consoles will give us hyper-realistic games. For drama, Sony at their press event outright insulted Microsoft. Most importantly, there were plenty of new games, and they looked better than the many banal franchise games on the show floor. To call these the most promising games of E3 isn't to say they're the best games of E3. To be the best, the games will have to be played and finished and considered. But these offerings were fine appetizers for the meals to come.

Titanfall (Electronic Arts/Respawn)

Created by the smart, former makers of Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, Titanfall is, one the surface, a game where giant robotic mechs battle each other to the finish. But judging from the size of its world, it's much more than that. Yes, Titanfall is to be played online only, something that's normally a major drawback. But when the lead artist showed me the fascinating way that Titanfall will weave what may well be a varied narrative into this multiplayer world, I was sold — at least for now.

Destiny (Activision/Bungie)

Bungie made Halo for Microsoft, which was instrumental in selling the Xbox. Now part of Activision, Bungie's invested many millions in making Destiny, a futuristic game that features a strikingly well-thought-out sci-fi mythology. You can unlock its mysteries as a single player, but you'll be enticed to join multiplayer events, too. In Destiny, mankind's Golden Age has ended. It will be up to you to deal with the many dangers that may wipe out humanity completely. Sure, it's a trope, but the twists and turns here may make it different and convincing.

Tearaway (Sony/Media Molecule)

The people who invented the delightfully feature-filled LittleBigPlanet have designed what amounts to a children's pop-up book come to life in a game. Add augmented reality to put yourself in this fantasy world as you interact with some delightful kooky paper characters, and you have what should be a worthy hit on the PlayStation Vita.

Lego: Marvel Super Heroes (WBIE/TT Games)

Ever since Lego Star Wars, I've had a soft spot for the Lego video games. But this is a big one. In this action-filled open world, you'll deal with more than 200 Marvel heroes and villains, all made of Lego bricks. The festivities commence when the Silver Surfer is taken down as he hangs ten in a game that inserts you into New York City — along with Thor's world of Asgard.

Murdered: Soul Suspect (Square Enix/Airtight Games)

Murdered: Soul Suspect could be one eerie, goose-bump-raising mystery. In Salem, Massachusetts, a strange, hooded man murders a detective with multiple gunshots. As the detective's ghost, you're haunted: Why would someone kill me? you ask. As you endeavor to uncover the reason for your violent demise, you encounter various creepy apparitions. Some will attack you. Some will help you. The question is, will you know the difference between the two?

Dying Light (WBIE/Techland)

I was really quite skeptical of Dying Light because there are far too many zombie games available already — and judging from what was shown at E3, there are more to come. But the varieties of zombies here add a sort of intriguing artificial intelligence that not only keeps you on your toes, it keeps you interested. Watch out for the nightfall — that's when the zombies become smarter. And scarily faster.

Watch Dogs (UbiSoft)

This unusual offering may be well-suited to a paranoid, real-life time in which governments and organized crime may be watching ... well, everyone. Here, in this open world rife with information warfare, you can hack into all manner of electronic devices, almost as if you can read people's minds. This alternate reality set in Chicago feels a bit too close for comfort, but that's what makes the stealth-filled gameplay compelling — the current fear of big data.

Saints Row IV (Deep Silver/Volition)

This rude, crude game of satire is truly for adults only. Here, the White House is like a corrupt frat house, and the president is the swaggering superhero who tries to save the world from an alien invasion. But it's the humor that could make Saints Row IV a winner. During 20 minutes of gameplay, I chuckled at least four or five times. It may be vulgar, but if all games could elicit such real emotion — humor, sadness and the gray areas in between — I daresay they'd get a lot more respect.

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (Konami/Kojima Productions)

Kiefer Sutherland adds his estimable acting ability to the mythos of Snake (here, known as Big Boss). With Sutherland on board, Hideo Kojima, one of Japan's greatest game celebrities, offers up a tale of mercenaries and vengeance that takes place primarily in 1984. Some say Kojima can be long-winded and needs an editor. Others say his work is the height of deep, video game narrative. Whatever the case, it's worked out well: this is the 10th game in the series. And David Bowie fans will delight in this fact: Big Boss' mercenary group is called Diamond Dogs.

Harold Goldberg contributes to The New York Times. His book about games is All Your Base Are Belong to Us (How 50 Years of Videogames Conquered Pop Culture).

Reading always turns any season into summer. Maybe it's because I associate my first bouts of time with books with time out of school, with summer afternoons on the back porch when the weather made it too hot to play, and the air seemed just quiet enough that you could focus your early reading skills on the page before you and make a story emerge from the shapes and squiggles printed there. Even for someone as fortunate as I am, someone who reads for a living, summer always feels like a special time.

For my recommendations for this particular hot summer now upon us I've got five works of fiction that I've been gathering together for the season, beginning with a just republished, long-out-of-print collection of stories by the Irish master John Banville. Four of these five books involve some sort of criminal mayhem, physical and psychological, and the last one has to do with the origins of life itself.

These are petty crimes rooted in mere thoughtlessness, of course, the kind of glancing collateral damage family members inflict on one another all the time. But Delisle deftly contrasts his cartoon avatar's self-involved and self-satisfied actions with their lingering effects on his guileless, po-faced kids. In "The Little Mouse," Delisle gets so worked up by his son's demanding more money from the French equivalent of the Tooth Fairy that he accidently gives the game away in the final panel: "Next time I'm gonna give you this [one-cent coin] here instead of two euros!" The change in his son's expression is subtle – he opens his mouth slightly – but in that tiny shift we can see a long-held belief crumbling to dust.

The brevity of each vignette highlights Delisle's acute sense of timing. In "The Monkey," he allays his daughter's bedtime fears ("There's no such thing as child snatchers," he tells her. "That's all there is to it.") The next panel is silent, as we see an expression of relief cross the girl's face. In the next panel, Delisle stands in the doorway of his daughter's room, regarding her thoughtfully. Now that Delisle the cartoonist has given us readers a beat to absorb this quaint domestic scene, Delisle the dad can proceed to screw it up, as he does in the very next panel.

"There's that story about the monkey, though ..." he says, and proceeds to recount a horrific newspaper story involving a monkey, a baby, and a fall from great heights. The strip ends with the girl staring up at the ceiling of her darkened bedroom, terrified.

In "The Pretty Picture," the book's highlight, his young daughter brings him one of her drawings. At first, Delisle praises her efforts, but the longer he looks, the more his professional eye kicks in, as the girl looks on impassively:

"And ... Uh ... I don't want to be too critical, but you've got to work on your drafting a bit. You're going to have put in some effort, or else don't even bother chasing after publishers. Look at the perspective here ... Hasn't anybody told you that things get smaller the farther away they are? This is completely haphazard. I can't tell where anything is. It's not a very complex concept, you know .... I know what you're going to say ... You're going to tell me it's your "style" and that you did it on purpose. Well, kiddo, let me tell you, there's a hell of a difference between drawing like a hack and having some kind of style. Not everybody's Art Spiegelman, you know."

If A User's Guide to Neglectful Parenting is significantly more slight than Delisle's travel memoirs, it's brighter and funnier as well. And it shares with his previous work a keen appreciation for the clash of cultures; this time, however, the cultures in question are those adults and children, and the damage that ensues is played for a rueful laugh.

Read an excerpt of A User's Guide to Neglectful Parenting

Laurence Anyways

Director: Xavier Dolan

Genre: Drama, Romance

Running Time: 168 minutes

Not Rated

With: Melvil Poupaud, Suzanne Clement, Nathalie Baye

(Recommended)

The Supreme Court's 5-4 decision Wednesday to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act is a monumental victory for advocates of same-sex marriage.

But what happens now that the 1996 federal law that confines marriage to a man and a woman has been declared unconstitutional?

Will federal benefits flow only to same-sex married couples living in states that recognize their unions?

What about same-sex spouses who are legally married but living in states that ban such unions?

And how will federal agencies, already with myriad rules and regulations regarding spousal eligibility for benefits, deal with the court's edict?

"Striking down DOMA is a great step forward, obviously," says Ari Ezra Waldman, legal editor at Towleroad, a widely read LGBT-oriented website, "but there will be difficult complications to work out."

The court's decision does not embrace a national constitutional right to same-sex marriage, but would make married gay couples living in states where their unions are legal eligible for federal benefits already enjoyed by married heterosexual Americans.

Those include considerations given to spouses in realms ranging from public employee benefits and bankruptcy to estate taxes and immigration.

The DOMA case decided by the high court involved a claim by a New York woman, who on the death of her legal same-sex spouse, paid $363,000 more in federal estate taxes than would have been collected from a heterosexual surviving spouse.

"Legally married couples in states that allow same-sex marriage are good to go," says Fred Sainz of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay advocacy organization. "The court's decision will be final in 25 days, and they should start seeing all the same federal rights and benefits."

More On The Rulings

Same-Sex Marriage And The Supreme Court

Timeline: Gay Marriage In Law, Pop Culture And The Courts

NPR's Uri Berliner is taking $5,000 of his own savings and putting it to work. Though he's no financial whiz or guru, he's exploring different types of investments — alternatives that may fare better than staying in a savings account that's not keeping up with inflation.

My taste of the commodities market started with a headline I read a few weeks ago: Cooling Coffee Prices Hit A Three-And-Half-Year Low.

I like coffee. Most people like coffee. That's not going to change. So maybe, just maybe, I could buy coffee low and sell high, not by hoarding sacks of actual coffee beans but with a bet on the futures price.

The futures market largely determines the price of the most basic commodities used in everyday life — oil, wheat, soybeans, corn, hogs, cattle, coffee and much more. Despite their significance, futures are a mystery to most people, including many investors and journalists. I caught up with Jack Scoville at the Price Futures Group in Chicago. He's a futures broker who analyzes the market for agricultural commodities, including coffee. He ticks off reasons why coffee prices have tumbled.

More Coffee Reading

The Salt

Exploring Coffee's Past To Rescue Its Future

At the turn of the 20th century, drugstores were little more than a pharmacist and a soda fountain. If you wanted to go shopping, you went to a department store.

Now, that trend is reversing. Department stores are suffering and drugstores are booming.

So much so that Walgreens — one of the industry's leaders — is experimenting with expanding its goods and services.

Publicity Move Or Something More?

The three-story Walgreens in Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown district is one of 10 "flagship" locations. The 20,000-square-foot store has a health clinic with exams rooms staffed with a nurse practitioner, an extensive beauty boutique complete with a nail salon, and a caf stocked with fresh food.

Enlarge image i

To say that Nashvillean Spencer Hays is crazy for French art is an understatement. "French art just quickens our step, fires our spirit and touches our heart," he says.

Hays' passion began when he was in his 30s. By then he was already a millionaire; Forbes estimated his worth at $400 million in 1997, money earned from book-selling and clothing businesses. Hays had humble beginnings.

NPR's Uri Berliner is taking $5,000 of his own savings and putting it to work. Though he's no financial whiz or guru, he's exploring different types of investments — alternatives that may fare better than staying in a savings account that's not keeping up with inflation.

My taste of the commodities market started with a headline I read a few weeks ago: Cooling Coffee Prices Hit A Three-And-Half-Year Low.

I like coffee. Most people like coffee. That's not going to change. So maybe, just maybe, I could buy coffee low and sell high, not by hoarding sacks of actual coffee beans but with a bet on the futures price.

The futures market largely determines the price of the most basic commodities used in everyday life — oil, wheat, soybeans, corn, hogs, cattle, coffee and much more. Despite their significance, futures are a mystery to most people, including many investors and journalists. I caught up with Jack Scoville at the Price Futures Group in Chicago. He's a futures broker who analyzes the market for agricultural commodities, including coffee. He ticks off reasons why coffee prices have tumbled.

More Coffee Reading

The Salt

Exploring Coffee's Past To Rescue Its Future

Cubillo should know: He produced Spanish versions of The Apprentice, Big Brother, The X Factor and Temptation Island, none of which have the rights to air in the U.S. Still, he admits he had doubts about Telemundo creating a children's show.

"I was afraid about the kid's version because it's so different, it's so pure," Cubillo says. "Kids are providing us with some elements that we couldn't get in the adult version, for sure."

That includes endearing scenes in which cute, small children burst into tears when they're eliminated and get hugs and kisses from their tearful coaches onstage.

Host Daisy Fuentes says the children have big dreams. "They're not joking around," she says. "They want the success. They want the fame and they want the recognition. And most of them will tell you it's to help their family."

The field of contestants gets whittled down every week and the kids are coached by three celebrity judges, including Mexican pop diva Paulina Rubio, who began as a child performer. "I started at 7," Rubio says. "I got a recording deal so no[one more] than me can understand them and their fears and their family's doubts. It is a lot of pressure."

Rubio notes that the show works with a team of psychologists to help the children. "The whole project is taking care [of] these little souls," she says.

More From The Media For Kids And Teens Series:

Code Switch

As Demographics Shift, Kids' Books Stay Stubbornly White

Roger Federer, who last year won his seventh Wimbledon title, is out of the 2013 tournament after falling to Ukrainian Sergei Stakhovsky, 6-7, 7-6, 7-5, 7-6. The upset comes two days after Rafael Nadal, who was in the same side of the bracket as Federer, was upset in the first round.

Sergiy Stakhovsky is ranked No. 116 in the world. Federer is ranked No. 3 in the world. The victory is Stakhovsky's first against an opponent ranked in the top 10.

And the women's No. 3 seed, Maria Sharapova, was also bounced Wednesday, falling to Portugal's Michelle Larcher de Brito 6-3, 6-4 in the second round. Sharapova fell at least twice on the court today, blaming her slips on the condition of the grass court's surface.

As for Federer, he said after his loss on the All England Club's Centre Court, "It was clearly not what I was hoping for."

That's according to USA Today, which quotes Stakhovsky calling his win "magic," adding, "I couldn't play any better today."

Federer's loss marks the first time he has failed to advance to a Grand Slam quarterfinal since the 2004 Wimbledon tournament, according to a release from the All England Club.

The top seeds have suffered at this year's Wimbledon. Earlier Wednesday, women's No. 2 seed Victoria Azarenka quit the tournament, citing a knee injury.

But the two No. 1 seeds, Novak Djokovic and Serena Williams, have had little trouble. And men's No. 2 Andy Murray now finds himself atop a bracket he once shared with Federer and Nadal.

We live in a society full of people who are obsessed with making sure that prices are right and supply meets demand. And then there's the live-music business.

Concert tickets are often too cheap, and the supply is too limited. Scalpers are the proof: If tickets were more expensive to begin with, or if venues were bigger, scalpers wouldn't be able to charge more than face value.

On today's show, we talk to Kid Rock about how he's trying to cut scalpers out of the business — and still sell cheap tickets to his shows.

For More: See Adam Davidson's New York Times Magazine column, How Much Is Michael Bolton Worth to You?

Read Josh Baron and Dean Budnick's book: Ticket Masters: The Rise of the Concert Industry and How the Public Got Scalped and economist Pascal Courty's many papers on the topic.

Music: Taylor Swift's "I Knew You Were Trouble," and Kid Rock's "God Save Rock 'N Roll," "Prodigal Son," and "Cowboy." Find us: Twitter/ Facebook/Spotify/ Tumblr. Download the Planet Money iPhone App.

The job of postmaster general was once one of the country's most politically powerful. It is also one of the oldest; a version of the position existed before the Declaration of Independence.

But today, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe finds himself continually caught in the political crossfire. Donahoe is tangling with unions and members of Congress over how to manage the Postal Service's future — as it faces huge losses, dwindling mail volume and ballooning costs.

It may seem strange now, but Donahoe was originally drawn to postal work by the money.

"$4.76 an hour, and in 1975 that was a lot of money," he recalls, "so I thought, 'Well, I'll try that for a while until I'm done with school' and I never left."

In 37 years, he has occupied nearly every position at the Postal Service: "vehicle maintenance, airport operations, accounting, personnel, labor relations."

The Postal Service is one of the largest employers in the country, but it is saddled with enormous retirement and health care costs that it cannot afford. It's running billions of dollars in the red and has had to borrow heavily from the U.S. Treasury. Its main source of revenue — first-class mail — is falling off. It is trying to grow its package-delivery business, but there, it competes with FedEx and UPS, and technological change is swift.

Donahoe grew up in Pittsburgh, coming of age at a time when that city was shaped by its own rapidly declining industry.

"In the '80s, we lost the steel industry. Gone! Well, I witnessed 100,000 people lose their jobs because people did not pay attention to what was going on in the economy," he says.

Donahoe is closing some mail-sorting facilities and reducing hours at less-trafficked post offices.

But reining in costs isn't just a business challenge; it's politically fraught. That's because, though its operations are not taxpayer-funded, the Postal Service is also controlled by Congress, which mandates delivery of mail to every household in the United States and requires it to prefund retiree benefits, decades into the future.

This hybrid governance structure, not surprisingly, leads to tension. Donahoe's most public skirmish with Capitol Hill came earlier this year, when he announced plans to save money by ending Saturday letter delivery without congressional approval. Two months later, Congress forced him to scrap those plans.

“ I speak to the people in the field. And time and time again, they've said to me, 'Don't give up on this stuff; my job's at stake.'

The economy "is unlikely to slow in the short-term, and may even moderately pick up," economist Lynn Franco predicted Tuesday as the Conference Board released its latest survey on consumer confidence.

The business research group, where Franco is director of economic indicators, said its index rose to a five-year high of 81.4 in June — up from May's 74.3. The index is based on surveys of Americans.

According to Franco, the index rose in large part because "consumers are considerably more positive about current business and labor market conditions than they were at the beginning of the year."

If consumers are feeling better about how things are going, that's good news for the economy because it suggests that in coming months Americans will be more willing to spend. That spending, in turn, could help spur job growth — and, potentially, create a "virtuous circle" in which stronger confidence boosts spending, which boosts hiring, which boosts confidence ... and so on.

There were other positive economic indicators released Tuesday, including:

— Word from the Census Bureau and Department of Housing and Urban Development that sales of new homes rose 2.1 percent in May from April, and were up 29 percent from May 2012.

— Another report from the Census Bureau said orders for so-called durable goods (appliances, equipment and other long-lasting products) rose 3.6 percent in May from April.

Stocks are trading higher in New York following this news. As of 11 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones industrial average was up about 112 points (0.75 percent) from Monday's close.

Lawmakers continue to wrangle over a bill that would overhaul the nation's immigration system. One provision in this bill would allow companies to import a lot more skilled workers. The tech industry has lobbied hard for this, despite fears among some American workers about the extra competition.

Illinois Senator Dick Durbin says the bill has American workers covered. "Employers will be given a chance to hire a temporary foreign worker when truly needed. But first, they'll be required to recruit Americans. No exceptions, no excuses," he said.

Still, making companies recruit Americans isn't the same as making them hire them.

If you talk to disgruntled tech workers much, sooner or later one of them is going to send you this video. It shows a Pittsburgh immigration lawyer at what looks like a seminar for clients in 2007. In the video, he's telling clients what to do when they want to sponsor one of their foreign workers for a permanent visa — a green card. The government requires employers to prove they looked for American workers first. So the companies have to advertise the job. But the lawyer tells them they don't have to advertise it too conspicuously.

"Our goal is, clearly, not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker," the lawyer in the video says. He later adds, "We're going to find a place where ... we're complying with the law and hoping — and likely — not to find qualified and interested worker applicants."

Immigration law firms do this all the time: They show employers how to recruit Americans without actually having to hire them. This lawyer didn't want to talk to NPR, maybe because anti-visa activists have been sending this video around for years. It's Exhibit A in their argument that recruiting rules are a sham.

In the parts of the country where tech companies are prevalent, this kind of "faux recruiting" is common knowledge. But people in the industry quickly learn not to waste their time on certain job listings, says Orion Hughes, a software tester.

"A lot of us are aware of that ruse," he says.

Hughes and others avoid the listings with overly specific requirements, such as the number of years in "the job offered." That often means the employer just wants to make permanent a temporary foreign worker who's already in the job. And if you're stubborn enough to apply anyway, Hughes says that interview is going to be awkward.

"If you want to put yourself in that manager's shoes, it's an uncomfortable situation for them," he says. "They will [have a] kind of a sour facial expression, and they'll go from one question to the next. They are finding some reason to exclude you."

Employers usually go through these motions only when they're sponsoring a foreigner for a permanent visa. But now the Senate immigration bill would extend a similar requirement to temp workers: the foreigners on the H-1B visas which have become so common, and controversial, in lower-end tech jobs. The bill would have employers post those jobs online first, and there'd be more recruiting rules for companies that use H-1Bs a lot. It sounds good, but it's a move that seems to ignore all the ill will that's been generated over the years by insincere recruiting.

"No one is ever hired," says Bruce Morrison, a former Democratic congressman from Connecticut.

Related Immigration Stories

U.S.

Visa Exchange Program Draws Scrutiny Under Immigration Bill

He's got a round, affable face and large, black, hipster glasses. He's smartly dressed in a blazer and button-up shirt. He looks straight into the camera, talking, singing, smoking and drinking — just him, for upward of 90 minutes.

"It only hurts when you think of it," he says, his normally jaunty voice wobbling on the edge of a break. "And if you're real, you think of it a long, long time, that's for sure. Those are the dues."

"He" is Jason Holliday, born Aaron Payne, and he's the subject — no, the heart — of the film Portrait of Jason, Shirley Clarke's remarkable 1967 film.

Remarkable it was, and remarkable it remains, in more ways than one. Its unadorned, first-person portrait of a black gay man was a first for films. But it also challenged the notion of what a documentary could be.

"I can't think of any other film that put a gay person in the center and just allowed them to talk about their life before Shirley Clarke's film," says George Chauncey, chairman of the Yale University history department and author of Gay New York.

Now that it's playing in theaters again, in a newly restored version, the film feels in some ways more pioneering than ever.

"It's really impossible to imagine what it felt like 45 years ago, when this film came out," says Jeffrey Friedman, who co-directed The Celluloid Closet, an eye-opening survey of representations of LGBT people in cinema.

"You know, we'd never seen anything like this," Friedman says. "This was before reality television; before we were used to people baring their souls on national TV and on the Internet."

Movie Reviews

Peeling Away The Layers In A 'Portrait Of Jason'

When Chinese workers have a grievance, they are increasingly taking dramatic and direct action.

As we've reported, an American executive at a Chinese factory has been prevented by workers from leaving the plant since last Friday. Chip Starnes, of Specialty Medical Supplies, says it's a misunderstanding following a decision to shut down part of his medical supply business and move some jobs to India where wages are lower.

He says workers erroneously believe he plans to lay them all off. As of Wednesday, he still wasn't allowed to leave the plant on the outskirts of Beijing.

This story is part of a larger pattern of labor strife in China.

As the Wall Street Journal noted: "While bosses aren't held captive in their companies every day in China, Starnes is not the first one. In January this year, around 1,000 workers at Shanghai Shinmei Electric Company held Japanese and Chinese managers hostage in the factory, claiming that work rules for bathroom breaks and punishments for tardiness were too harsh."

Li Qiang, executive director of New York-based China Labor Watch, says though the problem is common, it's rare for a Westerner to be involved.

"Generally, a lot of worker protests are similar to this because of unpaid wages," he told NPR through a translator. "Bosses move factories without a heads-up to workers, and so workers are left unpaid."

Indeed, as the Journal says: "Numbers for such disputes are hard to come by, though an investigation by the Economic Information Daily, a newspaper published by the official Xinhua news agency, found that more than 400 bosses ran away from bankrupt factories in eastern China's Zhejiang province in 2008.

Most of those executives worked for foreign companies, meaning workers had virtually no hope of claiming months or even years of backpay owed to them."

NPR's Anthony Kuhn explained the root of the story on Tuesday's Morning Edition:

"The big picture is that Chinese wages are starting to rise pretty quickly, particularly in the coastal manufacturing enclaves. And so foreign manufacturers have to look further inland where wages are lower or they have to look to other countries, including Southeast Asia. Every country welcomes investment coming in. When it [investment] starts to look elsewhere, when it starts to move out, sometimes companies experience difficulties. ... We may be seeing this more and more in the future, and the question is: Does China have the infrastructure and the institutional resources to deal with this? And in this case, the answer is no."

When Chinese workers have a grievance, they are increasingly taking dramatic and direct action.

As we've reported, an American executive at a Chinese factory has been prevented by workers from leaving the plant since last Friday. Chip Starnes, of Specialty Medical Supplies, says it's a misunderstanding following a decision to shut down part of his medical supply business and move some jobs to India where wages are lower.

He says workers erroneously believe he plans to lay them all off. As of Wednesday, he still wasn't allowed to leave the plant on the outskirts of Beijing.

This story is part of a larger pattern of labor strife in China.

As the Wall Street Journal noted: "While bosses aren't held captive in their companies every day in China, Starnes is not the first one. In January this year, around 1,000 workers at Shanghai Shinmei Electric Company held Japanese and Chinese managers hostage in the factory, claiming that work rules for bathroom breaks and punishments for tardiness were too harsh."

Li Qiang, executive director of New York-based China Labor Watch, says though the problem is common, it's rare for a Westerner to be involved.

"Generally, a lot of worker protests are similar to this because of unpaid wages," he told NPR through a translator. "Bosses move factories without a heads-up to workers, and so workers are left unpaid."

Indeed, as the Journal says: "Numbers for such disputes are hard to come by, though an investigation by the Economic Information Daily, a newspaper published by the official Xinhua news agency, found that more than 400 bosses ran away from bankrupt factories in eastern China's Zhejiang province in 2008.

Most of those executives worked for foreign companies, meaning workers had virtually no hope of claiming months or even years of backpay owed to them."

NPR's Anthony Kuhn explained the root of the story on Tuesday's Morning Edition:

"The big picture is that Chinese wages are starting to rise pretty quickly, particularly in the coastal manufacturing enclaves. And so foreign manufacturers have to look further inland where wages are lower or they have to look to other countries, including Southeast Asia. Every country welcomes investment coming in. When it [investment] starts to look elsewhere, when it starts to move out, sometimes companies experience difficulties. ... We may be seeing this more and more in the future, and the question is: Does China have the infrastructure and the institutional resources to deal with this? And in this case, the answer is no."

We live in a world filled with crimes, but most of them don't have much to tell us. They're cases of mere stupidity, cruelty or greed. But every now and then one comes along that invites larger thoughts about the culture.

Think of the 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese, stabbed to death while nearly 40 witnesses heard her screams but didn't want to get involved. Or the 1974 kidnapping of Patty Hearst, which felt like the final, mad curdling of the '60s political dream. Or the Ponzi scheming of Bernard Madoff, that hollow pillar of the community who came to personify the 2008 financial crisis. Such crimes felt emblematic.

Of course, not every emblematic crime is heavy. Take Sofia Coppola's entertaining film The Bling Ring, about a posse of thieving teens from L.A.'s prosperous West Valley suburbs. It's a true story, but you could believe its plot was dreamed up by some witty professor of cultural studies who wanted to make a point about American consumerism and celebrity mania.

“ If you're older than about 19, you may spend The Bling Ring wanting to break into a chorus of 'What's the Matter With Kids Today?'

The tenuous nature of efforts to bring peace to Afghanistan were dramatically underscored Tuesday morning when gunmen attacked buildings near Afghanistan's presidential palace in Kabul as journalists were gathering to hear from President Hamid Karzai about nascent plans for peace talks with the Taliban.

According to The Associated Press, four or five "suicide attackers set up a car bomb and battled security forces outside Afghanistan's presidential palace after infiltrating one of the most secure areas of the capital. All the attackers were killed and one palace security guard was wounded, officials said." (9:55 a.m. ET: See update below.)

The BBC adds that "Karzai was in the palace, but the target appears to have been the nearby Ariana hotel, which houses a CIA station."

The Taliban has claimed responsibility, according to The Guardian and other news outlets. "This is very much a message that 'we can still do war as well as peace,' " Kate Clark of the Afghanistan Analysts Network tells the Guardian.

Reuters says the "brazen assault ... could derail attempts for peace talks to end 12 years of war. ... A U.S. envoy was in Kabul on Tuesday to try to smooth the way forward for the stalled talks in the Gulf state of Qatar ahead of the pullout from Afghanistan of most of the NATO-led troops next year. He had been expected to meet reporters at the U.S. embassy, but the conference was called off. [As was Karzai's appearance.]"

And The New York Times notes that "the attack came just days after the Taliban opened an office in Doha, Qatar, ostensibly for starting negotiations about a peace process. It raised new questions about divisions within the Taliban and whether there is any broad commitment to peace."

Update at 9:55 a.m. ET. Eight Attackers, Three Guards Killed:

According to The Associated Press: "Taliban militants stormed the presidential compound Tuesday after bluffing their way past two checkpoints, triggering a gun battle that left eight attackers and three guards dead and sent journalists attending an official event scrambling for cover, officials and witnesses said."

Qatar's emir, Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, handed over power to his 33-year-old son on Tuesday, and we found this rather remarkable on several counts.

First, an abdication in the Middle East, or anywhere for that matter, is pretty rare. Yes, we know that Queen Beatrix abdicated earlier this year in favor of her son, Prince Willem-Alexander. But she was 75, and this is one of the few places that had a precedent for passing the baton in this manner.

The norm is for a monarchy to change hands through the death of an elderly king or queen. If you don't believe us, just ask Britain's Prince Charles.

In Qatar, Sheik Hamad came to power in a 1995 bloodless coup that deposed his father, who was on an extended summer vacation in Europe.

Sheik Hamad's decision to step down now is also surprising because he's just 61. Health may have been a factor, but the government has not divulged any details.

And Sheik Hamad has been a tremendously ambitious leader during his 18-year rule and did not seem like the type to step aside at a relatively young age.

He established Al-Jazeera, the satellite television network; he made his tiny island an outsized political player; and he used Qatar's great oil and gas wealth to invest in high-profile businesses that ranged from London's Harrods department store to soccer's Paris Saint-Germain.

Enlarge image i

Editor's Note: As part of our reboot of All Tech Considered, we'll invite contributors to blog about big-picture questions facing tech and society. One theme we're exploring is the lack of women and people of color in tech — a gap so glaring that ridiculously long lines at tech conferences have inspired photo essays and Twitter feeds.

Enlarge image i

Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared to rebuff the United States when he said NSA leaker Edward Snowden was in Moscow but is a "free person" who is "entitled to buy a ticket and fly to wherever he wants."

Snowden, Putin said, is in the transit zone of Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport and has neither crossed the Russian border nor "committed any crime" on Russian soil.

According to a report from the RT network, which is financed by Russian government, Putin made the comments in Finland during a joint news conference with Finnish President Sauli Niinist.

The United States has been pressuring Russia to arrest Snowden and extradite him. Putin rejected the notion.

"We can only extradite any foreign citizens to such countries with which we have signed the appropriate international agreements on criminal extradition," he said, adding the U.S. and Russia have no agreement.

Putin also seemed eager to get this whole thing over with, saying, "The sooner [Snowden] chooses his final destination, the better it is for him and Russia."

Then he used a pretty vivid metaphor: "In any case, I would like not to deal with such issues because it is like shearing a pig: There's lots of squealing and little fleece."

The BBC reports that earlier today, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called on Moscow to comply with "common law practices between countries." The BBC adds:

"'There are standards of behavior between sovereign nations. There is common law," Mr Kerry said.

"'We would simply call on our friends in Russia to respect the fact that a partner nation- a co-member of the permanent five of the United Nations [Security Council] - has made a normal request under legal systems.'"

While a few states in the U.S. are debating mandatory labels for genetically modified foods, some African nations are considering a bigger question: Should farmers be allowed to plant genetically modified crops at all?

The question carries extra weight in countries like Uganda, where most people are farmers who depend on their own crops for food.

Enlarge image i

Both candidates for U.S. Senate in Massachusetts are finishing a frantic day of campaigning ahead of Tuesday's special election to fill the seat vacated by Secretary of State John Kerry.

Veteran Democratic Rep. Ed Markey is running against Republican businessman Gabriel Gomez. But they are struggling to get voters to the polls in a summer election that has yet to capture much attention.

It's hard not to compare Tuesday's special election to the one in 2010. Once again, a charismatic Republican with an intriguing resume is trying to grab a Senate seat held by a Democrat for decades.

Scott Brown shocked everyone when he pulled it off. Now Gomez is trying to do it again.

"I know that our side — the people that are going to vote for me are enthusiastic," said Gomez, explaining why he was "fired up." "We've given them a reason to vote for someone."

Gomez — who's Latino, a former Navy SEAL and an investment banker — is trying to rally support, even as polls show him trailing Markey.

While Brown won by claiming the stakes couldn't be higher, Gomez is closing his case by arguing the opposite — that it's just a 17-month term, so there's really no harm in giving a new guy a try.

"You give me 17 months, I'll keep my word," he says. "If you don't like what I've done after 17 months, then you can vote somebody else in."

Bringing In Big Names

For his part, Markey says he's taking nothing for granted — imploring Democrats to vote. It's a point that was repeated by Vice President Joe Biden over the weekend.

"Don't put yourself in a position where you ... say, 'But, God, if I'd only gone down one more block, if I'd only made 20 more calls," Biden said.

Biden is only the latest in a parade of big-name Democrats who have stumped for Markey, including President Obama, Michelle Obama and former President Clinton.

Gomez has drawn in fewer big names; they have included Arizona Sen. John McCain and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

"Having Republicans nationally come in is definitely a double-edged sword," says Democratic consultant Chris Keohan.

He says it's tricky to run as an independent-minded Republican in the very blue state of Massachusetts. But, he says, the national party still could have done more than they did for Gomez.

"He's got a great bio," Keohan says. "He helps with all the demographics that Republicans historically have done poorly in. You would think that Gabriel Gomez would be exactly what Republicans would try and make their poster boy nationally. And to be honest, it really looks more like they've abandoned him."

Even Brown — still popular in Massachusetts — has been quiet, making his first rally with Gomez on Monday night.

"A little bit too little, too late, I think," says Maurice Cunningham, a political science professor at the University of Massachusetts, Boston.

Cunningham says that, at this point, probably nothing could bump Gomez into another political shocker.

"I always like to use a quote from Donald Rumsfeld about the 'unknown unknowns,' and, sure, of course, but we've had two — the Boston Marathon [bombing] and the scandals in the Obama administration — but neither one has really affected the race."

'Playing Defense'

While Brown built his win on the compelling case that he would be the critical 41st vote against "Obamacare," Gomez's core issue of change is more amorphous. He's been mocking Markey for his 37 years in office — as Gomez puts it, since "eight-track players were big, and the first Rocky movie had just debuted.

But Markey has been pitching his tenure as an asset to voters who have lost two veteran senators, and the congressman has been hitting hard on core Democratic issues like abortion and gun control.

"We have to make sure that our cities are safe," he told voters at a weekend rally. "Gabriel Gomez says he opposes an assault weapon ban."

Ultimately, Republican consultant John Sivolella says, Markey has managed to run successfully as a virtual incumbent.

"I think Ed Markey's kind of strategy paid off, just keeping it flat," he says. "I think just laying back and playing defense has worked for him. There was no reason for him to go out on a limb and do anything risky."

Indeed, one day before the election, many voters are still more focused on the Boston Bruins and Fourth of July picnics than politics. Low turnout will likely help Markey, giving what Keohan calls the Democrats' well-tuned get-out-the-vote machine.

"They knocked well over 50,000 doors just on Saturday alone," Keohan says. "There's really no on-the-ground solid operation on the Republican side. It's like they rebuild the wheel every two to four years."

Whatever happens on Tuesday, Gomez himself seems to have taken to heart his own message — that this term is only 17 months long. He's already hinting at another run.

The U.S. Supreme Court sent a case involving the use of race in the University of Texas' admissions process back to a lower court for stricter scrutiny on Monday. It's one more chapter in the university's long struggle with how it chooses who gets in.

Here's a brief look at some key moments:

The Two-Way

'Sweatt V. Painter': Nearly Forgotten, But Landmark Texas Integration Case

Both candidates for U.S. Senate in Massachusetts are finishing a frantic day of campaigning ahead of Tuesday's special election to fill the seat vacated by Secretary of State John Kerry.

Veteran Democratic Rep. Ed Markey is running against Republican businessman Gabriel Gomez. But they are struggling to get voters to the polls in a summer election that has yet to capture much attention.

It's hard not to compare Tuesday's special election to the one in 2010. Once again, a charismatic Republican with an intriguing resume is trying to grab a Senate seat held by a Democrat for decades.

Scott Brown shocked everyone when he pulled it off. Now Gomez is trying to do it again.

"I know that our side — the people that are going to vote for me are enthusiastic," said Gomez, explaining why he was "fired up." "We've given them a reason to vote for someone."

Gomez — who's Latino, a former Navy SEAL and an investment banker — is trying to rally support, even as polls show him trailing Markey.

While Brown won by claiming the stakes couldn't be higher, Gomez is closing his case by arguing the opposite — that it's just a 17-month term, so there's really no harm in giving a new guy a try.

"You give me 17 months, I'll keep my word," he says. "If you don't like what I've done after 17 months, then you can vote somebody else in."

Bringing In Big Names

For his part, Markey says he's taking nothing for granted — imploring Democrats to vote. It's a point that was repeated by Vice President Joe Biden over the weekend.

"Don't put yourself in a position where you ... say, 'But, God, if I'd only gone down one more block, if I'd only made 20 more calls," Biden said.

Biden is only the latest in a parade of big-name Democrats who have stumped for Markey, including President Obama, Michelle Obama and former President Clinton.

Gomez has drawn in fewer big names; they have included Arizona Sen. John McCain and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

"Having Republicans nationally come in is definitely a double-edged sword," says Democratic consultant Chris Keohan.

He says it's tricky to run as an independent-minded Republican in the very blue state of Massachusetts. But, he says, the national party still could have done more than they did for Gomez.

"He's got a great bio," Keohan says. "He helps with all the demographics that Republicans historically have done poorly in. You would think that Gabriel Gomez would be exactly what Republicans would try and make their poster boy nationally. And to be honest, it really looks more like they've abandoned him."

Even Brown — still popular in Massachusetts — has been quiet, making his first rally with Gomez on Monday night.

"A little bit too little, too late, I think," says Maurice Cunningham, a political science professor at the University of Massachusetts, Boston.

Cunningham says that, at this point, probably nothing could bump Gomez into another political shocker.

"I always like to use a quote from Donald Rumsfeld about the 'unknown unknowns,' and, sure, of course, but we've had two — the Boston Marathon [bombing] and the scandals in the Obama administration — but neither one has really affected the race."

'Playing Defense'

While Brown built his win on the compelling case that he would be the critical 41st vote against "Obamacare," Gomez's core issue of change is more amorphous. He's been mocking Markey for his 37 years in office — as Gomez puts it, since "eight-track players were big, and the first Rocky movie had just debuted.

But Markey has been pitching his tenure as an asset to voters who have lost two veteran senators, and the congressman has been hitting hard on core Democratic issues like abortion and gun control.

"We have to make sure that our cities are safe," he told voters at a weekend rally. "Gabriel Gomez says he opposes an assault weapon ban."

Ultimately, Republican consultant John Sivolella says, Markey has managed to run successfully as a virtual incumbent.

"I think Ed Markey's kind of strategy paid off, just keeping it flat," he says. "I think just laying back and playing defense has worked for him. There was no reason for him to go out on a limb and do anything risky."

Indeed, one day before the election, many voters are still more focused on the Boston Bruins and Fourth of July picnics than politics. Low turnout will likely help Markey, giving what Keohan calls the Democrats' well-tuned get-out-the-vote machine.

"They knocked well over 50,000 doors just on Saturday alone," Keohan says. "There's really no on-the-ground solid operation on the Republican side. It's like they rebuild the wheel every two to four years."

Whatever happens on Tuesday, Gomez himself seems to have taken to heart his own message — that this term is only 17 months long. He's already hinting at another run.

While a few states in the U.S. are debating mandatory labels for genetically modified foods, some African nations are considering a bigger question: Should farmers be allowed to plant genetically modified crops at all?

The question carries extra weight in countries like Uganda, where most people are farmers who depend on their own crops for food.

Enlarge image i

When the blood pressure drug Bystolic hit the market in 2008, it faced a crowded field of cheap generics.

So its maker, Forest Laboratories, launched a promotional assault on the group in the best position to determine Bystolic's success: those in control of prescription pads. It flooded the offices of health professionals with drug reps, and it hired doctors to persuade their peers to choose Bystolic — even though the drug hadn't proved more effective than competitors.

The strategy worked. In the 2012 fiscal year, sales of Bystolic reached $348 million, almost double its total from two years earlier, the company reported.

Now, data obtained and analyzed by ProPublica suggest another factor in Bystolic's rapid success: Many of the drug's top prescribers have financial ties to Forest.

At least 17 of the top 20 Bystolic prescribers in Medicare's prescription drug program in 2010 have been paid by Forest to deliver promotional talks. In 2012, they together received $284,700 for speeches and more than $20,000 in meals.

Nearly all those doctors were again among the highest prescribers in 2011, the most recent year for which Medicare data are available. Forest began disclosing its payments only last year; the company didn't specify which drugs doctors spoke about.

Dr. Bernard Lo, who was chairman of a national panel examining conflicts of interest in medicine, said he doesn't believe the findings are coincidental.

When there's no evidence a drug is better, "You have to question: Why are doctors prescribing this?" said Lo, president of the Greenwall Foundation, a New York City nonprofit that funds bioethics research. "What your evidence suggests is that there is a financial incentive for doctors who receive payments from drug companies" for pitching their products.

Until now, doctors' prescribing habits have been secret from all but pharmaceutical companies, which pay millions of dollars for such information from other firms that collect it.

ProPublica's analysis marks the first time anyone has matched payment data made public by drug companies with physician prescribing records from the Medicare drug program, which covers about 1 out of every 4 prescriptions in the U.S.

Prescriber Checkup

Editor's Note: As part of our reboot of All Tech Considered, we'll invite contributors to blog about big-picture questions facing tech and society. One theme we're exploring is the lack of women and people of color in tech — a gap so glaring that ridiculously long lines at tech conferences have inspired photo essays and Twitter feeds.

Enlarge image i

Supplies of oil have been surging this year, and U.S. drivers, who have been switching to more fuel-efficient cars, are using less gasoline.

That would seem to be the right economic combination to push down prices at the pump, but gasoline prices have remained stubbornly high this summer.

Even some people in the industry are wondering whether the law of supply and demand somehow has been repealed.

"I'm actually quite dumbfounded," says Azam Zakaria, vice president of Lone Star Petroleum, a family owned company that owns and operates 15 gas stations in the Houston area.

Zakaria, who has been in the business for nearly three decades, used to believe that more oil would mean lower prices, but he hasn't been seeing that lately.

The disconnect between supply and demand seemed to get even wider Wednesday, when the U.S. Energy Information Administration released its latest data, showing that U.S. crude oil inventories rose by 0.3 million barrels last week. Most experts had been expecting the oil inventory to decline by 0.6 million barrels.

That sort of surprise keeps happening as more and more domestic oil gets pumped. In fact last year, the United States saw the largest-ever yearly rise in oil production, according to a statistical review released last week by BP, the global oil giant.

At the same time, global oil reserves continue to grow, the BP report says.

The price of crude oil, however, continues to hover around $100 a barrel, and an average gallon of regular gasoline is still running above $3.62 nationwide. At the start of this year, the price was about $3.20 a gallon.

Zakaria worries that speculators are pushing up prices beyond what the usual balance of supply and demand would dictate. "Just to be blunt with you, I think that it's a commodity now that is being exchanged at Wall Street," he says.

Related NPR Stories

The Two-Way

Huge Boost In U.S. Oil Output Set To Transform Global Market

According to the countdown clock, at 2 p.m. ET Monday we were just 490 hours away from fresh Twinkies.

As the Los Angeles Times says, it's "time to welcome back the Twinkie. ... Hostess is bringing back its popular snack cakes on July 15 after going bankrupt last year and selling its brands to various bidders."

The snack saviors (via Bloomberg News):

"Hostess is owned by Apollo Global Management LLC (APO) and C. Dean Metropoulos & Co., whose combined offer of as much as $410 million for company's snack-cake enterprise was the only one submitted during the bankruptcy process in March. The spongy yellow cakes went out of production, prompting bidding wars for boxes on auction sites like EBay.

"Other Hostess products include CupCakes, Ding Dongs and Ho Hos."

Something similar occurs in a series of panels showing Regina preparing for a meeting of mysterious importance. She applies makeup, dons earrings and primps before allowing herself to stare into the mirror with an expression that mingles regret and worry. Sequences like this, which encourage the reader to linger before turning the page, are useful, given The Property's pacing and plotting, which depend on a comedy of errors and assumptions — characters are forever refusing to divulge everything they know, causing other characters to leap to conclusions that cause still other characters to misconstrue what they've learned and so on and on until the great, final-act reckoning.

Said reckoning, appropriately enough, takes place in a cemetery on Zaduszki, the Polish day of the dead. In a moonlit graveyard, long-buried family secrets finally stand revealed amid the uncanny glow of hundreds of colored candles placed atop tombstones. Because, as the characters of this wryly funny and ultimately wrenching graphic novel come to learn, nothing about the past stays buried forever.

Read an excerpt of The Property

When the blood pressure drug Bystolic hit the market in 2008, it faced a crowded field of cheap generics.

So its maker, Forest Laboratories, launched a promotional assault on the group in the best position to determine Bystolic's success: those in control of prescription pads. It flooded the offices of health professionals with drug reps, and it hired doctors to persuade their peers to choose Bystolic — even though the drug hadn't proved more effective than competitors.

The strategy worked. In the 2012 fiscal year, sales of Bystolic reached $348 million, almost double its total from two years earlier, the company reported.

Now, data obtained and analyzed by ProPublica suggest another factor in Bystolic's rapid success: Many of the drug's top prescribers have financial ties to Forest.

At least 17 of the top 20 Bystolic prescribers in Medicare's prescription drug program in 2010 have been paid by Forest to deliver promotional talks. In 2012, they together received $284,700 for speeches and more than $20,000 in meals.

Nearly all those doctors were again among the highest prescribers in 2011, the most recent year for which Medicare data are available. Forest began disclosing its payments only last year; the company didn't specify which drugs doctors spoke about.

Dr. Bernard Lo, who was chairman of a national panel examining conflicts of interest in medicine, said he doesn't believe the findings are coincidental.

When there's no evidence a drug is better, "You have to question: Why are doctors prescribing this?" said Lo, president of the Greenwall Foundation, a New York City nonprofit that funds bioethics research. "What your evidence suggests is that there is a financial incentive for doctors who receive payments from drug companies" for pitching their products.

Until now, doctors' prescribing habits have been secret from all but pharmaceutical companies, which pay millions of dollars for such information from other firms that collect it.

ProPublica's analysis marks the first time anyone has matched payment data made public by drug companies with physician prescribing records from the Medicare drug program, which covers about 1 out of every 4 prescriptions in the U.S.

Prescriber Checkup

Ecuador says it is considering Edward Snowden's request for asylum.

This is the second high-profile case involving leaks of classified information, asylum and the South American country. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, to prevent being extradited to Sweden where he is wanted for questioning over allegations of sexual assault. It's worth mentioning here that WikiLeaks in a statement Sunday said it is giving Snowden legal help.

So why would the Andean nation consider giving refuge to Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor accused of leaking classified surveillance information?

"It becomes the center of attention. [Ecuador's] President Rafael Correa enjoys that," says Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington, D.C. "He likes needling the U.S. This satisfies that impulse. It also gives them a sense of consistency and commitment to principles by linking it to the Assange case."

Carl Meacham, director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, adds: "Correa is interested in inheriting the mantle of Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro. To be able to do this with Julian Assange and Mr. Snowden puts him, in his view, as a protector of freedom of information."

But, Shifter notes, Correa probably hopes that by granting refuge to Assange and considering asylum for Snowden he can shift the focus away from Ecuador's own record of press freedom.

Human Rights Watch has criticized the country's new Communication Law, saying the measure "seriously undermines free speech."

"To some extent, Correa can try and use this [incident] to point to the hypocrisy and double standards of everyone else who's coming down hard on him," Shifter says.

As a small country, Ecuador could be vulnerable to U.S. pressure, though its oil gives it a buffer.

Ecuador is the smallest member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and one of the top sources of crude oil imports to the U.S. West Coast. It's also a beneficiary of the massive Chinese investment in South America.

"There are going to be implications and consequences" to granting Snowden asylum, says Laura Powell, a research associate at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington.

She adds: "Diplomacy is not going to get very far. The U.S. has to rely on trade sanctions" and similar measures to achieve its goals.

Shifter of IAD says that at most the U.S. won't renew the Andean Trade Preference and Drug Eradication Act that covers Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia and Peru; Ecuador would like that deal to continue.

"But it's not going to be a fatal blow," he says.

CSIS's Meacham doesn't see it that way.

"It's pretty bad for them," he says. "Their trade benefits from the Andean Trade Preference and Drug Eradication Act are important. Forty-two percent of their goods are sold to the U.S. So on paper, it's not in their interest."

Ecuador and the U.S. do have an extradition treaty, but as Meacham of CSIS notes: "Snowden is charged with espionage/treason, neither of which is covered by the extradition treaty."

South Africans, and millions more people around the world, are waiting anxiously for further word about Nelson Mandela and praying for the former president and anti-apartheid icon.

Mandela, 94, remains in critical condition at a hospital in Pretoria where he's being treated for a recurring respiratory infection.

The word from South African President Jacob Zuma on Monday was that "doctors are doing everything possible to ensure his well being and comfort," South Africa's News 24 reports.

But as NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton reports from Pretoria, Zuma's spokesman, Mac Maharaj, added that: "Let's hope that he's able to improve, but at the same time, let us appreciate that [Mandela's condition] is critical."

And the BBC writes that "a senior official said South Africans should not hold out 'false hopes.' " The news network's Karen Allen "reports from outside the Pretoria hospital that the mood in the country is somber, and reality is sinking in."

Mandela, as NPR's Jason Beaubien reminds us, was born in a country that viewed him as a second-class citizen. But from his childhood as a herd boy, Mandela went on to lead the African National Congress' struggle against the racially oppressive, apartheid regime of South Africa. For his efforts, he spent 27 years behind bars as a political prisoner, finally being released in 1990.

In 1993, Mandela shared the Nobel Peace Prize with former South African President Frederik Willem de Klerk — the nation's last white leader. They were recognized for "their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime, and for laying the foundations for a new democratic South Africa."

Then, in 1994, Mandela was elected president in South Africa's first democratic elections. He pledged to serve just one term and left office in 1999.

Nelson Mandela, the former South African president and anti-apartheid leader, is in critical condition in a hospital in Pretoria where he was admitted two weeks ago with a recurring respiratory infection.

A statement from South African President Jacob Zuma said the 94-year-old Mandela's condition had become critical over the past 24 hours.

"The doctors are doing everything possible to get his condition to improve and are ensuring that Madiba is well-looked after and is comfortable. He is in good hands," said Zuma, referring to Mandela by his clan name.

NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton reports that Zuma has also met with Mandela's wife, Graca Machel, to discuss his health.

Mandela, a Noble Peace Prize laureate, was rushed to the hospital on June 8, but was reportedly stranded for 40 minutes en route after his ambulance broke down.

On Saturday, Zuma's office confirmed that an ambulance that transported Mandela had been disabled. Presidential spokesman Mac Maharaj said Mandela was transferred to another military ambulance for the remainder of the journey between Johannesburg and the Medi-Clinic Heart Hospital in Pretoria.

He did not say how long the trip to the hospital took, but said "all care" was taken to ensure that Mandela's medical condition was not compromised.

Mandela's lung problems date from his long imprisonment at Robben Island near Cape Town, where he spent 27 years for his anti-apartheid activities before being released in 1990.

In 1994, Mandela became South Africa's first black president.

Anthony Soprano, a waste-management consultant from Essex County, N.J., died this week.

Tony Soprano was — according to reports that aired for six years on HBO — head of the DiMeo crime family, which allegedly ran illicit drugs, untaxed alcohol, illegal sports betting and other criminal enterprises from the back of an adult entertainment venue called the Bada Bing club on Route 17 in Lodi.

Mr. Soprano denied his involvement in organized crime. He said it was a "vicious stereotype" that slurs waste-removal professionals who promote a green, healthy environment.

Mr. Soprano's survivors include his wife, Carmela, who loved him, but was often exasperated by his frequent absences from family life; a daughter, Meadow, who cherished him but could be embarrassed by her family; and a son, Anthony Jr., who was diffident, rebellious, but still relied on his family for support.

Mr. Soprano also left several grieving mistresses and their jewelry. He loved animals, including ducks that waddled into his swimming pool.

Mr. Soprano's mother once tried to have him killed. This made family gatherings awkward.

This week, Mr. Soprano was remembered by associates for uttering many memorable, self-revelatory phrases. "What kind of person can I be," he once exclaimed, "where his own mother wants him dead?"

He also became a public symbol for mental health by seeking professional counseling for his feelings of anxiety and ennui. "This isn't painful," he told his psychiatrist. "Getting shot is painful. Getting stabbed in the ribs is painful. This isn't painful. It's empty. Dead."

Mr. Soprano was suspected — but never convicted — of several murders, including the killing of Sal "Big Pussy" Bonpensiero, who had become an FBI informant; Ralphie Cifaretto, whom Mr. Soprano held responsible for killing his racehorse for insurance money; and Christopher Moltisanti, Mr. Soprano's own nephew, who was addicted to drugs and therefore considered vulnerable to turning state's evidence for the feds — excuse me, federal investigators.

Mr. Soprano also allegedly ordered the execution of Adriana La Cerva, Mr. Moltisanti's girlfriend, because she wanted "Chris-ta-pha" to join her in the Witness Protection Program.

But Mr. Soprano defended Vito Spatafore from other mobsters who wanted him murdered when his homosexuality was revealed.

Tony Soprano was a brutal, loyal, sentimental, cruel and enthralling character who danced on a high wire between humanity and absurdity. He died this week when James Gandolfini, the actor who portrayed him so deftly and indelibly on The Sopranos, died this week at the age of 51.

Ecuador says it is considering Edward Snowden's request for asylum.

This is the second high-profile case involving leaks of classified information, asylum and the South American country. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, to prevent being extradited to Sweden where he is wanted for questioning over allegations of sexual assault. It's worth mentioning here that WikiLeaks in a statement Sunday said it is giving Snowden legal help.

So why would the Andean nation consider giving refuge to Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor accused of leaking classified surveillance information?

"It becomes the center of attention. [Ecuador's] President Rafael Correa enjoys that," says Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington, D.C. "He likes needling the U.S. This satisfies that impulse. It also gives them a sense of consistency and commitment to principles by linking it to the Assange case."

Carl Meacham, director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, adds: "Correa is interested in inheriting the mantle of Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro. To be able to do this with Julian Assange and Mr. Snowden puts him, in his view, as a protector of freedom of information."

But, Shifter notes, Correa probably hopes that by granting refuge to Assange and considering asylum for Snowden he can shift the focus away from Ecuador's own record of press freedom.

Human Rights Watch has criticized the country's new Communication Law, saying the measure "seriously undermines free speech."

"To some extent, Correa can try and use this [incident] to point to the hypocrisy and double standards of everyone else who's coming down hard on him," Shifter says.

As a small country, Ecuador could be vulnerable to U.S. pressure, though its oil gives it a buffer.

Ecuador is the smallest member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and one of the top sources of crude oil imports to the U.S. West Coast. It's also a beneficiary of the massive Chinese investment in South America.

"There are going to be implications and consequences" to granting Snowden asylum, says Laura Powell, a research associate at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington.

She adds: "Diplomacy is not going to get very far. The U.S. has to rely on trade sanctions" and similar measures to achieve its goals.

Shifter of IAD says that at most the U.S. won't renew the Andean Trade Preference and Drug Eradication Act that covers Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia and Peru; Ecuador would like that deal to continue.

"But it's not going to be a fatal blow," he says.

CSIS's Meacham doesn't see it that way.

"It's pretty bad for them," he says. "Their trade benefits from the Andean Trade Preference and Drug Eradication Act are important. Forty-two percent of their goods are sold to the U.S. So on paper, it's not in their interest."

Ecuador and the U.S. do have an extradition treaty, but as Meacham of CSIS notes: "Snowden is charged with espionage/treason, neither of which is covered by the extradition treaty."

Every weekend, I rise at 7 a.m. to get on the subway to hunt for apartments. The cheapest two-bedroom homes in the suburbs of Shanghai cost $200,000 or more, which would take me more than 12 years to pay off — if I don't spend a dime of what I make.

This is the reality of China's boom. After decades of explosive growth, the cost of living in China's big cities has skyrocketed, and many young people have been priced out of the housing market.

People in the West tend to think the Chinese are taking over the world; the reality is young people here struggle to make ends meet. Putting food on the table and having a shelter are still their biggest concerns. I'm 27, with a graduate degree in journalism and a good job in my field, and I'm worried about these basics.

No Home, No Honey

Owning a home is even more important in China than in America. Homeownership is the main prerequisite for single men looking for wives — property becoming a unifying force that binds two families together.

“ A rough calculation reveals that every month after paying the mortgage and for food and other essentials, I will have a little more than $100 left. A crowded bus ride to the office now takes nearly two hours.

Aracelis Upia Montero bounds through the front door of her wood and cinderblock house, calling out for her children. The bubbly 41-year-old Montero — whom everyone calls Kuki — proudly shows guests around her cramped single-story home in Villa Altagracia in the Dominican Republic.

Montero points out her new living room furniture. In the past couple years, she has added two bedrooms and now has indoor plumbing. She has also built a little apartment at the end of her dirt driveway that she rents out.

"I was able to save money very quickly, and I could get a loan from the bank," she says. "I'm now eligible for loans and credits from the bank because I earn a good salary."

Three years ago, she never would have imagined life could be so good. The single mother says she was desperately poor, didn't know how she was going to feed her four children and had little hope for the future.

Enlarge image i

South Africans, and millions more people around the world, are waiting anxiously for further word about Nelson Mandela and praying for the former president and anti-apartheid icon.

Mandela, 94, remains in critical condition at a hospital in Pretoria where he's being treated for a recurring respiratory infection.

The word from South African President Jacob Zuma on Monday was that "doctors are doing everything possible to ensure his well being and comfort," South Africa's News 24 reports.

But as NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton reports from Pretoria, Zuma's spokesman, Mac Maharaj, added that: "Let's hope that he's able to improve, but at the same time, let us appreciate that [Mandela's condition] is critical."

And the BBC writes that "a senior official said South Africans should not hold out 'false hopes.' " The news network's Karen Allen "reports from outside the Pretoria hospital that the mood in the country is somber, and reality is sinking in."

Mandela, as NPR's Jason Beaubien reminds us, was born in a country that viewed him as a second-class citizen. But from his childhood as a herd boy, Mandela went on to lead the African National Congress' struggle against the racially oppressive, apartheid regime of South Africa. For his efforts, he spent 27 years behind bars as a political prisoner, finally being released in 1990.

In 1993, Mandela shared the Nobel Peace Prize with former South African President Frederik Willem de Klerk — the nation's last white leader. They were recognized for "their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime, and for laying the foundations for a new democratic South Africa."

Then, in 1994, Mandela was elected president in South Africa's first democratic elections. He pledged to serve just one term and left office in 1999.

Interview Highlights

On why he loved The Goonies as a kid

"When I saw it as a kid, you know, it was kind of that adventure that every kid wants to have. I felt very jealous of the kids in the movie."

On why he thinks this movie is timeless

"This movie absolutely stands up as an adult. Whenever I find someone who hasn't seen it, I get so excited cause I want to talk about it and kind of build it up because this movie actually does live up to the expectation, you can't build this movie up high enough. It is the gold standard for an action-adventure-fantasy story."

The world's wealthiest nations are promising to fight what they call the scourge of tax evasion. This week's meeting of the Group of Eight industrialized countries concluded with a pledge to end the use of tax shelters by multinational corporations.

But there are still big questions about how they will make a dent in the problem.

In the aftermath of the global recession, countries all over the world have struggled with budget shortfalls. More and more of them have come to blame part of their revenue problems on one culprit — tax avoidance.

The G-8 statement this week represents a kind of doubling down on the determination of wealthy countries to take on the problem.

"If you want a low-tax economy, which I believe is fundamental to growth, you have to collect the taxes that are owed," British Prime Minister David Cameron said Tuesday. "That is only fair for companies and for people who play by the rules."

Big Questions Remain

But the G-8 statement was short on specifics about how to address the problem.

It says tax authorities in different countries should share information more readily. It also says multinational companies should be more transparent about the taxes they pay.

Related NPR Stories

Planet Money

We Set Up An Offshore Company In A Tax Haven

Every weekend, I rise at 7 a.m. to get on the subway to hunt for apartments. The cheapest two-bedroom homes in the suburbs of Shanghai cost $200,000 or more, which would take me more than 12 years to pay off — if I don't spend a dime of what I make.

This is the reality of China's boom. After decades of explosive growth, the cost of living in China's big cities has skyrocketed, and many young people have been priced out of the housing market.

People in the West tend to think the Chinese are taking over the world; the reality is young people here struggle to make ends meet. Putting food on the table and having a shelter are still their biggest concerns. I'm 27, with a graduate degree in journalism and a good job in my field, and I'm worried about these basics.

No Home, No Honey

Owning a home is even more important in China than in America. Homeownership is the main prerequisite for single men looking for wives — property becoming a unifying force that binds two families together.

“ A rough calculation reveals that every month after paying the mortgage and for food and other essentials, I will have a little more than $100 left. A crowded bus ride to the office now takes nearly two hours.

Facebook has discovered a bug that compromised contact information for millions of people. The company estimates that about 6 million users had email addresses or telephone numbers inadvertently shared with others they have a connection to.

CNN explains how the accidental sharing occurred:

"The bug, which has since been repaired, was part of the Download Your Information tool, which lets Facebook users export all the data from profiles, such as posts to their timeline and conversations with friends. People using the tool may have downloaded inadvertently the contact information for people they were somehow connected to."

A shabby old fishing port on the South Coast of Massachusetts was once known as the City That Lit the World. Its whale oil powered candles and lamps around the country.

Now, the city is trying to rekindle that flame with an alternative form of energy: offshore wind.

A Distant History Of Wealth

New Bedford's glory days are long gone. The city suffers from a long list of woes — high crime, persistent unemployment and poor public schools.

For generations, the sea was New Bedford's lifeblood. Now, the water is still there, but the wealth is gone.

You can see just a glimmer of New Bedford's old opulence shining through its cobblestone streets and the whaling captains' old mansions.

"On the eve of the Civil War, New Bedford was the wealthiest city per capita in the United States," says Mayor Jon Mitchell. "New Bedford was to whaling what Detroit was to automobiles."

Striving For New Opportunities

On a chilly May morning, Mitchell joined state officials and local union representatives to break ground on the New Bedford Marine Commerce Terminal.

The port is being described as the first of its kind in the country — big enough to transport wind blades the length of a football field. Locals hope it will serve as the hub for the offshore wind industry and bring in jobs. New Bedford's current employment rate is among the worst in the state.

The Energy Department estimates that if the U.S. takes advantage of its wind potential by 2030, some 20,000 jobs could sprout up around the offshore wind industry.

A quarter of the nation's wind reserves lie just south of Martha's Vineyard, and New Bedford is the closest deep-water port. Mitchell says his city is sitting on the Saudi Arabia of wind.

"New Bedford is the biggest commercial fishing port in America," says Mitchell. "We know what we're doing out on the water."

Contagious Optimism

The mayor's optimism is rubbing off on Justin Silvia, who wakes up at 3:30 am to drive more than an hour to get to his job as a heavy equipment operator. He says he would love to find work closer to home so he could spend time with his three kids. He's trying to land himself a job on this port project.

"There's definitely a big buzz in the area as far as how many jobs it's going to create. I mean, the main focus is get as many New Bedford unemployed workers that are capable and trained properly," he says.

New Bedford is already working with Bristol Community College to secure grants that will train displaced workers.

Skepticism Remains — On The Water And Off

But not all of the folks on the water think offshore wind is the solution to all the city's troubles. Fishermen have been struggling to find work in recent years as the government declared certain waters off limits.

Tony Alvernaz is a fisherman in New Bedford. He wonders how fishermen will be able to navigate around giant wind turbines to find healthy fish.

"New Bedford has been a seafaring city for how many years, how many centuries? And so let's do away with that; let's bring on the wind farm. Is that the answer? I don't think so," he says.

Matt Kaplan, a wind analyst for IHS Emerging Energy Research in Cambridge, says it's a big bet. "Offshore wind will have to be tied to creating jobs in order to really be successful here because of the premium cost."

Kaplan says the problem is that no matter how strong the wind gusts blow, local utility companies have to be willing to pay a premium for pricey offshore wind energy. For now, there are federal subsidies that help nudge development along, but there is no guarantee that the government's helping hand will always be there.

Still, Kaplan said it helps that New Bedford is first in designing an offshore wind-friendly port.

"But whether that's going to make New Bedford the one-stop shop moving forward forever, for being the only port for offshore wind, I think it's a really tough call just because of the need to really create local jobs in each state that has one of these projects," Kaplan says.