Morning Edition

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DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Good morning, I'm David Greene.

The action film "Jack Reacher" hit theaters in December, and it got some favorable reviews. But one New Zealand moviegoer didn't think it was action-packed enough. That's because the trailer featured an explosion that wasn't in the movie. Disappointed, the man complained to the Advertising Standards Authority. He said the explosion was one of the main reasons he went to see the flick in the first place. Paramount Pictures has now offered to refund the money for his ticket.

David Greene talks to Muhannad Hadi, the World Food Program's regional emergency coordinator for Syria, about the growing humanitarian crisis in Syria. The civil war there has entered its third year, and last month was its deadliest.

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And today's last word in business is space memorabilia.

Heritage Auction house is selling items that have gone to the moon. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin's toothbrush could be yours with the right offer.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

OK. The bidding for this toothbrush - I hope they disinfect it - it's a light blue, Lactona tooth tip brush. The bidding starting at $9,000. The auction house is actually hoping that buyers will offer more than that.

More than a week after Susan Patton's letter to the editor of The Daily Princetonian prompted heated criticism, the 1977 Princeton alumna says she still stands by her words.

"I have never had a problem voicing an unpopular opinion if it's heartfelt," Patton tells NPR.

In her letter, Patton wrote to young women attending her alma mater, "Find a husband on campus before you graduate."

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The Obama administration is delaying the start of a key piece of the Affordable Care Act - the national healthcare law. Workers in small businesses will have to wait an additional year to be able to choose from more than one plan in the new online marketplace that start next January. NPR's Julie Rovner reports that the change might dampen enthusiasm, at least at the start. But not everyone thinks that's a bad thing.

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Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep. Punxsutawney Phil has his counterpart in the average Maryland crab - except while Phil supposedly predicts the weather and this year missed a cold snap, Maryland crabs react in real time. This week was supposed to be the start of crabbing season but the chill in the Chesapeake has left the water too cold for the crabs to come out of the mud. It turns out this is extending their life spans - since it means watermen can't catch them. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Good morning, I'm David Greene.

Raedyn Grasseth might get the award for most creative 911 operator. The Washington state woman dispatched an officer to rescue a stranded kayaker on the Colombia River. The boater was in powerful currents, hanging onto a pile of logs. Grasseth had a feeling she might not be reached in time. And so, she called an experienced kayaker who happened to live nearby, her mother. The dispatcher's mom paddled out and within minutes brought the woman to safety.

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If you travel a lot you're probably doing a lot of meals in airports, maybe fast-food by Gate C31 or the chain coffee place nearby. Well, one of the busiest airports in the country is now bringing in local restaurants.

As Peter O'Dowd reports from member station KJZZ in Phoenix, these small businesses are taking a risk for a shot at a big reward.

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A former House historian, prolific biographer and professor emeritus at the University of Illinois, Chicago, Robert Remini spent a lifetime exploring handwritten letters and other documents that illuminate the 19th century. He won a National Book Award for the three-volume The Life of Andrew Jackson.

President Obama is trying to regain some traction for federal gun control measures by visiting states that are moving forward on their own.

On Wednesday, the president speaks in Colorado, where lawmakers recently passed a series of bills requiring background checks for all gun purchases and limiting the size of ammunition magazines.

Obama would like to see similar measures adopted nationwide. But if Colorado serves as an inspiration for the president, it also provides a cautionary tale.

Camden, N.J., has serious health problems, with too many people going to local emergency rooms unnecessarily. But progress is being made, albeit slowly.

John Pike, 53, is a Camden resident who used to be a frequent flier at the ER.

Pike has a smoker's cough, and when that cough or pain in his bad hip flared up, he'd go to the ER — maybe eight or nine times a year. But when he did, ER staffers didn't really remember him or his medical history.

The demand from American companies for high-skilled immigrants seems to be up this year. And that could mean something is about to change for the overall economy.

There is a cap on the number of visas the government gives out for these kind of workers every year. Lately, that cap has been 85,000. Demand always outstrips supply, but for the past couple of years, it has taken at least a few months to hit the quota. But this year, the H-1B visas might be gone by the end of the week.

It being the start of baseball season, that means we've been inundated by predictions — who'll win the divisions and the pennants and the World Series? We know two things on this subject. In every sport, at the start of the season, the experts are bound and determined to make these long-range predictions. And second, they are invariably wrong.

Friends of a New York man planned a surprise party, but he found out. To surprise him, they threw a pillowcase over his head, threw him in a van and drove him to the party in Pennsylvania. Witnesses to the fake abduction called police, who mounted a massive search.

In 1964, Robert Ostertag attended his first of 50 straight New York Mets home openers. That same day, Luke Gasparre began his job as an usher. The New York Times captured quite a moment Monday: Gasparre showed Ostertag to his seat in section 310.

Fans are returning to Major League Baseball parks for a new season. Let's take a break from the intensity of college basketball's March Madness, and talk about the beginning of the long and winding Major League Baseball season.

David Greene talks to Yvette Aehle, director of the Southwest Georgia Regional Airport, about her plans to shut down the airport's air traffic control tower. Because of sequestration, the FAA will no longer pay for air traffic controllers at 144 smaller airports.

If it was a sleepy Monday for you, you may have fallen victim to some April Fools' Day pranks. David Greene and Steve Inskeep have a roundup of some of the all-in-fun pranks.

Much has changed since last November, when Afghans were praising Pakistan for saying it would no longer support the Taliban and would instead work for peace.

"We believe that relations between the two countries are deteriorating," says Aimal Faizi, spokesman for President Hamid Karzai.

Faizi says the downward slide started last month. The two countries had agreed to convene a conference of religious scholars, or ulema, to denounce suicide bombing. But the conference fell apart at the last minute, with each country blaming the other for undermining the effort.

The federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., is sometimes called the second most important court in the country, regularly delivering the final word on major environmental, labor and national security cases.

But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has a whopping four vacancies, the most in the nation, including one opening that dates all the way back to 2005, when John Roberts moved to the U.S. Supreme Court.

They report the great playwright did not entirely make his living in the theater. He was also a merchant, a moneylender and a tax dodger. In 1598, he was prosecuted for hoarding grain during a famine.

The man was picketing Moscow's Hydrometeorological Center wearing swim trunks and holding a sign that read: "Let Summer Come Faster." Russian forecasters now predict that "everything will thaw fast" — adding, "we are meeting him halfway."

India's Supreme Court on Monday rejected drug maker Novartis AG's attempt to patent a new version of a cancer drug. It's a landmark decision that health activists say ensures poor patients around the world will get continued access to cheap versions of lifesaving medicines.

Public expressions of concern are on full display as South Africans monitor the hospitalization of anti-apartheid hero and former president Nelson Mandela. The 94 year old is being treated for pneumonia.

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And today's last word in business is one of this year's contenders for highest profile April Fools joke.

The video-sharing website YouTube announced yesterday it's shutting down.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

In a video message, YouTube executives said that the whole site was actually designed as an eight-year contest to find the best video on the web. Well, eight years are up. And now panel of experts, the company said, will spend the next decade watching everything uploaded on the site to choose a winner.