NPR 2010-12-14

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From NPR News in Washington, I'm Lakshmi Singh.

In a legal blow to the Obama administration, a federal court judge in Virginia has struck down a central piece of the president's health care law. US District Judge Henry Hudson ruled today that requiring Americans to buy health insurance was "unconstitutional". White House spokesman Robert Gibbs says the administration's confident the law will remain intact.

"This is the third federal court that's rendered a decision on this portion of the Affordable¹ Care Act. And two of those courts have upheld it. So we are confident that the Affordable Care Act will be upheld."

But congressional Republicans say today's ruling underscores legal concerns they raised when health care legislation was under debate. Required health coverage² does not take effect until 2014.

Senators are expected to start holding a test vote this hour on the tax-cut compromise President Obama struck with the GOP last week. Some Democrats³ had pledged to fight an estate tax provision that they say unfairly benefits the wealthy. They wanted to see tax rates for the wealthiest households rise starting next year. Outgoing White House economic advisor⁴ Larry Summers says the tax-cut deal will help boost the economy. But as NPR's Scott Horsley tells us, Summers warns that deal isn't enough.

Larry Summers says the federal government should make a substantial and sustained effort to rebuild infrastructure⁵ next year. He says such government spending wouldn't only patch roads and bridges, but also help to fill a demand gap that's keeping the economy from reaching its full potential.

"While the economy may be out of the intensive care unit, the patient now faces the long road of not just recovering from previous affliction, but beginning to address chronic⁶ ailments⁷."

Summers' speech at the Economic Policy Institute was his last as a member of the White House economic team. He's stepping down to return to his teaching post at Harvard. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.

Cold temperatures and lake-effect snow still causing problems in much of the Upper Midwest, Chuck Quirmbach of Wisconsin Public Radio says many schools are also closed.

Parts of Wisconsin received more than a foot of snow over the weekend. Drifting of that snow combined with below-zero wind chills have prompted some Wisconsin school districts to close their doors today. Patrick Saunders is a superintendent⁸ of the largely rural Luxembourg-Casco School District, where all 1,900 students have been told to stay at home.

"To put a bus out on an area where that hasn't been ploughed or has been drifted shut, the riskiest⁹ was sending a bus down those roads."

Authorities says several deaths in Wisconsin were linked to the weekend storm. The snow and cold are also triggering headaches elsewhere in the Midwest, particularly in northwest Indiana and the Lake Michigan snowbelt. For NPR News, I'm Chuck Quirmbach in Milwaukee.

The Dow's up more than 60 points at 11,472.

This is NPR.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton confirms US special envoy¹⁰ Richard Holbrooke is in critical but stable condition at a Washington D.C. hospital. Holbrooke was admitted Friday for surgery to repair a torn aorta¹¹.

Today, North Korea warned military cooperation between the US and South Korea could bring a nuclear war to the region. From Seoul, Doualy Xaykaothao reports the new statement was released as South Korea began new firing exercises off its three coasts.

The regularly scheduled naval¹² exercises are being conducted at some 27 locations, but not near Yeonpyeong Island, where North Korea last month fired a barrage¹³ of artillery¹⁴ shells at the South. The North claimed it fired at the island in response to South Korea firing artillery shells into its territorial¹⁵ waters. As today's military maneuvers¹⁶ began, the North, in a commentary by its state-controlled news agency, accused the South of ratcheting up tension in the region by holding joint¹⁷ military exercises with the US and Japan. Meanwhile, at a security forum¹⁸ in the capital earlier, South Korean and US defense¹⁹ officials agreed to form a joint committee that will focus on extended deterrence²⁰. For NPR News, I'm Doualy Xaykaothao in Seoul.

Iran's top diplomat's been fired. State media report President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sacked Manouchehr Mottaki who's been under growing scrutiny²¹ in the past year amid repeated UN sanctions over Iran's nuclear program. But the statement from the president's office today didn't say why Mottaki was dismissed after more than five years in office. Mottaki's been temporarily replaced by the head of Iran's nuclear program.