3:50pm

Wed April 4, 2012
The Two-Way

Coroner Says White Powder, Spoon Found In Whitney Houston's Hotel Room

Credit Getty Images / Getty Images

A final report from Los Angeles coroner is shedding some light on Whitney Houston's last hours.

According to the report, the pop super star complained of a sore throat and an assistant suggested she take a bath. By the time the assistant got back to the room after running an errand, she found Houston lying face down on in the tub "in approximately 13-inches of water," People Magazine reports.

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3:21pm

Wed April 4, 2012
The Salt

Milk Not Jails Makes Partners Out Of Farmers And Ex-Cons

Credit Jim Commentucci / The Post-Standard /Landov

What's plentiful in upstate New York? Cows and prison inmates, to name a few things.

Reformists in the two communities don't make natural allies, but organizer Lauren Melodia is trying to do just that.

"I was living in this prison town, and at the same time, the dairy industry was in a lot of turmoil," Melodia tells The Salt. "We thought this [dairy] might be the perfect ally in trying to build a different economy in upstate New York, and shift some of the economic dependency away from the prison system."

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3:08pm

Wed April 4, 2012
It's All Politics

Santorum Adviser Says Calls To Exit GOP Race Are Premature

Credit Jae C. Hong / AP

Much of the Republican political establishment, many GOP voters and political analysts were telling Rick Santorum that the time had come for him to end his quest for his party's presidential nomination even before Tuesday when he failed to win any of three primaries.

Those calls had only increased by Wednesday as Santorum fell further behind Romney in the delegate count.

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3:04pm

Wed April 4, 2012
The Two-Way

Play Ball: On Opening Day, A Look A The Quirky New Marlins Park

Originally published on Wed April 4, 2012 8:22 pm

3:02pm

Wed April 4, 2012
Race

Data Reveals Complex Picture Of Hispanic Americans

Credit Spencer Platt / Getty Images

Just over half of Americans of Spanish-speaking origin have no preference between the terms "Hispanic" and "Latino," according to new data from the Pew Hispanic Center.

Of those with a preference, 33 percent preferred "Hispanic," versus the 14 percent who said "Latino" better describes them.

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2:25pm

Wed April 4, 2012
Environment

Pollution Playing A Major Role In Sea Temperatures

Originally published on Wed April 4, 2012 3:20 pm

Credit NASA Earth Observations

The Atlantic Ocean, especially the North Atlantic, is peculiar: Every few decades, the average temperature of surface water there changes dramatically.

Scientists want to know why that is, especially because these temperature shifts affect the weather. New research suggests that human activity is part of the cause.

Scientists originally thought that maybe some mysterious pattern in deep-ocean currents, such as an invisible hand stirring a giant bathtub, created this temperature see-saw.

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2:05pm

Wed April 4, 2012
Around the Nation

Meet The New Official Cab Of New York City

Credit Courtesy of Nissan

The "Taxi of Tomorrow" has arrived in New York City. On Tuesday night, officials unveiled the Nissan-designed cab that, over the next 10 years, will gradually replace the country's largest taxi fleet. It's the first New York taxi to be designed for the job since the city's iconic Checker cab.

For Nissan's designers, the process of putting the new cab together involved months of riding in taxis and talking to cab owners, drivers and passengers about what they did and didn't like.

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1:51pm

Wed April 4, 2012
Shots - Health Blog

Drug Spending Levels Off, But Not For The Usual Reasons

Originally published on Wed April 4, 2012 3:10 pm

Credit Roel Smart / iStockphoto.com

U.S. spending on prescription drugs grew just barely in 2011, according to the annual report from IMS Health, which keeps track of these things.

But the reason for the barely discernible increase of 0.5 percent, to $320 billion, was not the expected one.

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12:52pm

Wed April 4, 2012
The Two-Way

Theater Bombing In Mogadishu Breaks Tenuous Calm In Somalia

Credit Abdurashid Abdulle / AFP/Getty Images

Just as things had begun to seem peaceful in the Somali capital, a bomb exploded in the newly reopened National Theater. And it happened as the prime minister gave an address.

The New York Times reports that the bombing shattered what had been a tenuous calm in Mogadishu, which has been the center of a fierce civil war for the past 21 years.

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12:50pm

Wed April 4, 2012
Shots - Health Blog

Speaking Multiple Languages May Help Delay Dementia Symptoms

Credit Tim Boyle / Getty Images

The brains of people who grow up speaking two languages are wired differently, and those differences protect them from dementia as they age.

That's the news from two studies out this month from a scientist in Canada who has spent decades trying to figure out whether being bilingual is bad or good. "I've been doing this for 25 years," Ellen Bialystok, a distinguished research professor of psychology at York University in Toronto, tells Shots. "Suddenly people are interested. I figure it's because everybody's scared about dementia."

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