Morning Edition

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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

It's MORNING EDITION, from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

And I'm David Greene. Good morning.

If you grew up in the middle of the country, you grew up around tornadoes. You hear the lore of great storms past. You learned very young how to take shelter. When a siren wails, you know just what to do. Yet, even in Moore, a suburb of Oklahoma City, people could not be entirely prepared for the devastation they faced yesterday.

Giant technology firm Apple is paying billions of dollars less than it should in U.S. taxes each year, according to a report by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. In a hearing Tuesday in Washington, D.C., Apple CEO Tim Cook will defend the company.

The subcommittee's report says Apple avoids the tax payments mainly by shifting profits to three subsidiary companies in Ireland. The investigation found Apple is taking advantage of technicalities in U.S. and Irish tax laws to avoid paying any tax on a huge portion of its profits.

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JPMorgan Chase holds its annual shareholder meeting today in Tampa, Florida, and the shareholders will vote on a key measure: a proposal to strip the CEO, Jamie Dimon, of his other title, chairman of the board. A growing number of companies have split the CEO and chairman roles.

Shareholder activists and corporate governance experts say having a balance of power at the top helps to reduce risk. The bank and its supporters disagree. NPR's Yuki Noguchi reports.

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Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep. Germany paid a price for asserting its financial power. Germans, more than others, had to finance bailouts for countries like Greece, and imposed austerity measures in return. Those who disapprove may have struck back. People across the continent and beyond watched the Eurovision song contest.

A California woman turned on the TV last week and saw she had the winning numbers in Wednesday's drawing. She thought she had won $360 million. It turns out she bought her ticket an hour after Wednesday's drawing.

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It's planting season, at least for those growing things like summer squash, beans and cherry tomatoes. And we're seeing a change. Rather than buy already developed seedlings, which are more expensive, many gardeners are buying seed packets. It's a sign they want to start their gardens from scratch. And seed companies say they've seen an increase in orders since the economic downturn.

Reporter Sasa Woodruff reports that it's easy to read the directions on these seed envelopes, the hard part is following them.

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NPR's business news starts with a big blogging buyout.

Today, Yahoo announced its purchase of the blogging site Tumblr. The $1.1 billion deal was unanimously approved by Yahoo's board. Analysts say the acquisition is Yahoo's attempt to revitalize itself.

NPR's Kirk Siegler has more.

California is about to become the first state to require shore power at its ports. A new law mandates at least half of a shipping line's fleet to shut down their diesel engines and plug into shore-side electric power when they unload their cargo. It's part of a larger effort to cut pollution at the state's busiest ports, but costs have been a sticking point.

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Now let's look little more deeply at this narrative of scandal. NPR's Scott Horsley has more.

SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: When President Obama gets frustrated with the gridlock in Washington, he sometimes looks back wistfully to the decades after World War II. Back then, he suggests Republicans and Democrats managed to work together, despite their differences, building highways, protecting consumers, and educating generations of workers.

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Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep, with best wishes to a man on Craigslist. He advertised for a date to attend a wedding. The Washington, D.C., man says he had a last-minute cancellation. Ladies, you could accompany him. He describes himself as a clean man with a job and no arrest record, who adds: I don't like murder. For extra motivation, he promises an open bar, and adds: You only YOLO once.

YOLO is you only live once, so that's you only you only live once once. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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Good morning, I'm Steve Inskeep.

Kevin Williamson took a stand against annoying cell phone use. The National Review writer attended a musical in New York and says the crowd was disruptive. One woman was Web surfing on her phone, violating theater rules. Mr. Williamson tells Gothamist he complained to the woman. She replied: So don't look. That's when Williamson grabbed her phone and threw it across the theater, an offense for which he says he's glad to go to jail if he is prosecuted.

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Some other news, New Orleans police have arrested six people after last Sunday's shooting spree at a Mother's Day parade. Two of those suspects, brothers, face 20 counts of attempted murder after 20 people were injured. The shooting galvanized residents of a city with one of the world's higher murder rates. Keith O'Brien has the story.

KEITH O'BRIEN, BYLINE: Residents at the intersection of Frenchman and North Villere Streets were thrilled to see it yesterday morning, a produce truck selling fruits and vegetables, door to door.

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All right, through much of this week, we've been hearing from young Afghans on the future of their country after NATO troops withdraw in 2014. Yesterday, our colleague Renee Montagne met with the American general who commands coalition forces in Afghanistan. They traveled to a special forces base where young Afghan men - and a few women - are being trained.

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This weekend, the Cannes Film Festival pays tribute to the 100th anniversary of Indian movies. It will host the world premier of a film called "Bombay Talkies." Commentator Sandip Roy says one scene in that movie breaks new ground for Bollywood.