Morning Edition

Transcript

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

And today's last word in business is Mandela money.

That's Nelson Mandela, the anti-apartheid leader and first black president of South Africa. He's now also the first black person to grace South Africa's currency.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Transcript

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

Opposition groups working to bring down the regime in Syria are meeting in Doha, Qatar in a furious bid to reorganize and reinvigorate themselves. The aim is to form a legitimate government in exile that would be recognized by the international community. This new effort to bring together the Syrian opposition is strongly backed by the U.S. NPR's Kelly McEvers is in Doha and joins us to talk about it.

And let's start by you telling us exactly who is there.

The effects of a nor'easter is bringing wintry weather to the Northeast. The storm began blowing along the coast Wednesday — bringing new misery to those in New York and New Jersey. A lot of residents there are already without heat, power or in some cases, a place to live.

When Stephen Wheeler realized he had an aching, swollen finger, he called his primary care doctor, who works for MedStar Health. The doctor referred him to PromptCare, an urgent care clinic in a strip mall in the Baltimore suburbs.

Wheeler says he probably would have ended up waiting a long time if he'd gone to the doctor. And even longer at the emergency room.

A couple hundred years ago. hard apple cider used to be the drink of choice for thirsty Americans. It was easy to make and easy to find. But as people moved into cities, and beer became more popular, cider fell out of fashion.

Now it's come roaring back. U.S. hard cider sales are up 65 percent over last year, and just about all the big beer companies sell it, as well as many artisan brewers. Finding cider at your local bar is often no longer a problem.

Although voting problems in Tuesday's election were fewer than some people had expected, there were extremely long lines at many polling sites; so many that President Obama noted them in his victory speech.

"I want to thank every American who participated in this election, whether you voted for the very first time, or waited in line for a very long time," he said, adding, "by the way we have to fix that."

As we near the end of another year, the music industry has a few reasons to be optimistic. Digital music sales are expected to reach record highs this year, and legal streaming services continue to gain in popularity. But unauthorized music file sharing is still going strong.

Transcript

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

Let's hear two strong points of view on last night's election.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Jonathan Chait is a liberal columnist for New York magazine. Welcome back to the program.

JONATHAN CHAIT: Thank you.

MONTAGNE: And Jonah Goldberg is a conservative columnist and editor-at-large for National Review Online. Welcome to the show.

JONAH GOLDBERG: Hey, thanks for having me.

Republicans and independent analysts didn't think there was any way President Obama could reassemble the coalition that enthusiastically backed him in 2008. But Michael Dimock of the Pew Research Center found a few surprises in exit polls. Dimock talks with Steve Inskeep about the exit polling data.

Transcript

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

Russian President Vladimir Putin sent word congratulating President Obama on his victory. Still, as NPR's Corey Flintoff reports from Moscow, during the campaign, the Russian government and state-run media sough to discredit the American electoral process.