News From NPR

So what did we learn from Secretary of Defense nominee Chuck Hagel's sometimes rocky confirmation hearing Thursday before the Senate Armed Services Committee?

1) We learned that the former two-term Republican senator from Nebraska with the reputation for speaking his mind and not sticking to his party's talking points has through the years said lots of things that could be used against him in such a setting.

And they were. Repeatedly.

What appears to be a significant explosion has rocked the Pemex tower in Mexico City. Television images are showing smoke billowing from the glass high rise in the Mexican capital.

Pemex, the state-owned oil company, tweeted that an explosion happened in a building that is part of the oil giant's headquarters. According to the company and the country's interior minister, 14 people are dead and 80 are injured.

Salmonella is one of the most common illnesses people get from food. Undercooked ground beef is risky. And some of the biggest recalls ever involved eggs potentially contaminated by the bacteria.

An assistant district attorney in North Texas was shot and killed as he arrived at the courthouse where he worked on Thursday.

The Associated Press reports:

In the U.S., farmers and farm workers alike say the current system to import temporary workers, especially in agriculture, is slow and fraught with abuses.

But the shape of a new guest-worker program is still being hashed out. Some say the U.S. should import temporary workers the same way Canada does. For nearly four decades, the governments of Canada and Mexico have cooperated to fill agriculture jobs that Canadian citizens won't do, and that Mexicans are clamoring to get.