NPR News

The independent mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, has just endorsed President Barack Obama for president of United States.

Bloomberg opened his editorial in Bloomberg View by saying his decision was affected by the effect Superstorm Sandy had on New York City. The country, he said, needs a leader who will tackle these issues.

NPR's Margot Adler is covering the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy in New York.

I walked out of my apartment at 5 this morning in a part of Manhattan -– the Upper West Side — that never lost power. Still, I skirted around downed trees on my way to the subway. Across the street, a car was crushed by a tree. Almost no one was on the street.

For the first time in the school's 181-year history, the University of Alabama has named a woman to be its permanent president.

In his new book, Race-Baiter, media critic Eric Deggans says modern media outlets trade in bigotry and bias to build audience and sell advertising.

Deggans dissects media coverage of events such as Hurricane Katrina, the Trayvon Martin case and the 2012 presidential election to build an argument that Americans lack the right vocabulary for having important conversations about race, and that the echo chambers of our fractured media landscape aren't helping. The fix, he says, is a more savvy audience that demands better conversations.