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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

It's Wednesday and it's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

And I'm David Greene. Good morning.

Everyone is entitled to a chance. Those were the words of then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in January, when he announced plans for women to serve on the front lines in combat roles long closed to them. Yesterday the Pentagon offered some details. For one thing, women can begin training for the Navy's inland water combat units as early as next month.

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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Some other news. We have a more complicated view this morning of the scandal at the IRS. An inspector general critiqued the tax agency's targeting of conservative groups - many of them linked with the Tea Party movement. We knew that much. And now it's become apparent that more liberal or progressive groups were also targeted.

NPR's Tamara Keith reports.

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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.

In Milwaukee, cartoon characters dressed up like various sausages race at each Brewers' game; in Washington, five of our beloved presidents do their own bratwurst ramble. But the character I want to appear at every baseball game –– and at a couple of other sports, too, is ...

tick-tock,tick-tock

... the crocodile from Peter Pan who swallowed a clock and shadows a terrified Capt. Hook.

There is one basic question that keeps being asked about the U.S. auto industry: Is it on the rebound?

"People ask a lot, is the auto industry back?" says Kristin Dziczek, a director at the Center for Automotive Research. "And it depends on what scale you want to look at."

So if we're looking at scales, let's start with productivity. In this case, how many work hours it takes to build a car. Productivity in U.S. plants is 39 percent higher than it was in 2000. "Productivity has never been this high," Dziczek says.