NPR Blogs

While soon-to-be Hurricane Isaac isn't looking like another Katrina, the storm is expected to pick up steam as it heads toward a landfall, conjuring up powerful memories of the disaster seven years ago.

Mayor Mitch Landrieu declared a state of emergency for New Orleans on Sunday, warning residents to "think about how you will spend time without power or water."

Good morning - so far today, we're following these stories:

-- Tropical Storm Isaac Strengthens At It Heads Toward Louisiana

-- Taliban Blamed For Killing 17 Partygoers

And here are more early stories:

Who might direct the upcoming Justice League film? Perhaps the Wachowskis, whom you might remember from a few films with Matrix in their titles. [Vulture]

Clive James has an essay about Pauline Kael, whose stuff you really should read if you never have. "Trash, Art, And The Movies" changed my life. [The Atlantic]

Seventeen people at a party in southern Afghanistan were attacked and beheaded by insurgents, officials said Monday.

The civilians were apparently targeted because they had "flouted the extreme brand of Islam embraced by the militants," The Associated Press reports. A government spokesman blamed the Taliban.

The news agency quoted a district government chief as saying the party involving music and dancing, activities shunned by the Taliban.

UPDATE at 2:40 ET:

Here's the National Hurricane Center's update at 1:00 CDT on Monday:

...HEAVY RAINS AND FLOODING AFFECTING THE FLORIDA EAST COAST... SIGNIFICANT STORM SURGE THREAT EXPECTED FOR THE NORTHERN GULF COAST...

The storm surge for south-central Louisiana was expected to be 3 to 6 feet, the NHC said.

The American Academy of Pediatrics on Monday announced its first major shift on circumcision in more than a decade, concluding that the health benefits of the procedure clearly outweigh any risks.

"There is clear evidence that supports the health benefits of circumcision," said Susan Blank, who led the 14-member task force that formulated the new policy being published in the journal Pediatrics.

As we age, our sleep patterns change. We've all heard the complaints: "I wake up in the middle of the night and can't get back to sleep!"

Some sleep experts estimate that as many as 40 percent of older adults suffer sleeping problems such as sleep apnea and insomnia. Now, researchers have found a link between disrupted sleep and cognitive decline.

Miranda Kelly, a 14-year-old from Sykesville, Md., says she's been sleepwalking since she was 6 or 7. The first time, she says, "I woke up on the couch on a school day. And I'd gone to bed in my bed."

Since that first episode, Kelly now sleepwalks every couple of months. "I wake up in weird places, randomly. I have once woken up in the kitchen, and on the floor of the bathroom wrapped in my sheet," she says.

On July 18, 1969, President Nixon's speechwriter Bill Safire drafted a statement — a just-in-case statement. The manned mission to the Moon was only days away. The White House was preparing for all contingencies. According to Safire, the chances of getting Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin onto the moon were pretty good.

It seems like another era. It feels like another age.

It was the DayGlo world of variety TV: Dean Martin, the Smothers Brothers. It was billowing smoke of riots on campus and in the ghettos. Looking back at images of beehive hairstyles and hippy bellbottom pants it all seems so clearly like our past, something tinged with the sepia colors of old Polaroids — something we left behind.

If there's one thing that HBO's The Newsroom is especially good at, it's portraying journalists who aren't especially good at journalism.

Well, maybe that's not fair. The fact is, they haven't had much opportunity to engage in journalism, since every major story that's come their way has been cracked not through know-how, persistence and telephonic grunt work but through the fortuitous involvement of people with whom the fictional News Night staffers happen to already be good buddies.

I loved the TV show The Six-Million Dollar man growing up. For me, Steve Austin (played by Lee Majors) wasn't less cool because he had bionic implants that enabled him to perform superhuman feats. He was more cool.