WSDL-FM: Steve Inskeep

Assuming all goes as planned, at least 49 states will have signed on to a broad settlement between the banks and state attorneys general over robo-signing. Troubled homeowners may see some benefit, the banks will get some immunity provisions and the Obama administration is hoping to get some credit for negotiating the deal.

Fighting in Syria has intensified within a few miles of the capital city. Damascus has remained under firm government control but in the suburbs, the army has sent in tanks to retake areas that had been under the effective control of rebels. Activists inside Syria say more than 60 people have died in the past day.

NPR has confirmed some elements of a reported $200-million-settlement that resolves civil and criminal penalties growing out of last year's Upper Big Branch mine disaster in West Virginia. Sources tell NPR the deal will include cash payments for the families of the 29 mine workers killed in the nation's worst mine explosion in 40 years.