NPR News

The Mars rover Curiosity is beginning its fifth day on the red planet, and it's been performing flawlessly from the moment it landed.

That's been especially gratifying for NASA landing engineer Adam Steltzner. Last Friday, while Steltzner was still on pins and needles waiting for the landing to take place, I told the story of Steltzner's decision as a young man to give up his life as a rocker and go for a career in space engineering.

The tragic shooting at a Sikh house of worship in Wisconsin this month has turned the spotlight on the Sikh faith and the nation's Sikh community.

Earlier this year, Surinder Singh and his son Rupinder visited a StoryCorps booth in San Francisco, where they reflected on their own experiences standing out among their peers and neighbors.

Both practicing Sikhs, Surinder and Rupinder wear turbans, and maintaining that tenet of their faith has made for some difficult experiences.

This afternoon for the first time since a gunman opened fire and killed six people on Sunday, volunteers and members of the Sikh community ventured back into the temple.

As soon as the FBI allowed it, they started the grim task of cleaning the Gurdwara. The Sikh Coalition has been tweeting on the progress. They noted that they received help from the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

The prolific and pervasive film industry of India, often called Bollywood, is pushing the country's decency envelope with its latest summer release, which features a real-life porn star. The film, awkwardly titled Jism 2, is a sequel to a 2002 blockbuster and stars Indian-Canadian adult film star Sunny Leone in the leading role. (The title means 'body' in Hindi.)

When we reported the 'total loss' of NASA's moon lander Morpheus during testing, some readers expressed disappointment.

Sandra Chapin called it a 'bummer':

"To me the sad thing is not the loss of money, but the loss of time. How long will it take to redesign and build a new one? Puts us that much further behind in gathering data."

Citing a loss of confidence in the book's details, Christian publisher Thomas Nelson is ending the publication and distribution of the bestseller, The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You've Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson.

How many votes can President Obama gain or Mitt Romney lose because of the Republican's opposition to renewing federal tax credits to wind energy producers? The answer, with apologies to Bob Dylan, is blowin' in the wind.

Obama hopes to influence the answer by relentlessly pounding the all-but-official Republican presidential nominee's opposition to the renewal.

This week, the presidential campaign has been dominated by debate over the welfare law from the 1990s. It's just the latest example of how both sides are trying to use the Clinton years to their advantage — portraying them as a halcyon golden age.

Faced with a booming population and a disappearing water supply, the city of San Antonio responded by dramatically cutting consumption, pioneering new storage techniques and investing in water recycling and desalination projects. It now boasts that it is "Water's Most Resourceful City."

There are so many programs and projects that Chuck Ahrens of Water Resources and Conservation with the San Antonio Water System can hardly keep track.

The attorneys for the James Holmes, the alleged Colorado shooter, say their client is mentally ill.

The AP reports the disclosure came during a hearing today at the Arapahoe (Colo.) County Courthouse in which news organizations, including NPR, were asking for documents in the case to be unsealed.

The AP adds:

"Holmes had the same dazed demeanor that he has had in previous court appearances.

(This post appeared in our Olympics blog, The Torch.)

The American Ashton Eaton can call himself the greatest athlete in the world, today.

With 8,869 points, Eaton took the gold medal in the decathlon. His American teammate Trey Hardee took the silver with 8,671 points.

If you're not familiar, the decathlon is the closest the sports world comes to a standardized test in athletic ability. It spans two days and 10 events, including the 100 meter dash, the long jump, the high jump and the shot put.