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VIDEO: Today's Headline News from Associated Press

FEDS: BOSTON SUSPECT DOWNLOADED BOMB INSTRUCTIONS

 

BOSTON (AP) -- Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev downloaded bomb-making instructions from an al-Qaida magazine, gathered online material on Islamic jihad and martyrdom, and later scribbled anti-American messages inside the boat where he lay wounded, a federal indictment charged Thursday.

 

The 30-count indictment contains the bombing charges, punishable by the death penalty, that were brought against the 19-year-old Tsarnaev in April. But prosecutors added charges covering the slaying of an MIT police officer and the carjacking of a motorist during the getaway attempt that left Tsarnaev's older brother, Tamerlan, dead.

 

Three people were killed and more than 260 wounded by the two pressure-cooker bombs that went off near the finish line of the marathon on April 15.

 

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was captured four days later, hiding in a boat parked in a backyard in Watertown, Mass.

 

According to the indictment, he scrawled messages on the inside of the vessel that said, among other things, "The U.S. Government is killing our innocent civilians," "I can't stand to see such evil go unpunished," and "We Muslims are one body you hurt one you hurt us all."

 

The Tsarnaev brothers had roots in the turbulent Russian regions of Dagestan and Chechnya, which have become recruiting grounds for Islamic extremists. They had been living in the U.S. about a decade.

 

But the indictment made no mention of any larger conspiracy beyond the brothers, and no reference to any direct overseas contacts with extremists. Instead, the indictment suggests the Internet played a central role in the suspects' radicalization.

 

GOODBYE M&M'S, HELLO GRANOLA BARS AS SCHOOL SNACKS

 

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Kids, your days of blowing off those healthier school lunches and filling up on cookies from the vending machine are numbered. The government is onto you.

 

For the first time, the Agriculture Department is telling schools what sorts of snacks they can sell. The new restrictions announced Thursday fill a gap in nutrition rules that allowed many students to load up on fat, sugar and salt despite the existing guidelines for healthy meals.

 

"Parents will no longer have to worry that their kids are using their lunch money to buy junk food and junk drinks at school," said Margo Wootan, a nutrition lobbyist for the Center for Science in the Public Interest who lobbied for the new rules.

 

That doesn't mean schools will be limited to doling out broccoli and brussels sprouts.

 

Snacks that still make the grade include granola bars, low-fat tortilla chips, fruit cups and 100 percent fruit juice. And high school students can buy diet versions of soda, sports drinks and iced tea.

 

But say goodbye to some beloved school standbys, such as doughy pretzels, chocolate chip cookies and those little ice cream cups with their own spoons. Some may survive in low-fat or whole wheat versions. The idea is to weed out junk food and replace it with something with nutritional merit.

 

The bottom line, says Wootan: "There has to be some food in the food."

 

PAYPAL LOOKS TO CONQUER SPACE (PAYMENTS)

 

NEW YORK (AP) -- PayPal wants to explore space - or at least begin to figure out how payments and commerce will work beyond Earth's realm once space travel and tourism take off.

 

PayPal, which is eBay Inc.'s payments business, says it is launching an initiative called PayPal Galactic with the help of the nonprofit SETI Institute and the Space Tourism Society, an industry group focused on space travel. Its goal, PayPal says, is to work out how commerce will work in space.

 

Questions to be answered include how commerce will be regulated and what currency will be used. PayPal's president, David Marcus, said the company is very serious about the idea. He says that while space tourism was once the stuff of science fiction, it's now becoming a reality.

 

"There are lots of important questions that the industry needs to answer," he said. There are regulatory and technical issues, along with safety and even what cross-border trade will look like when there are not a lot of borders.

 

"We feel that it's important for us to start the conversation and find answers," Marcus added. "We don't have that much time."