All Things Considered

Second in a three-part series

In this economy, who in their right mind would quit their job and move to a new city where they don't have any contacts? That's exactly what thousands of military spouses do each year. They don't have a choice.

Stephanie Davis thought she had picked a field that would be portable: teaching.

"And I really loved it," says Davis. "I was at a great school, great district."

That is, until last year when her husband, 2nd Lt. Charles Davis, an Army officer, got orders to transfer to Fort Hood in Texas.

Mid-summer is a time when movie audiences crave action. And that's no truer of the multiplex than it is at the art house, where Point Blank, a new thriller from France (no relation to the Lee Marvin/John Boorman crime picture from 1967) opens — quite literally — with a bang. It's the crash of a man who, clutching his bleeding stomach, smashes through a door into the wall of a metal staircase. And it's followed by another crash seconds later, when two men with guns smash through the door after him.

Robert Siegel talks with reporter Matt Largey of member station KUT about the arrest of an AWOL Army private named Naser Jason Abdo for threatening a terrorist attack on Fort Hood in Texas.

Conservationists are praising a slate of new air pollution regulations on oil and gas drilling proposed Thursday by the US Environmental Protection Agency.  The new rules stem from a lawsuit filed by a Colorado and New Mexico-based group.

They Might Be Giants' members have been making quirky, smart — some say geeky — pop songs since the early '80s. They found early success with songs like "Birdhouse in Your Soul" and a cover of the novelty tune "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)." More recently, the group has been writing children's songs.