NPR Blogs

Good morning.

Our early headlines:

-- Texas Fertilizer Plant Blast Killed Several, Injured Dozens

-- Boston Marathon Explosions: Thursday's Developments

There were 352,000 first-time claims for unemployment insurance last week, up by 4,000 from the week before, the Employment and Training Administration reports.

The "4-week moving average" that gauges the trend rose by 2,750, to 361,250.

Paul Kevin Curtis, the 45-year-old Mississippi man arrested Wednesday in connection with the possibly ricin-tainted envelopes sent to President Obama and Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., is "better known to some as a celebrity impersonator," The Clarion-Ledger writes.

The Jackson, Miss., newspaper adds:

The daily lowdown on books, publishing, and the occasional author behaving badly.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that police must generally obtain a warrant before subjecting a drunken-driving suspect to a blood test. The vote was 8-to-1, with Justice Clarence Thomas the lone dissenter.

President Obama ditched his usual diplomacy and accused Republican senators of putting politics ahead of the wants of the American people, when they voted to reject a bipartisan measure that would have expanded federal background checks for firearm purchases.

"All in all, this is a pretty shameful day in Washington," Obama said.

The U.S. military says the number of prisoners on hunger strike at the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay has risen to 52 — up from 45 a day earlier. The news comes just days after guards raided a section of the facility to move prisoners to single cells from their communal holding area because the detainees had covered security cameras and engaged in other actions.

The Miami Herald's Carol Rosenberg had this tweet:

A bipartisan compromise that would have expanded federal background checks for firearms purchases has been rejected by the Senate.

The defeat of the measure by a 54-46 vote — six votes shy of the number needed to clear the Senate — marks a major setback for gun-control advocates, many of whom had hoped that Congress would act to curb gun violence in the wake of December's Newtown elementary school massacre, where 20 students and six adults were killed.