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Former FBI Director Louis Freeh tells the Sept. 11 panel that, given limited resources and legal authority, his agency did everything it could to fight terror prior to the 2001 attacks. The commission releases documents showing Attorney General John Ashcroft rejected an FBI request for more money on Sept. 10, 2001, and that fighting terror was not a Justice Department priority prior to Sept. 11. Hear NPR's Pam Fessler.

Last week, Michelle Witmer was killed in Baghdad, becoming the first woman in the history of the Wisconsin National Guard to die in combat. Witmer's two sisters also serve in Iraq. After the funeral, they face a decision: return to Iraq or complete their tour of duty elsewhere. Wisconsin Public Radio's Brian Bull reports.

Fallujah, the site of gruesome attacks on four U.S. civilian contractors Wednesday, has a long and bloody history. Experts on the area say they are not surprised by the violence of this week's attacks. Hear NPR's Bob Edwards and Rashid Khalidi, director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia University.

Mars' longer days make for a topsy-turvy schedule for the scientists here on Earth operating the two NASA rovers exploring the planet. NPR's Joe Palca reports.

Twenty years ago the nation faced a new drug scourge: crack cocaine. With it came thousands of children born to addicted mothers and labeled "crack babies." When the drug first hit the streets of New York in the 1980s, the city had 17,000 children in foster care. A decade later, that number had soared to 50,000. Many of the children had been exposed to crack cocaine before birth. NPR's Cheryl Corley speaks with several people who were affected in some way by the crack epidemic.

When Condoleezza Rice gave sworn testimony to the Sept. 11 panel Thursday, her job was to counter former counter-terrorism chief Richard Clarke's charges the Bush administration didn't pay enough attention to terrorism. But the bigger challenge was harder and more subtle: to counter "The Apology" -- the moment when Clarke said he was sorry to Sept. 11 victims' families and to America. Commentator James Poniewozik says that Clarke and Rice demonstrate what's wrong with apologies today -- they are both too easy and too hard.

Commissioners on the Sept. 11 panel call on the White House to declassify a presidential briefing dated Aug. 6, 2001. The document warned that Osama bin Laden was planning attacks inside the United States. In Thursday's testimony, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice said that and other pre-Sept. 11 warnings were too vague to act on. Hear NPR's Pam Fessler.

Sen. John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic nominee in the 2004 presidential race, is trying to tout his plan for U.S. economic recovery. But he's finding it difficult to get anyone interested in anything other than Iraq and the commission investigating the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. NPR's Andrea Seabrook reports from Chicago, where Sen. Kerry made a campaign speech Friday.

Marches for and against abortion rights swell after a leaked draft opinion shows a majority of the Supreme Court is ready to overturn the landmark 1973 ruling that established the right to abortion.

Next week members of the Sept. 11 commission will hear testimony from the current and former heads of federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Commissioners want to know what structural reforms have taken place in government since Sept. 11, 2001, that would or could prevent future attacks. Hear NPR's Linda Wertheimer, public service professor Paul Light of New York University, and John MacGaffin, the CIA's former associate deputy director for operations.