NPR News

The emerging media narrative about the House Republicans' leadership of that chamber is that no sooner had Speaker John Boehner and his team gotten airborne, then they hit some fairly severe turbulence.

Part of the problem for Boehner, an Ohio Republican, and his fellow leaders is a large GOP freshman class with a strong anti-authority streak. And some of those new Republican members feel little loyalty to the party since they were propelled into office by Tea Party activists.

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Watch out Wisconsin: Northern California has become a hub — some say the hub — for cheese making, especially farm-based specialty cheeses.

But high-profile recalls of cheese made with unpasteurized milk have put an unwelcome spotlight on the industry. Now officials say they may tighten the rules on raw milk cheese — perhaps banning it altogether.

Here in Point Reyes, 40 miles north of San Francisco, the Giacomini family has been raising dairy cows since 1959. Jill Giacomini Basch grew up here.

Chances are, Arab leaders would never abdicate power en masse.

And regardless of how events in Egypt play out, it's not clear that other countries will face serious threats to their regimes in the form of sustained, wide-scale protests.

Nevertheless, it is clear that the tumult in Tunisia and Egypt is having repercussions that will continue to affect the Middle East and Africa — and perhaps other regions — for months or years to come.

We made it through January ... barely. And in some parts of the country, a brief winter thaw brought a hint of spring.

But don't be fooled. It's February.

Personally, I think it's dangerous to even hope for spring until February is long gone. As an Irish Catholic New Yorker, my own personal marker is St. Patrick's Day. An endless parade of Catholic school kids marching up Fifth Avenue in a blizzard is a sorry sight indeed.