NPR News

Bob Boilen and I were out in Portland and Seattle last week on our summer listening party tour, so we didn't post a new poll of albums everyone can love. Fear not: To make up for the week off, this week we've got 40 albums for you. In the coming weeks we'll let you know which records have been doing the best and have some sort of runoff between the highest vote-getters to come up with a top ten we all can agree on (well, most of us, anyway).

Here's this week's double-size poll. Just tell us whether you love, don't love or haven't really heard each album.

The North Alabama rock band Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit makes its second appearance on Mountain Stage here. As a member of Drive-By Truckers for six years, Isbell was responsible for some of the band's most memorable work, including "Never Gonna Change" and "Outfit." Out on his own since 2007, Isbell has released three studio albums with his band The 400 Unit, the most recent being Here We Rest.

The Associated Press and The Huffington Post have gotten their hands on early copies of No Easy Day. As Mark wrote earlier this month, the book is a firsthand account of the secret military raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

Flu is most deadly for children with neurologic problems and disorders, an analysis of swine flu fatalities finds.

The results come from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention researchers who looked at childhood fatalities during the H1N1 flu pandemic of 2009, when there were five times the usual number of deaths.

In all, 43 percent of the deaths occurred in children who had neurologic diseases, such as cerebral palsy and epilepsy, or developmental disorders.

It's become a perennial problem for Republicans, but not one that the party yet knows how to solve.

Transcript

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Now, Greg mentioned Plaquemines Parish. Look at a map of Louisiana and you'll see that parish, a finger of land sticking far out into the Gulf of Mexico. Jennifer Hale of WVUE Television is in the parish, spent the night there. And Ms. Hale, where are you now?

The Bureau of Economic Analysis revised its GDP numbers today, saying that during the second quarter of this year, the United States economy grew at a 1.7 percent annual rate.

That's up from its original estimate of 1.5 percent.

The BEA reports:

The eye of Isaac made its first landfall at Plaquemines Parish, a stretch of thin land southeast of New Orleans that extends into the Gulf from Louisiana.

According to the parish president, the damage there is just as bad, perhaps even worse, than what happened during Katrina.

In an interview with Morning Edition's Steve Inskeep, Billy Nungesser said the parish's levee had been overtopped and parts of the parish that had never flooded during a hurricane were under 5 feet of water.

Transcript

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

And I'm David Greene. Hurricane Isaac made landfall last night in Louisiana and it is battering the Gulf Coast with high winds and a lot of rain. For the latest we turn to NPR's Greg Allen. He's in New Orleans and we have reached him by telephone. And Greg, give us a sense of this storm. It sounds like, you know, Category 1, which, you know, makes you not worry so much, but a lot of people fearing that it could just stay in one place for a good while.

Transcript

DAVID GREENE, HOST: