The News Never Stops

The longest day of the year is now in our rear-view mirror, and we enter that nether-season where seemingly one-eighth of the American population is on some form of summer vacation at any given time.  But we trudge on.  The news never stops, nor do we.  My thanks to Lester Holt for filling in for me on Friday.  The following are our options for the start of this new week:

The Tahoe fire is still dangerously out of control, as is the drought across some areas of the country.  The Supreme Court came out with two fascinating 5-4 rulings today, which are always best explained by our own Pete Williams -- as they will be tonight.

Also tonight, we'll revisit those long days and weeks and months after Sept. 11, when the "pit" at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan was the focal point of this city.  We now know the air was harmful -- and while common sense dictates that the air might well have been harmful, some positive EPA readings received much attention back then.  Former EPA chief Christie Todd Whitman answered for some of that today.

I realized during our editorial meeting today that I was the only person in the room with a teenage son at home.  When others scoffed at the notion of video games having an addictive quality, I paused...and thought of some of the six-hour gaming marathons I've witnessed.  We're taking a look at that story for tonight.  Also, we have a "What Works" report tonight in addition to an interesting piece of environmental reporting by Anne Thompson.

Please take a moment to read today's Medal of Honor recipient biography.  We're also thinking of Lady Bird Johnson today -- she remains hospitalized in Texas.

Back to work.  We hope to have you with us tonight for the Monday edition of NBC Nightly News.