The Supreme Court has set its agenda for the week and will hear arguments on two cases involving civil rights. The first case involves the strip search of a young girl by school administrators hot in pursuit of...ibuprofen. They had received a tip that she was distributing, but turned up nothing in their search of the honor student. While this seems like a blatant and outrageous violation of the girl's fourth amendment rights, the Court has upheld such searches and allows the court to revisit the issue of whether civil rights can be limited at the schoolhouse door in order to protect the health, safety, or morals of the children within.

Next on the docket is a look at affirmative action in practice in the city of New Haven, Connecticut. The court will hear arguments on behalf of several firefighters (mostly white, but one is Latino) who feel that the city violated their rights to equal opportunity for work by eliminating a test that put firefighters who passed the exam on track for promotion. One of the firefighters, who had severe dyslexia, got tutoring and studied for thirteen hours a day and passed it. But no African American candidates on the firefighting force passed it, which prompted the city of New Haven to eliminate the test on the ground that it showed a gross disparity of opportunity for black firefighters than for whites.

Joining The Takeaway to discuss these cases and more is Kenji Yoshino, the Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Law at NYU law school.

Novelist J.G. Ballard, famed for novels such as Crash and Empire of the Sun died over the weekend. His style was so distinctive that there's now an adjective, "ballardian" that describes his dystopian, bleak style. Patrik Henry Bass, a Takeaway contributor and literary editor at Essence Magazine, takes a look at Ballard and other writers who deserve their own adjectives.

The winning line-up of this year's Pulitzer Prizes for literature was a far more diverse group than in years past. Two African American women were winners: Playwright Lynn Nottage won for Ruined, a searing play about rape in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Annette Gordon-Reed won the award for non-fiction with, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family, which traces the family of Sally Hemings and their lives at Thomas Jefferson's estate. To discuss these winners and their works, The Takeaway is joined by Patrik Henry Bass, a Takeaway contributor and literary editor at Essence Magazine.

Today, Tamil separatist fighters ignored an ultimatum issued by the Sri Lankan government. Despite potentially risking the lives of tens of thousands of civilians, the Tamil rebels refused to surrender, trapping the civilians who are unable to flee the city. Fierce fighting continues now. Joining us with details of the ignored ultimatum is Somini Sengupta, South Asia Bureau Chief for the New York Times .

Particularly these days, its easy to feel that our economic destiny is shaped by huge, impersonal forces beyond our control. Nonsense, says Alan Beattie, World Trade Editor of the Financial Times and author of False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World. Countries have choices, and these choices have largely determined whether they have succeeded or failed. Beattie joins The Takeaway to look at some examples of fateful economic choices, and what we can learn from them today.

Yesterday President Obama visited the Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters in Langley, Virginia and delivered a message of reassurance and renewal. His speech at the CIA came in the wake of his administration's release of the so-called torture memos. Those documents detailed the "enhanced interrogations techniques" that CIA operatives used to extract information from purported al Qaida operatives. The Obama administration has said these techniques might constitute illegal torture. In his speech, President Obama joined CIA Director Leon Panetta in telling the CIA that they supported them in their mission, but waterboarding and other harsh tactics devalues their work and America’s moral standing in the world. Joining The Takeaway to discuss the CIA's reaction to the President's words is Art Keller, a former CIA case officer.

Miss the President's speech at Langley? Here it is:

Polo fans and equestrian-lovers watched in horror as seven horses sickened and died in front of their eyes. The horses were meant to take the field for a polo match in Wellington, Florida on Sunday afternoon. Soon seven other horses fell sick. Veterinarians rushed the fields, but were unable to save a single horse. By Monday, 21 horses, all from the same Venezuelan team, had died. Now, investigators are searching for the cause. The Takeaway turns to Brian Haas, a newspaper reporter on the ground in Florida and Dr Celeste Kunz, a horse veterinarian, to try and piece together this equine mystery.

For more, read Brian Haas' article, PBSO and state investigations launched in deaths of 21 horses in Wellington in the Sun Sentinel.

CBS News has this report:



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President Barack Obama is set to meet with King Abdullah of Jordan today. This is his first major meeting with a leader from the Middle East and the leader is not Israeli. It has long been standard practice for U.S. Presidents to meet with Israeli leaders first, before reaching out to their Arab counterparts. Earlier this week Press Secretary Robert Gibbs described Jordan as a close ally and partner of the United States. But is this international friendship worth the risk of appearing to snub the Israeli government? For more we turn to the BBC's Jonathan Marcus.

Fifteen years ago, Nelson Mandela swept to an historic victory to become the first black President of South Africa. That victory was the start of the dominance of Mandela's African National Congress Party. A decade and a half later, the African National Congress Party's candidate, Jacob Zuma, is again poised to reign supreme. Today is the last day of campaigning before South Africans head to the polls on Wednesday.

To help us understand what Zuma's presumed leadership will mean for South Africa and what the U.S. will be watching in this election, The Takeaway talks to Dan Simpson. Simpson is currently an editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Before taking the reigns at the paper, he was Director of Southern African Affairs in the State Department in the 1980s and has been U.S. Ambassador to several African countries.

International computer spies have broken into the Pentagon's Joint Strike Fighter Project. The $300 billion program is the military's costliest weapons project ever. The intruders into the Fighter Project were able to copy data related to design and electronic systems of the planes, potentially making it easier to defend against the craft. Recently, similar cyber-attacks have breached the Air Force's air-traffic-control system. While those directly responsible for this attack could not be identified, many former officials claim the move bears the hallmarks of previous encounters with China. For more we turn to the reporter responsible for breaking this story, Siobhan Gorman, Intelligence Correspondent for the Wall Street Journal.

For more, read Siobhan Gorman's article, Computer Spies Breach Fighter-Jet Project, in today's Wall Street Journal.