Those who loved Senator Ted Kennedy are standing in line to pay their respects, even at this early hour.  Kennedy lies in repose at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston. We talk with Sean Corcoran, a senior reporter from WCAI who is in Boston collecting stories from people gathering there. We also talk with Robert from Oakville, Connecticut who drove up with his 14-year-old grandson Ryan.

The Massachusetts Governor’s office is feeling pressure from Capitol Hill to sign into law a bill the late Senator Edward Kennedy proposed. If ratified, the bill would give Governor Deval Patrick the legal authority to name a temporary replacement for the senator. The existing law was established during John Kerry's 2004 presidential run and specifically enacted to prevent then-Governer Mitt Romney from appointing a Republican replacement had the Democratic senator won the presidency; the law mandates Patrick wait at least 145 days to hold a special election. Timothy Murray is the Lieutenant Governor for the State of Massachusetts and tells us about the bill's progress.

California's budget is still in terrible shape, so the cash-strapped state is having a garage sale. Starting today at a warehouse in Sacramento, the state will be selling more than a thousand computers, jewelry, and 600 government vehicles, some signed by Governor Schwarzenegger. Eric Lamoureux, spokesman for the California Department of General Services, tells us what's for sale.

The FDIC, the body that insures the money we put into our bank accounts, is currently supporting 416 failed and "problem" banks. Is all that strain on our nation's banking backbone a cause for alarm? We speak to Louise Story, Wall Street and finance reporter for The New York Times, to ask her if we should start stuffing money under our mattresses.

We finish our week-long series of health care roundtables with a look beyond our borders. We speak to three Americans living abroad about the health care systems in other countries. Christina Geyer  joins us from Bavaria, Germany, where she has lived since 2002. Lynne Udalov joins us from Moscow, where she has been for over 10 years. And Amanda Graham joins us from Derry, in Northern Ireland, where she moved in May.

Click through for an overview on the health care system of each country, or read the other round tables in this series.

Today on The Takeaway, we speak to the outgoing restaurant critic for The New York Times, Frank Bruni. Just as his stint on the food beat ends, he’s coming out with a book about his lifelong struggle with bulimia called “Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater.” Click through for the full interview transcript.

President Hamid Karzai and U.S. Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke had an "explosive" meeting the day after last week's presidential election at which Holbrooke raised concerns about ballot-box-stuffing and other fraud allegations. We speak with Rob Watson, defence and security correspondent for the BBC, for the latest news on Kabul.

44 American servicemembers have died in Afghanistan so far in August, tying with July as the deadliest month yet for U.S. troops in that conflict. The increase in violence has reignited debate about the U.S. role in the country. We speak to some familly members of the troops stationed there about their take on sending their loved ones off to this war. 

Mary Galeti is from Cleveland, Ohio. Her husband, Russell, is a first lieutenant with the Ohio National Guard. He is currently training with NATO forces in Hungary, but will be deployed to Afghanistan in January. Kim Clark is from Erie, Pennsylvania. Her son Daniel is a Marine in an artillery unit near Helmand Province in Afghanistan. And Larry Syverson is from Richmond, Virginia. His son Branden is a sergeant in the Army's 5th brigade, 2nd infantry, near Kandahar, Afghanistan.

President Obama and his family were supposed to be on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard all this week, but after several disruptions for official business, they're cutting their time-off short as the president and first lady head to Boston to pay respects to Senator Ted Kennedy. For an update on the Obamas' vacation, we talk to Boston Herald Columnist, Laura Raposa, who is in Martha's Vineyard.

This week the White House reported that the federal deficit is rising faster than expected. The projected 10-year deficit is now $9 trillion — that's $2 trillion more than previous estimates. Does increased spending mean a healthier economy, or does burgeoning debt spell trouble for the future? To decode this number and other indicators we speak to Lakshman Achuthan, managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute.

Will Ted Kennedy's Senate seat be filled by another Kennedy? Both Joe, Robert Kennedy's son, and Vicki, Ted's wife, have been mentioned as possible successors, but how well would they fare in a special election? We ask longtime Boston journalist Christopher Lydon. He's a former public radio host who ran for mayor of Boston in the early 1990's.

We go this morning to Sean Corcoran, senior reporter with WCAI, Cape and Island Radio. He joins us live from the Kennedy Library in Boston, where the body of Senator Ted Kennedy lies in repose, to talk about the public's response to the death of their long-serving senator. We also talk to two people who lined up to pay their respects: 41-year-old Darren Ring, from Weymus, Massachusetts, who was the first person in line; and Ann Zeller, from Fremont, New Hampshire, who drove to Boston with her husband.

Here are a few pictures from Boston as people readied for today's wake:

Dominick Dunne, writer for Vanity Fair magazine and best-selling author of crime stories about the rich and famous, died yesterday at age 83 in his home in Manhattan. He's well-known for his best-selling novels, "The Two Mrs. Grenvilles,” and “An Inconvenient Woman,” both about murders in high society. We talk with David Carr, New York Times columnist.

Estimates for today's second quarter GDP numbers will show a decline of somewhere between one percent and 1.5 percent. That’s a sharp improvement – or at least a smaller worsening – after the 6.4 percent decline earlier in the year. Is the worst behind us? With us to help navigate the stormy waters of our global economy is Gus Faucher, director of Macroeconomics at Moody’s Economy.Com. 

Part three of our week-long series of round tables brings to the discussion a group likely too-familiar with the health care system: people with long-term illnesses. Robert Groth, of Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, has multiple sclerosis. Sid Whigham of Lincoln, Nebraska, had one of his legs amputated due to complications from diabetes and a blood clot; he has also been battling blood cancer for the last two years.

Click here to access the other round tables in this series

We've been following news coming in from post-election Afghanistan all morning. From Kabul we talk to Chris Morris, BBC's South Asia reporter, about the casualty count among coalition troops, assertions of voting fraud, and the release of the youngest prisoner from Guantánamo Bay: Mohammad Jawad, who was arrested in Afghanistan in 2002.

At the JFK Library and Museum in Boston, mourners are lining up to view the body of Senator Kennedy, who will lie in repose later today. To set the scene, Emily Rooney, host of WGBH's Beat the Press, joins us from Boston, and Sean Corcoran, senior reporter at WCAI, joins us from Cape Cod.

As President Barack Obama has become a symbol for millions in his father's homeland, Kenya, the Kennedy family was a symbol of success for millions in Ireland. Throughout his career, Senator Edward Kennedy fought hard to maintain those bonds. Kennedy used his position to facilitate diplomatic inroads for any Irish leaders visiting our country, and he was instrumental in securing the Good Friday Agreement under President Clinton in 1995.

We are joined by Niall O’Dowd, founder and editor of Irish Voice newspaper and IrishCentral.Com.  O'Dowd was extensively involved in the negotiations leading to the Good Friday Agreemement. 

The Apple Tablet: an all-in-one multimedia device with a touch pad you use like an iPhone and a screen the size of a laptop. If were to exist, someday, it might have a movie player, an e-reader, a properly sized web browser...  But right now, it's an entirely imaginary device.  Apple is, as usual, staying silent ahead of their next public event on September 9th.

With iPhone sales at 5.4 million units in the last quarter alone, there's no wonder expectations are high for Steve Jobs to build this. To find out why the tablet has techies so revved up, we speak to Sam Grobart, personal technology editor for The New York Times, and Queena Kim, who produces a podcast called CyberFrequencies at KPCC Public Radio in Los Angeles.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai's been surrounding himself with a number of figures with checkered pasts, including his running mate, ex-militia chief Mohammad Fahim. James Risen, investivative reporter for The New York Times, joins us to discuss why the U.S. dislikes Fahim but had no leverage effective enough to prevent Karzai from selecting him as his running mate.