National News from NPR

For the first time, the Department of Transportation has fined an airline for keeping passengers cooped up in a plane while it lounges on the tarmac for hours. Today, DOT announced it fined American Eagle, a regional affiliate of American Airlines, $900,000 for 15 planes that sat on a Chicago O'Hare International Airport runway for more than three hours.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Over the past 30 years, prolific American author Don DeLillo has written more than a dozen novels, including White Noise, Falling Man, Libra and Underworld. But his latest, The Angel Esmeralda, is a departure from his expansive novels. It is a collection of short stories — nine brief flashes, which, like DeLillo's longer works, center on characters who feel out of sync with the worlds around them.

In a country where politicians shield themselves behind dark-tinted windows in sleek limousines, Roman paparazzi are having a field day with Italy's new premier-designate, Mario Monti, who actually walks down the street, without bodyguards.

But the longest sound bite reporters are likely to get from him is: "Isn't it a splendid day?"

Monti was chosen to replace the flamboyant Silvio Berlusconi, who was forced to step down over the country's worsening eurozone crisis.

King Abdullah of Jordan put more pressure on Syria's embattled President Bashar Assad to step down.

"I believe, if I were in his shoes, I would step down," King Abdullah told the BBC. "If Bashar has the interest of his country, he would step down, but he would also create an ability to reach out and start a new phase of Syrian political life."

As one GOP presidential candidate after another bounces up, and then down, in the polls, Mitt Romney has established himself as the slow and steady front-runner for most of the race.

Even if he's not thrilling the Republican Party's conservative wing, the former Massachusetts governor has managed to hover at or near the top. That's also true in the leadoff caucus state of Iowa, despite waging a low-key campaign.

The economy is expected to dominate all other issues in next year's presidential race. But in recent days, both the Republican candidates and President Obama have focused on foreign policy.

It's easy to think of local food as a diversion for people with plenty of time and money — something that could never be a major source of food in a globalized world. But the number $5 billion might change that perception.

When the Diaspora project was first announced, it made huge waves in the tech world. A group of students from New York University were asking for money to create a social network that rivaled Facebook, but without the privacy concerns. They wanted a place where users had full control of their content and they raised more than $200,000 to do it.

Over the weekend, Ilya Zhitomirskiy, one of the founders, died at age 22. The cause of death has not yet been confirmed.

Before it could be awarded, the trophy for the winner of the Big Ten Conference Football Championship has been changed from the Stagg-Paterno Championship Trophy to just the Stagg Championship Trophy.