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Eight colleges in Georgia will now become four, the State Board of Regents announced today. The move wil affect about 36,000 students and was proposed in an effort to save money.

Binge drinking in America looks to be an even bigger problem than we thought.

About 1 in 6 Americans, or 17 percent of the population, went on at least one drinking binge in a month last year, according to the latest figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That works out to 38 million people.

NPR's Neal Conan reads from listener comments on previous show topics, including the moment that changed your life, differences between identical twins, and a proposal for a new calendar.

Sites like PolitiFact and Factcheck.org are designed to verify political claims and hold politicians accountable. But critics say fact-checking entities are themselves biased. The Weekly Standard's Mark Hemingway and Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post discuss fact-checking in American politics.

Every year, film fans and studio executives travel to Park City, Utah, for the Sundance Film Festival, a showcase for independent films from around the world.

While feature films are always a draw at the festival, documentary fans closely follow the nonfiction films that premiere at Sundance each year.

The demonstrations that spread across the Middle East in 2011 unseated leaders in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. Yemen's president has agreed to step down and violence continues in Syria. NPR foreign correspondents discuss developments since the Arab Spring and what they mean for the region and the U.S.

The victims of a North Carolina program that forcibly sterilized thousands of people should receive $50,000 in compensation, a task force said Tuesday. The AP writes that this is first time, the state tries to make up for a eugenics program that ran from the 1930s until 1977.

Before any payments are made, however, the state Legislature must approve the panel's recommendation.

The AP reports:

Primary Day in New Hampshire turned into open season as GOP rivals launched a barrage of attacks seeking to undermine front-runner Mitt Romney, whose campaign hopes to live up to expectations that he will deliver a solid victory.

Not only does Romney need to win, he needs to win convincingly — holding challengers such as Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich and a resurgent Jon Huntsman comfortably at arm's length.

I don't know about you, but when I spoon into store-bought ice cream or chomp into hot dogs, I don't consider it a risky activity, one that could land me in the dentist's chair with a broken tooth. But it turns out that this does happen. Even Costco, the giant warehouse retailer, says it's true.

There are three new hosts of CBS This Morning, which was unveiled yesterday. One is Erica Hill, a holdover from The Early Show, the previous program in the early-morning time slot. Another is Gayle King, still best known as Oprah Winfrey's best friend, who's here to handle most of the entertainment interviews. And the third, the pivot point, is Charlie Rose, brought over from PBS to give this new show an injection of instant respectability and seriousness.

The Transportation Security Administration clarified its cupcake policy in a blog post. Cupcakegate — as the agency has termed it — was prompted in December, when TSA officers told Rebecca Hains, who was flying out of Las Vegas, she could not carry cupcakes in her carry-on luggage. The TSA said the icing on the two cupcakes was a security risk.

Slapping on a nicotine patch may not just be for smokers trying to kick the habit.

In an intriguing test, researchers tried nicotine patches as a memory booster for nonsmokers with mild declines in their thinking ability, a precursor to dementia or Alzheimer's disease.

In late 2006, Barack Obama held a meeting with his wife Michelle and his advisors to weigh whether he should run for President.

"And Michelle Obama, in front of everybody, asks her husband a very dramatic question," says New York Times Washington correspondent Jodi Kantor. "She says, 'What do you think you can bring to this that the other candidates can't?'"

Her husband paused for a second, and then responded, "I really think if I became President, it would inspire people all over the world to think of new possibilities."

The emotionally charged task of putting price tags on the lives of coal miners killed in the nation's deadliest mine disaster in 40 years continues for a fifth day in West Virginia.

Sources familiar with the mediation talks say the families of 13 Upper Big Branch mine explosion victims are still considering settlement of wrongful death claims with mine owner Alpha Natural Resources.

Six families settled yesterday in mediated negotiations that began Friday at a resort in Glade Springs, W. Va.

At least 30 people were killed at a busy market in northwest Pakistan after a bomb was placed inside the car of a local militia group tasked with fighting against the Taliban.

CNN reports the explosion occurred in the Jamrud Market in the Khyber near the Afghan border. The AP adds:

This may well be the worst story you've come across yet on politics.

Really, I beg you: You should have very, very low expectations for this story.

And this expectations thing is important stuff.

Pundits, reporters and the campaigns themselves have devoted a lot of energy to setting expectations for the candidates' performances.

Myanmar's upcoming special parliamentary elections just became more legitimate. Aung San Suu Kyi, a leading opposition figure in the country as well as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, said she will mount a campaign for a seat in parliament.

After a 21-0 victory over LSU in the bowl championship game last night, a final AP poll crowned the Crimson Tide No. 1. Alabama received 55 first-place votes, while LSU got one.

As the AP reports, yesterday's victory easily erased Alabama's Nov. 5 loss against LSU.

If the New Hampshire primary goes as widely expected, Mitt Romney should emerge the winner among the candidates for the Republican presidential nomination. For weeks, polls in the state have shown him with a commanding lead.

But the 2012 campaign season has already delivered some surprises. Maybe New Hampshire will provide the latest in the series of unexpected twists?