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JENNIFER LUDDEN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Jennifer Ludden in Washington; Neal Conan is away. We still don't know why a U.S. Army soldier allegedly murdered 16 men, women and children in Afghanistan. That investigation continues. The consequences, though, seem clear.

The families involved are devastated. The Taliban promises revenge. The Afghan Parliament issued a statement saying Afghans had run out of patience with foreign soldiers, and the New York Times reports that the Obama administration is debating a speedier pullout from the country.

An advertising agency sparked controversy at the South by Southwest technology conference when it hired homeless people in Austin to act as "Homeless Hotspots." Critics charge that it exploits the homeless. But Megan Garber, a staff writer for The Atlantic, sees some good in the project.

NPR's Jennifer Ludden reads from listener comments on previous show topics including the controversy over mapping Muslims, the jump in grey divorces, reaction to the viral video Kony 2012, and leaving the Catholic Church.

Comedians Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele push stereotypes to new — and sometimes uncomfortable — levels in their jokes.

On stage, on MadTV and now in their Comedy Central show, Key & Peele, they find the humor in their biracial upbringings and the many roles of black men in America.

Transcript

JENNIFER LUDDEN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Jennifer Ludden, in Washington. Neal Conan is away. Losing a loved one is, simply put, painful. Such separation brings extreme sadness that can feel sometimes too heavy to bear. The Irish writer C.S. Lewis chronicled his suffering and healing after his wife died of cancer at the age of 45.

Much has been reported in recent years about payday loans and the huge fees and sky-high interest charges that borrowers can rack up if they use such services.

And though their demise has been predicted, they live on.

Geoff Nunberg, the linguist contributor on NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, is the author of the book The Years of Talking Dangerously.

"My choice of words was not the best," Rush Limbaugh said in his apology. That's the standard formula for these things — you apologize not for what you said but for the way you said it.

Anyone who's visited an aquarium or watched "Flipper" reruns knows how happy those dolphins look when they score a nice fat fish. But they might not be tasting that fish at all.

That's the news from a study from researchers who tested the DNA of wild animals to see if they could taste sweet, bitter, and umami (or savory) flavor.

Our friend Liz Halloran reports that Mitt Romney "might just win in the South" today as Republicans go to the polls in Alabama and Mississippi to pick between the four remaining candidates for the GOP presidential nomination.

As she writes:

Hip replacements can do a lot of good, but they don't last forever.

To lower the failure rates of artificial hips, particularly in younger people, doctors have tried using metal-on-metal hip joints with larger heads.

But those metal-on-metal hips, which were supposed to be more durable, have their own problems.

"Strange things are happenin' to me" a bewitched Mitt Romney said recently to a crowd of Mississippi supporters. The former Massachusetts governor is right: Strange things do happen to folks, especially national political candidates, when they talk to us Southerners. They start drawling and twanging, trying to sound like us. Sometimes, they're mocking us; sometimes they're just trying to be friendly. We know the difference.

President Bashar Assad's forces have placed landmines "near the borders with Lebanon and Turkey" along routes used by refugees trying to flee the fighting inside Syria, the watchdog group Human Rights Watch reported today.

Saying it has collected "reports and confirmations from witnesses and Syrian deminers," the organization called such actions "unconscionable."

There was a 1.1 percent increase in retail sales in February from January, the Census Bureau says. It was the largest rise in five months, Reuters reports.

And the gain didn't come just become rising gas prices led to a 3.3 percent increase in the value of gasoline sales. According to The Associated Press, retail sales rose 0.8 percent excluding gasoline.

Buford is an old railroad town which was once home to thousands, but now has a population of one. Don Sammons plans to retire from managing his businesses and move. Up for auction next month:a gas station, convenience store, garage and a home.

Pizza chefs from around the world are gathered to compete in events like: largest dough stretch, fastest pizza-box folding and freestyle acrobatic dough-tossing.

(As news comes in from Afghanistan about the killings of 16 civilians, allegedly by a U.S. soldier, we'll update this post.)

There are fears that the killing of 16 Afghan civilians on Sunday, reportedly by a U.S. Army staff sergeant who gunned down the men, women and children in cold blood, will inflame the people of that nation.

Alabama and Mississippi will play an unaccustomed high profile role Tuesday as each candidate for the Republican presidential nomination looks to voters in those states to give his candidacy a boost towards inevitability, if you're Mitt Romney, or just keep their candidacies alive if you're Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich.