Helen Gurley Brown made her name by writing frankly about women and sex when that was truly a rare thing. Her 1962 best-seller came out a year before “The Feminine Mystique.” And “Sex and the Single Girl” was its own kind of feminist text, although most of the book is lighthearted advice on everything from where to find a man to how to invest in stocks. She summed up her greater point in a TV interview 1981.

 

“I'm one of the first people who said for heaven's sake don't live through your man. You’re just as good as they, that other sex, are. Why don't you get some of the spoils and the glory and the rewards.” 

 

Helen Gurley Brown got plenty of all of those things as the head of Cosmopolitan magazine for decades. She made it the sex-centric glossy we know today. Selena Simmons-Duffin, NPR News.

 

President Obama is on a three-day swing through Iowa, pledging more relief to farmers and ranchers during one of the country's worst droughts in a half century. In Council Bluffs today, he urged Congress’s Republican leadership to do the same. 

 

“The best way to help these states is for the folks in Congress to pass a farm bill that not only helps farmers and ranchers respond to natural disasters, but also makes some necessary reforms and gives farmers and ranchers some long-term certainty. Unfortunately, right now, too many members of Congress are blocking the farm bill from becoming law.” 

 

The new Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan also campaigned in Iowa, where he told supporters at the state fair in Des Moines that he and presidential hopeful Mitt Romney would fix the country's budget.

 

“President Obama has given us four years of trillion-dollar-plus deficits. He’s making matters worse, and he is spending our children into a diminished future. We don't have to stand for that. We’re not going to stand for that. And on November the 6th, we’re going to change that.”

 

Romney campaigned today in Florida while Vice President Joe Biden attended a campaign rally in North Carolina. 

 

Doctors say Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. is being treated for bipolar disorder. The Mayo Clinic states Jackson is responding well to treatment for his condition which affects parts of the brain controlling thought, emotion and drive. The Democratic Illinois congressman was last seen in public in mid-June. 

 

Before the close on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 38 points at 13,170; NASDAQ up two points at 3,023; S&P 500 down two at 1,404.

 

This is NPR News.

 

The moderators for the presidential and vice presidential debates have been announced. As NPR's Brian Naylor tells us, for the first time in two decades a women will preside over a presidential telecast.

 

The Commission on Presidential Debates says CNN's Candy Crowley will moderate the second presidential debate which will be in the format of a town hall meeting and take place October 16th. The commission had been under pressure to name a woman journalist, which had not done for the presidential debates in 20 years. The other two presidential debates will be moderated by Jim Lehrer of PBS on October 3rd and Bob Schieffer of CBS on October 22nd. The vice presidential debate will also be moderated by a women, ABC's Martha Raddatz, on October 11th. Brian Naylor, NPR News, Washington.

 

A two-year investigation into researchers who wrote a famous report on drowned polar bear is finally over, according to their lawyer. But as NPR's Nell Greenfieldboyce reports, the scientists have not been able to see its conclusions.

 

Charles Monnett and Jeffrey Gleason are wildlife biologists with an agency of the Department of the Interior. The department's Office of Inspector General has been investigating allegations of scientific misconduct and contract management issues. Investigators repeatedly questioned the scientists about report they wrote on apparently drowned polar bears, which became a symbol of the threat of climate change and melting ice. Attorney Jeff Ruch of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility now says inspectors submitted a final report to the agency in June, but it won't be released while it's still under review. A spokesperson with the agency says it does not comment on personnel matters.  Nell Greenfieldboyce, NPR News.