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Boxer Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini won the championship his fighter father never could — but his life was marred by tragedy when he defended his title against a South Korean boxer who died after the match. A new biography of Mancini describes how his life changed after that fateful fight.

NPR's Ari Shapiro joins host Scott Simon to preview a pair of pieces he's reported for next week on the political ad wars. He talks about the unprecedented number of ads, the money and how it feels in one community: Colorado Springs.

Since 1986, the U.S. has steadily built an infrastructure on its Southern border and inland. All told, the nation has spent nearly $200 billion in today's dollars. Roughly 80,000 government workers depend on immigration enforcement, along with defense contractors large and small. NPR's Ted Robbins reports immigration is down, but there's no end in sight for the border-industrial complex. (This piece initially aired Sept. 12, 2012, on Morning Edition).

Fifty years ago, Charles de Gaulle traveled to Ludwigsburg, Germany, to declare "Long live Bonn, long live Germany, long live the Franco-German friendship." NPR's Philip Reeves reports on the state of the Franco-German friendship in this time of euro debt crisis.

Using three keystrokes to suggest a smile may not be a great scientific advance, but the emoticon has been simple, useful and enduring.

Residents of Zimbabwe's second largest city are flushing the toilets at the same time tonight. The action isn't some form of protest, but the result of 72 hours of water restrictions thanks to a severe drought.

With Terraplane, the guitarist transforms from New York avant-garde aesthete to down-and-dirty Chicago bluesman. In an interview with NPR's Jacki Lyden, Sharp remembers Chicago blues guitarist Hubert Sumlin and his "pearls of blue wisdom."

So far in this presidential campaign, the two main contestants have managed to keep details of their plans for the White House remarkably vague. Weekends on All Things Considered guest host Jacki Lyden speaks with James Fallows of The Atlantic about what he'd like to hear once they share the same stage at the first debate.

President Obama and Mitt Romney seem to have switched places in recent days. The incumbent president is promising to change Washington from the outside. Meanwhile, Romney, who made his fortune turning businesses around, says he wants to work within the existing political system.

NASA mission specialist Stan Love's playlist also includes David Bowie's "Space Oddity."