NPR News

The Republican-controlled House voted 293-132 today to renew a payroll tax cut that benefits 160 million workers, as well as extending benefits to millions of unemployed Americans.

The Senate is expected to quickly approve the legislation, which then goes to President Obama for his signature.

Workers would continue to receive the two percentage-point cut in the 6.2 percent Social Security payroll tax — as much as $2,200 for high-income earners.

The Associated Press reports:

Jonathan V. Last is a senior writer for The Weekly Standard.

We're not far away from the primary in Michigan, the state where Mitt Romney was born, where his father served as governor in the 1960s — and where Romney won four years ago. But the most recent polls have the latest "not Mitt" candidate — Rick Santorum — ahead.

Gerry Hasan is a writer for Foreign Policy.

Greg Mitchell writes daily for The Nation.

Anthony Shadid, 43, perhaps the most respected US reporter covering numerous wars and battles zones throughout the Middle East and North Afrida in the past dozen years, died today in Syria. He reportedly suffered an asthma attack. His body was then carried across the border to Turkey by his New York Times colleague, photographer Tyler Hicks.