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The independent Congressional Budget Office has finished scoring the budget compromise reached by President Obama and Congressional leaders, yesterday.

In a letter to House Speaker John Boehner, the CBO reports that because of budget caps, the legislation would reduce budget deficits by $917 billion between 2012 and 2021 and because of spending cuts, it would reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion. That's a $2.1 trillion cut over the next ten years. Using another projection, it found the cuts could amount to at least $2.3 billion.

President Obama and congressional leaders reached an agreement Sunday to avoid a first-ever U.S. default. The plan raises the debt ceiling and cuts more than $2 trillion from government spending over a decade. The Senate is expected to vote on it today. To learn more about the deal, host Michel Martin speaks with U.S. News and World Report's Mary Kate Cary and The Washington Post's Jonathan Capehart.

I was trying to keep track of the negotiations over raising the debt ceiling this weekend, and all of a sudden, it reminded me of an incident I had in a parking garage near my house last year.

It was late spring or summer, and it was hot. I had the kids with me, and we were finished doing whatever it was we were doing, and we were ready to go home. We jumped into the car and tried to head out. But we could not.

July was scorching. The National Weather Service says it was the warmest month on record in Washington, D.C.(84.5) Oklahoma City (89.2) and Wichita Falls (92.9). And the stifling heat will continue in the Southern and Central Plains, this week.

But as you wipe that sweat off your brow, think about Dallas. The city is in the midst of a 30-day streak of triple-digit temperatures. That is the second hottest streak in history.

The markets reacted positively to the debt ceiling deal this morning, but bad news on the manufacturing level sent them lower.

The Institute for Supply Management announced that manufacturing activity barely grew in July. The AP reports:

House and Senate leaders prepared for possible votes Monday on the tentative deal to raise the government's debt ceiling and prevent a U.S. default.

Both Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and the office of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) said the votes could come as early as Monday evening, depending on the outcome of meetings with members. Cantor's office said the House would go first.

The agreement gained momentum in the Senate on Monday after months of partisan rancor.

Forty years after parachuting into folklore, the mysterious skyjacker identified as D.B. Cooper may soon be identified.

"We do actually have a new suspect we're looking at," says FBI spokeswoman Ayn Sandolo Dietrich in a story in the British newspaper, The Telegraph. "And it comes from a credible lead who came to our attention recently via a law enforcement colleague."

The government of Syrian President Bashar Assad continued its bloody offensive against protesters today. On Sunday, government forces shelled the city of Hama and human rights groups said there were as many as 142 people dead.

Al Jazeera reports that the people of Deir ex-Zor, who were protesting the attack on Hama, found themselves under fire this morning:

The holy month of Ramadan begins Monday in many parts of the Muslim world — 30 days of fasting from dawn to dusk, when large crowds gather for an additional nighttime prayer.

Ramadan could also be a decisive time for the protest movement in Syria. The government has stepped up mass arrests as activists vow to shift from weekly rallies to nightly ones outside mosques that have become centers of protest.

"I am not going to stop," said Mohammed Ali, a 24-year-old architect, and one of many activists who say they will be on the streets every night during Ramadan.

In the years after Fidel Castro's Cuban revolution, Havana's neighborhoods went through an extraordinary upheaval. As wealthy and middle-class families fled, poorer Cubans moved into their homes.

Now, communist authorities are preparing to legalize property sales for the first time in 50 years, and the city's old racial and class divisions are already creeping back.

House Hunting

Is al-Qaida planning an attack to coincide with the tenth anniversary of September 11?

"Of course they'd like to," says national security analyst Peter Bergen. "And some of the materials recovered in the [Osama] bin Laden compound indicate a desire to do something. But a desire to do something is quite different than actual implementation. I think that this is a group that that has not only suffered the loss of its leader, but was already in very bad shape before that happened."

You know the feeling: You're driving and you spot a little-known memorial that makes you want to pull over and find out more. It could be a monument to some local hero or to a long-forgotten historical moment. NPR is taking a summer-long road trip and exploring the deep — and sometimes mysterious — histories of these spots. Click on the icons below to explore the series.