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NPR's Jim Zarroli reports Wall Street's top brokerage firms agreed to pay nearly $1.5 billion in fines to settle conflict-of-interest charges. Regulators accused the firms of continuing to recommend stocks they privately had turned against. Besides fines, the firms agree to spend several hundred million dollars in coming years buying research from independent firms that don't mix stock research with investment banking.

President Elect George W. Bush named two of his top campaign aides to new jobs today, completing the transfer of his "Texas Iron Triangle" from Austin to Washington. Senior strategist Karl Rove will become senior adviser to Bush in the White House, where he will handle public liaison and strategy as well as politics. Joe Allbaugh, who has been Bush's campaign manager, will become the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Don Gonyea reports from Austin.

The top prizes in science this year recognize inventions that have changed our lives and that could shape the future. The physics award will be shared by people who developed the computer chip and figured out surprising new ways to get semiconductors to do other tricks, such as emitting light. The prize in chemistry goes to researchers who developed plastics that can conduct electricity. NPR's Richard Harris reports. (4:00) Note: The words god damn appear near the end of the third actuality of this piece.

NPR's Anne Garrels reports from Belgrade that the French foreign minister visited the Yugoslav capital today. He told president Vojislav Kostunica that assistance to Yugoslavia's new leadership is Europe's top priority. The West has been waiting to see some positive signs from Kostunica on Kosovo. The new president today raised the issue of a possible exchange of ethnic Albanian and Serb prisoners. Ironically, Kostunica's easiest task now seems to be dealing with the West. He has yet to consolidate control over the police and governmental bodies in the Serbian republic.

NPR's Eric Weiner reports that Japan's worst economic downturn since World War II has radically changed expectations of young college graduates. In years past, the country's corporate giants would go to the top schools and actively recruit new employees, who generally were given jobs for life. Now it is the students who are chasing employers. And many of them are not finding jobs. Some have given up on full-time employment and simply bounce from one part-time job to another while living with their parents.

On his new album, Timeless Love, rhythm and blues legend Smokey Robinson sings hits from the American songbook, including "I Can't Give You Anything But Love (Baby)," "Night and Day" and "More Than You Know." Robinson William "Smokey" Robinson recorded dozens of top 40 hits for the Motown label as a solo artist and with The Miracles.

Junior Senior's single "Move Your Feet" has spent nine weeks on Britain's top 10 pop charts and sold more than 200,000 copies. Now the Danish musical duo hopes to take America by storm. Their CD, Don't Stop the Beat, makes its U.S. debut Tuesday. Charles de Ledesma reports.

Paul Bremer, the new U.S. administrator for Iraq, says restoring law and order and reviving the country's economy are his top priorities. He points to increased police patrols and a jump in the arrest of petty criminals as signs the situation is already improving. He also vows to purge the government of former Baath party officials. NPR's Guy Raz reports.

Secretary of State Colin Powell will meet with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to discuss improving security within Iraq. The meeting comes two days after an explosion at the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad killed more than 20 people, including the top U.N. envoy in Iraq. Hear retired Gen. William Nash and Nancy Soderberg, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.

Sen. Joe Biden has been in the spotlight lately because of his work on two panels: the Judiciary Committee, which questioned new Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and the Foreign Relations Committee, on which Biden is the top Democrat.