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R.A. Dickey's career as a major league pitcher has been as unpredictable as his signature pitch, the knuckleball.

And on Tuesday night, the New York Mets' 37-year-old phenomenon will hit a new pinnacle: the pitching mound at baseball's All-Star Game.

He won't be starting for the National League — manager Tony La Russa chose Matt Cain of the San Francisco Giants for that honor. But the manager says says Dickey will pitch.

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MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:

Texas is saying no to key parts of the federal health care law. Today, Governor Rick Perry said Texas will not create a state exchange for people to buy health insurance and will not expand Medicaid. In a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Governor Perry called both provisions a power grab, brazen intrusions into the sovereignty of our state.

Here's Governor Perry today on Fox News.

In Scranton, Pa., city workers are fuming about their sudden pay decrease. The city's mayor says there isn't enough money to pay employees their regular wages. So, the most recent paychecks reflected minimum wage — no matter what workers' previous salaries had been.

A federal panel on Monday began hearing a lawsuit by the state of Texas against the U.S. Department of Justice, to allow the state's new voter ID law to go into effect. The Justice Department has blocked the law, arguing that it violates the Voting Rights Act by disproportionately harming Hispanic voters, who are less likely to have the required photo ID. Melissa Block speaks to NPR's Pam Fessler.

Silk is in neckties, scarves and some fancy underwear and pajamas. Before too long, it might just help keep people from getting sick with measles or polio.

Vaccines play an important role in health, but can be tricky to transport to the far corners of the world. Many vaccines and some other drugs require constant refrigeration — from the factories where they're made to the places where they're ultimately injected into people.

That's where silk comes in.

Nothing breeds lawsuits like uncertainty. That being the case, the Supreme Court's landmark health care ruling is almost certain to open the door to lawsuits challenging the federal government's authority.

The court ruled the federal government can't force states to participate in a major expansion of Medicaid or else risk losing existing Medicaid funds from Washington. That threat amounted to unconstitutional coercion.

The southern African nation of Botswana is grappling with a relatively new problem in the evolving AIDS pandemic: It now has a large group of HIV-positive adolescents.

The teenagers were infected at birth before Botswana managed to almost wipe out mother-to-child transmission of the virus. These children have survived because of a public health system that provides nearly universal access to powerful anti-AIDS drugs.

Any doubt, and there probably wasn't much, that Texas would reject an expansion of Medicaid under the big federal health law was dispelled today.

The Supreme Court decision on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act allows states to opt out of the expansion without losing all federal Medicaid funding. Only the federal money that would have gone toward the expansion is affected.

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NEAL CONAN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington. At the end of last month, a line of powerful storms left millions without electricity in the midst of record-breaking heat. The storms killed some as trees fell on houses and cars, then the heat took more lives as people sweltered without fans or air conditioning.

The heat wave's broken, the power's back on for most, but the widespread outages left many frustrated and angry. What took so long? Can't we protect power lines? And what about the crews who arrive to help out?

An investigation into a perplexing outbreak among young kids in Cambodia is getting traction.

Doctors have identified a potential cause, a virus associated with hand, foot and mouth disease. (The illness is not foot-and-mouth disease, which affects only animals.)

Recovery has been creeping at a slow pace for much of the American economy, but sales by US auto makers have revved up. Chrysler and General Motors both saw double digit growth in June, and Ford wasn't too far behind. Guest host Maria Hinojosa and NPR's Sonari Glinton talk about what's driving the rise.

All summer long, fellow NPR program Weekends on All Things Considered is asking directors, actors and producers what movie they could watch over and over again. To Kill A Mockingbird is an all-time favorite for Whoopi Goldberg, the actor, comedian and talk show host.

I have a simple question for you: Do you have a good idea? Something that could change the world?

Enter your big idea in NPR's "What's Your Big Idea?" video contest from July 9 to Aug. 12, 2012, and you could win the chance to get advice on making your big idea a reality from a big name in science and technology. And even if you don't win that grand prize, we'll showcase your video on NPR's YouTube channel and on Facebook.