Good morning, Boston... One of the suspects in Monday's marathon bombings is dead after a protracted shootout on a residential street in nearby Watertown. And much of the metro area is locked down while hundreds of heavily armed police search for his brother, the man caught on cameras after the blasts wearing a white hat.

A late-night media frenzy kicked up after scattered reports about a 7-11 robbery in Cambridge, then the fatal shooting of an MIT campus police officer, and then a carjacking. Soon after, residents looking out their bedroom windows close to midnight local time were Tweeting out video and photos of a gun battle, some 15 miles away from MIT, and telling outlets about men in backpacks who threw a bomb.

The brothers have been identified as Chechen refugees who've lived in the United States for years. Tamerlan Tsarnaev, dead, was a promising boxer who reportedly once said "I don't have a single American friend. I don't understand them." His younger brother, Dzhokhar, 19, still on the run, and, cops say, armed and dangerous, etc., graduated as an honors student two years ago from the same prestigious high school that gave the world Ben Affleck, Patrick Ewing, and e.e. cummings. An uncle of the men has called at least one of them a "loser."

Remember the arrest announced this week in the "plot" to mail ricin-tainted letters to President Obama and other government leaders? The Mississippi man charged, an Elvis aficionado, predictably was struggling with his sanity and worried about being spied on by drones and black market body-part rings.

The Boy Scouts still won't allow gay leaders. But the group might promise not to kick out gay kids.

The toll in the massive explosion at a Texas fertilizer plant has climbed. Twelve bodies have now been pulled from a blast site that includes large swaths of the town of West, and the number of injured has risen to 200. West is known as an outpost of Czech culture, and its famed bakery stayed open the night of the disaster, serving hot kolaches to victims and survivors.

A bipartisan compromise on immigration is destined to fall apart go up for a vote this June and become the latest disappointment chance at redemption for a troubled, broken Congress.

Pakistan's former president lammed it out of court and down a busy street with the aid of bodyguards yesterday. Today, he's in custody again—a turnabout for a controversial figure who returned from exile, risking legal action, amid grandiose hopes of saving the nation.

Multnomah County is poised to pass a modest set of gun control measures this month, forced to take only the limited steps because of state laws that pre-empt local communities from passing more robust measures.

The other Portland is jealous that we're getting a big Navy boat named after us and only us, unlike past incarnations of boats named USS Portland.