In Nevada, Senate Majority leader Harry Reid is fighting for every vote against Republican nominee and Tea Party favorite, Sharron Angle. In Pennsylvania, Democrat Joe Sestak is trailing Republican Pat Toomey by four points. Colorado's Senate race is being called the closest in the country and in Massachusetts, Republican candidates for Congress are hoping the Scott Brown effect will rub off on them. Finally, we land in California, where Senator Barbara Boxer is ahead in the polls, but still facing a tough opponent in Republican Carly Fiorina.

Our guests:

Worldwide security concerns persist in the wake of a thwarted plot to mail bombs from Yemen to the United States last week. Germany has suspended passenger flights out of Yemen, while the U.S. and allied governments have tightened security surrounding air cargo and shipped packages everywhere, amid concerns about other devices possibly still in circulation. We get the latest from Mark Mazzetti, national security correspondent for the New York Times.

A series of mass shootings left several dozen people dead over the last week in Mexico. Our guest, William Finnegan, worries that the massacre at a drug rehab center in the border city of Tijuana might be the opening shots of a territorial battle between drug cartels for control of the city, which is valued for its access to the U.S.  Tijuana hadn't been overly violent until around two years ago when the city began to see gruesome decapitations, dismemberments, corpses left hanging from bridges, and piles of bodies with tongues cut out. Finnegan reports on Mexico for the New Yorker Magazine.

• Talking Heads, "This Must Be the Place"
• Peter Dixon, "Nagog Woods"
• Paul Simon, "50 Ways To Leave Your Lover"
• Radiohead, "There, There"
• Christian McBride, "Theme for Kareem"
• Air, "Mike Mills"
• The Wee Trio, "About a Girl"