>> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. on the "newshour" tonight: we assess what caused the stock market rout and the federal reserve's latest action to prop up the economy. >> woodruff:: then, we examine the latest battle over u.s. federal funding, as a congressional tug-of-war over disaster aid could lead to a government shutdown. >> brown: ray suarez looks at turkey's prime minister erdogan, who took the stage today at the united nations, part of an effort to boost his country's profile in the middle east and elsewhere. >> woodruff:: from texas, betty anne bowser has the story of one city's push to rebuild better and stronger, after a disaster. >> if there is one thing people in galveston know about its hurricanes. but these days, they're working on something new-- how to make this gulf coast city a healthier place to live. >> brown: and as part of our "economist film project" series, we talk to the director of "last train home"-- a film about the world's largest human migration.

>> i wanted to make a film about the chinese migrant workers and they are 200 million of them. i think they deserve a story of their own. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us.

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>> woodruff: investors worldwide had a rough ride today. sell-offs hit all the major markets amid downbeat reports from asia, europe and the u.s. federal reserve. at one point, on wall street, the dow jones industrial average was down well over 500 points. it finished with a loss of just under 400. traders at stock exchanges around the world sat glued to their many screens, as they watched shares skid down, down, down. when the closing bell clanged at the new york exchange, the dow jones industrial average had lost 391 points or 3.5% to finish under 10,734. the nasdaq gave up 82 points to end at 2,455. overseas, after asian stocks headed down, european markets sank to 26-month lows. the german dax fell almost 5%. and the main french index dropped even more-- 5.25%.

a fund manager in france cited multiple causes. >> ( translated ): first of all, a decision from the u.s. federal reserve last night, which was expected, so the lack of surprise has created a lack of support on the market. also some negative news, as the downgrading of the debt of some >> woodruff: that federal reserve decision will shift $400 billion into long-term securities to lower interest rates and boost investment and spending. just as important to investors, the fed underscored long-term risks that may delay a complete recovery for years. in washington today, treasury secretary tim geithner agreed, the u.s. faces a combination of economic problems. >> the two other clouds still over us are the european crisis and the deep concern that you can see across the world and around the country about whether

the political system in the united states is up to the challenges we face. not just the near-term challenges of supporting an economy still healing from crisis, but long-term challenges of growth and competitiveness and fiscal sustainability. >> woodruff: but speaker of the house john boehner complained the fed's new stimulus efforts will make things worse. republican leaders had warned against any such move. >> we continue to have concerns with the activities of the fed because it appears to us they're taking actions because they don't believe the political system can do what needs to be done. frankly, i think that's enabling the political process rather than forcing the political process to do what it should do and that's to deal with our deficit and our debt which is imperiling jobs and imperiling the future for our kids and grandkids. >> woodruff: the president of the world bank-- robert zoellick-- acknowledged that

kind of fear for the future, even though he doubted that a new downturn is coming. >> i still think that a double dip recession for the world's major economies is unlikely but my confidence in that belief is being eroded daily by the steady drip of difficult economic news. >> woodruff: some of that difficult economic news continued in greece, where protesters staged another 24- hour strike against new austerity measures. greece needs international bailout payments, or it will run out of cash by mid-october, and face default. >> brown: for more we turn to two people who follow these events closely. greg ip is u.s. economics editor for "the economist" magazine and hugh johnson is chairman and c.e.o. of hugh johnson advisors he worked as staff economist for the new york fed and economic advisor to the central bank of england.

if the fed action was to some degree expected, what do you see explaining the strong drop today? >> well, i think it was what the fed said. and the drop started after that 2:20 statement yesterday from the f-- where they said there are significant downsized risks to an economy that was already growing fairly slowly. and then the policy response was largely as expected. so it's a bit like your doctor telling you you are very seriously ill but he's only got an aspirin for you. >> brown: so same with you, so investors, this is everywhere, investors are terrified of taking any risk at this point is this. >> i think that's right. the markets this year have been driven by whether people want to take risk or not take risk. the determine the market risk on or risk off. and people started to take risk off during the s&p downgrade in early august, the u.s. treasury debt and

the problems with european sovereign debt and fears over european banks. and we had a big plunge in the markets and a lot of fear measured by volatility. and we spent the better part of september climbing out of those fears and the fed pushed us right back in. >> brown: now greg, you watch the fed. >> yeah. >> brown: go back here a day at least. what did the fed actually do? >> okay, well as you know the federal reserve manages the economy usually by raising or lowering its short-term interest rate and thereby making people who spend more, spend less am but that short-term interest rate has been at zero basically since the end of 12008 so they have lost their ability to help the economy through conventional means. since then they have been trying to help by pushing down long-term rates that affect mortgages, for example, an borrowing rates of companies. they first did it through quantitative easing. they bought trillions of dollars of bonds and paid for them simply by printing money out of thin air. but there was a lot of negative reaction to that not just on capital here but in other yeses.

so yesterday the fed did something slightly different. they said we're going to go out and buy $400 billion of long-term bonds, again with the intention of pushing up their prices, pushing down their yields and lowering everybody's borrowing costs. but instead of paying for it by printing money like we did last time, we'll pay for it by selling some the shorter term bonds we own whose interest rates are already close to zero. they did one other thing that a lot of people have not sort of pick approximated up on. they also own a lot of mortgage-related securities. and these have been basically shrinking as they mature. what they have said is as those bonds mature we will buy more of those and that will deliver an extra dollop of help to the mortgage market. >> brown: is this in essence pumping in more money or just shifting money in hopes that it goes to the right place an lures investors? >> in theory it should actually have roughly the same impact that their previous quantitative easing operations did. the idea of both of them is that long-term interest rates, although they are very low, they are still above zero. if we can push them down further t will do two things t will encourage some people to borrow and spend.

and investors who are no longer happy getting such low returns on treasury bonds may take, you know, the chance and buy something riskier like stocks or perhaps even invest in a new business. >> brown: and you heard john refer to the language that they used. does it sound like they are signaling, because that is always hard to read their languaging but of course the great fear is a double dip recession at this point. >> this is what is interesting, jeff, is that historically the federal reserve would often say they were worried about the economy. but that didn't cause the markets to fall. because investors always believe that no matter how bad the economy was, the fed could do something to help it. the thing that you have seen happening in the last month or two is that the fed tells the economies in trouble, but people say yeah, but i don't think you're able to help us very much. the tool that you have left are somewhat kind of unconventional, a little bit desperate and i think that's adding to the sense of bloom out there. >> brown: does that sound right to you, that plus of course the political gridlock. >> i agree with that assessment. i mean it went-- the fed

went to a 1961 policy that it tried called operation twist. this buying long treasuries and selling short treasuries. and the general wisdom from economists looking back at that period is it wasn't a very effective policy. so it does seem something of a hail mary play. but i would say this, the economy doesn't have a monetary problem. interest rates are very low. the banks have $1.7 trillion of excess reserves. so it's not the level of interest rates that's stopping people investing, stopping people from buying houses, it's other aspects of economic policy in the economy. and yet the gridlock in washington in other areas means that fiscal policy can't address those issues. and so people are left saying we've got to struggle through on our own. and i will add one more thing. these low long-term interest rates perversely may hurt the economy rather than help the economy because people have a lot of liquid assets and live off fixed income,

retirees. and that's really hurting retirees, pushing interest rates down. so if you are not encouraging people to borrow but you are hurting retirees, those lower rates can curtail demand. >> brown: greg, coming back to the political issue here, theres with a political issue, of course, in the fed acting, we heard john boehner refer to it. it was a letter written -- >> yeah. >> brown: asking that the fed not act. how does that play into what is going on. >> that is very unusual to have a letter from the leadership of a political party telling the fed on the day that they are meeting, you know, we really think it is a bad idea for you to act. now it's not new for the federal reserve to be under attack by congress. the federal reserve is independent precisely so it can do the right thing. you know, in the '70s and '80s, paul volcker was threatened with impeachment, the chairman of the house banking committee, was always beating up on the fed chairman. what's different now is that it's not these lower level people, it's not people on the fringe like ron paul, it's the leadership of the republican party, it's their leading presidential candidates.

and they're essentially channeling the high degree of suspicion and skepticism of the republican base of any form of government activism. now i don't seriously think that pem at the fed are living this, to stop them from doing right now what's necessary. and indeed we saw them move perhaps a bit more aggressively than we expected. but over time, it does perhaps, you know, add a restraint on their willingness to act more aggressively. more interesting i think is in 2014 when ben bernanke the current chairman, when his term is up, who replaces him. it is entirely possible that if it were a republican administration he would be replaced with somebody with a more hawkish and austere view, vision about where monetary policy should go. >> brown: thank you both very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff:: still to come on the "newshour": renewed fears of a u.s. government shutdown; turkey's role on the world stage; galveston rebuilding with health in mind and a mass migration in china. but first, the other news of the day kwame holman.

>> holman: new numbers from the u.s. census painted a stark picture today of how the recession has hit young adults. the 2010 data found unemployment among those in their 20's is the highest since world war two. as a result, record numbers of young adults are living with their parents, and almost one in five are living in poverty. they're also choosing to delay getting married or buying a home. the president of iran mahmoud ahmadinejad blamed the u.s. and western nations today for the world's economic and other ills, before the u.n. general assembly. diplomats, including the u.s. and french delegations, responded by walking out. in all more than a dozen followed, while the 30-minute speech was still under way. >> ( translated ): it is as lucid as daylight that the same slave masters and colonial powers that once instigated the two world wars have caused widespread misery and disorder with far-reaching effects across the globe since then. and they continue to control the international political centers and the security council.

dear colleagues and friends: do these arrogant powers really have the competence or ability to run or govern the world. >> holman: as in previous speeches, ahmadinejad also questioned the holocaust and he accused the west of using it to maintain unwavering support of israel. hundreds of palestinians protested today against u.s. opposition to palestinian statehood efforts in the u.n. the demonstrators waved flags and chanted against the u.s. position. they gathered outside the palestinian president's office in the west bank and in gaza. in his u.n. speech yesterday, president obama again urged palestinian president mahmoud abbas to seek statehood only through direct talks with israel. in yemen, at least 15 people were killed as government forces attacked protesters in sanaa with mortars, grenades and sniper fire. the clashes broke a cease-fire negotiated on tuesday. amateur video from the city showed thick smoke rising above the skyline. the latest violence took the

death toll to 100 across yemen since sunday. the top u.s. military officer accused pakistan today of exporting violence to wage attacks inside afghanistan. admiral mike mullen-- the chairman of the joint chiefs-- pointed to the haqqani militant network, based in pakistan. that group has been implicated in a series of recent, high- profile attacks. >> the haqqani network, for one, acts as a veritable arm of pakistan's internal services intelligence agency. with i.s.i. support, haqqani operatives plan and conducted that truck bomb attack, as well as the assault on our embassy. we also have credible intelligence that they were behind the june 28 attack on the inter-continental hotel in kabul and a host of other smaller but effective operations. >> holman: defense secretary leon panetta also testified. he said the u.s. has warned pakistan's intelligence agency that future cross-border attacks won't be tolerated.

the pakistani interior minister rehman malik rejected the u.s. accusations. and he warned against any american ground incursion into pakistan. there was word today that a bedrock assumption of physics may be in jeopardy. scientists in europe reported they have clocked sub-atomic particles called "neutrinos", going faster than the speed of light-- 186,282 miles an hour. that's not supposed to be possible under albert einstein's special theory of relativity. the researchers said, if the findings check out, it will force a fundamental reassessment of modern physics. those are some of the day's major stories. now, back to judy. >> woodruff:: the threat of a government shutdown once again loomed over washington today. house republican leaders were scrambling to secure enough votes after their first attempt to pass a bill that would fund the government through november 18 failed on the floor last night. at the heart of the dispute is the amount of emergency disaster relief funding included in the bill and how it is paid for.

both parties sparred thursday over who was to blame for the impasse. within there's no threat of government shutdown. let's just get this out there. this continuing resolution was designed to be a bipartisan bill. and we had every reason to believe that our counterparts across the aisle were supportive. and once they began to see where some of our votes are, they decided to play politics and vote against disaster relief, for millions of americans who have been affected by this. >> well, we're watching the tea party shutdown movie for the third time this year, neff's gotten two thumbs down for attempts to shut down the government over the cr first round and shut down the economy and the economy over the debt ceiling. but still they put this movie up on the screen again. the ending isn't surprising, it isn't even interesting any more. we know how this ends.

ultimately they'll realize that the american people are fed up with this strategy of shutting down our government and threatening to do it time and again. >> woodruff:: for more on this still developing story, we are joined by naftali bendavid, congressional correspondent for the "wall street journal." good to you have back with us. >> thanks for having me. >> woodruff: so another impasse in the congress, another possible government shutdown, say it ain't so. what are the real prospects? >> well, the truth is that i think both parties are very well aware that the voters were absolutely disgusted by the last time this happened, by the threat of default and government shutdown before that. and you saw speaker boehner be very careful to distance himself from any possibility of a government shutdown. and i think both parties know that that would be very poorly received by voters. of course it's always possible if they can't by october 1st figure out how to resolve their differences over the spending bill, we could see the threat of a shutdown but my sense is that both of them understand how unpopular that would be, and that's going to make them work very hard to avoid

it. >> woodruff: so naftali, explain for us the basis of what this fight is all about. >> what the debate comes down to is disaster aid relief, there is hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, all kinds of stuff and that makes victims that need federal aid so the senate put forward a bill that would provide $700 billion in that aid, a democratic proposal. the house is proposing $3.6 billion, but a catch there is that they want to offset some 6 that with a big cut elsewhere in the federal government,-- federal budget. and so that's really what the fight has come down to. is over how to handle disaster relief. >> woodruff: and when we hear the speaker put the blame on democrats saying they were playing games, i mean, the fact is it's more complicated than that. there were members of his own party who said they are not going to go along with it. >> yeah, i mean 48 house republicans voted against this spending bill that was backed by house republican leaders. i just think when you run the chamber and 48 of your members defect, you can't really blame the other side.

i mean the minority votes against the bill. the democrats were actually uncharacteristically unified in opposing this bill. but that is what the minority party does and can be expected to do. i think really was a problem for house republican leaders. it's a problem they faced before and are likely to face it again. they have these 50 rebellious conservative members that are likely to oppose a lot of what the leadership tries to do. >> woodruff: what is-- that is what i was going to ask, who are the holdouts and what is it they don't like about this legislation. >> you know, it is the same people that have opposed similar bills in the past. it tends to be-- many are freshman, others are just conservatives that have been around a long time. many of them have tea party backing but they're unhappy with the level of spending in this bill. the spending in this bill is a level that was agreed to by both parties after the debt limit debate. but these folks think it should be a lot lower. and they just flat out, four dozen of them said they are not going to support it for that reason. and all the arm twisting and ca joeling and pleading that boehner and other republican leaders tried to do wasn't enough to change their mind. >> woodruff: and the ca joeling was going on today.

but meanwhile the democrats who as you said were uncharacteristically united on this, don't like what it was that the money was going to come out of that was going to be offset. >> yeah, they were very unhappy that the money was going to come out of a program that promoted energy efficiency in cars. and you know, they think it's a program that has done a lot of good, that's provided a lot of jobs. but there's another issue here too which is it is no accident that democrats are planting their flag in a terrain of disaster relief. this is one area that a lot of people, even people who think the government should be spending a lot less, they favor the government spending money to help suffering americans in need. and it's a way for democrats to kind of underline that the government can do good things, that sometimes federal spending serves a good purpose. so they picked a fairly popular area and they figured this was a good political fight for them to have. >> woodruff: because traditionally disaster relief has been almost a given when it has come up before congress. >> absolutely. and it hasn't been offset by cuts elsewhere. it's just one of those areas

where military spending is sort of like this as well. but perhaps not even as much. there is just something about seeing americans struck by a tornado or by a hurricane or by wildfires that makes other people want to help them and feel like this is a legit mass role for the government. so usually these things are funded by energy spending measures usually not offsettles where. again the democrats felt like if they were going to make a case for spending rather than having it be on some obscure program, this was a way to do it. and i think that is why the fight has come to where it is. >> woodruff: so where does this go from here. we know the senate majority leader harry reid said today that these offsets involving energy spending that you mentioned, energy cuts will not fly in the senate. so what happens now? >> well, they have to reach some kind of compromise. i mean one thing the democrats are really worried about. it is not just this particular offset. they are worried about creating a particular precedent where any time there is disaster relief spending, some government program gets slashed. they want to make sure the precedent maintain this kind of spending doesn't

necessarily get taken from elsewhere in the budget. so you know, they're going to have to sfinld compromise. one possibility is that they have the lower level of spending, that the republicans want but that they take away this offset so no other program gets sacrificed in order to support this spending. and that's my sense of probably where it's going to go. but you know they don't have that much time. they are supposed to be in research next week. right after that the fiscal year comes to an end so they are operating under something of a deadline. >> woodruff: meanwhile finely naftali to what extent are members of congress aware of how this looks to the rest of the country even the rest of the world. >> i think they are all too aware, to tell you the truth. when they went home in august, there was such a public backlash over the brinksmanship over threats of default and government shutdown, a sense that congress wasn't able to tackle the big problems facing the country, they were more interested in bickering and arguing. that they came back, particularly the republicans, somewhat chastened and determined to look more like they were going to cooperatement but this immediately came up, immediately they are back at it.

i think they know that this looks terrible. and i think that's one reason that we are probably going to have a resolution relatively soon. but of course with congress you just never know whs's going to happen. >> woodruff: i marked down that you said that on september 22nd, we will see, naftali bendavid of "the wall street journal," thank you. >> thanks very much. >> brown: next tonight, ray suarez reports on a mideast leader rapidly raising his country's profile in the region and beyond. >> reporter: the turkish prime minister recep tayyip erdogan took his latest turn on the world stage this afternoon. he addressed the u.n. general assembly and called for recognizing a palestinian state. >> ( translated ): it is necessary to put pressure on israel to achieve peace despite what those who govern this country do and to show them clearly they're not above the law and one of the most important steps that need to be taken in this regard is recognizing the just demands of

the palestinian people to be recognized as state and to have the representatives of the state of palestine take their well deserved place in this august assembly as a member of the u.n. >> reporter: it was erdogan's latest move in a growing effort to bolster turkey's standing in the middle east and it's gotten washington's attention. henri barkey is a specialist in turkish affairs, and a former state department official in the clinton administration. he's now at lehigh university. >> now you see that given that the turks have done very well economically, they have essentially used soft power to establish a position in the region, given that they are both a nato country and also a country that is a candidate for the european union, they are in an exceedingly good position. on top of that, in the region countries like iran, egypt, syria, israel, all are having their own problems and therefor turkey has emerged as the

uncontested regional power. >> reporter: as part of their political offensive, the turks have broken with longtime ally israel. relations were strained by last year's israeli raid on a turkish-based aid flotilla that tried to break israel's blockade of gaza. nine people were killed. last month, the turkish government again demanded an apology and again the israelis refused. turkey then kicked out the israeli ambassador, and renewed a threat to have turkish navy ships escort future aid flotillas. erdogan addressed the issue at a meeting of arab foreign ministers last week. >> ( translated ): the conditions we have set are still in effect and must be met in order for turkish-israeli relations to return to normal. so long as israel does not apologize, so long as they do

not pay reparations to the victims' families, so long as they do not lift their naval blockade of gaza, turkish- israeli relations will not return to normal. >> reporter: that appearance was part of what you might call the turkish leader's arab spring tour. he received a warm reception in egypt and met with that country's prime minister essam sharraf. and erdogan was lauded in libya on friday. he greeted crowds and later discussed turkish aid for the new government and potential investments. henri barkey says the turkish break with israel has greatly enhanced ankara's influence across the region, but it does pose a risk. >> turkish-israeli relations are in a low point, the lowest point they have been in a very, very long time. what i worry is that they can actually go even lower. and that is the big danger at the moment. the rhetoric that's coming out the worrisome part is that an accident may happen on the high seas, something else, there are many other incidents that can

take place that will make the relationship even worse. and that will also be very dangerous for the united states because it will involve the united states. >> reporter: there's also been a new flare-up off cyprus, long a flashpoint between turkey and greece. greek cypriots and a u.s. partner started drilling for offshore oil and gas this week. but yesterday, erdogan signed an agreement to help turkish cypriots conduct their own exploration and he warned the turkish military would protect them. today, the greek cypriots announced they'd be willing to share any energy finds. all of this has added to erdogan's widespread support back home. his justice and development party won re-election by a landslide four months ago giving him a third term. but even as he seeks a larger profile in the wider world, his regime faces many challenges. they include, a stalled bid to join the european union, failed attempts to get a new

constitution and an increasing terrorist threat. kurdish separatists have escalated attacks in the country since july. and today, they claimed responsibility for a deadly car bombing at a high school in ankara on tuesday. >> brown: at the united nations tomorrow, the palestine issue will continue to be center stage with speeches from palestinian leader mahmoud abbad and israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu. >> woodruff: now, can a mid-size city rebuild itself in such a way that it promotes healthier living at a time of economic distress? that question is very much on the minds of citizens on one texas community. "newshour" health correspondent betty ann bowser has the story. >> reporter: galveston island texas is one of those american coastal cities that gets hurricanes, in fact, there have

been 11 in a little over 100 years. the last big one, hurricane ike, hit in 2008. and three years later, you don't have to look very far see the havoc it created on this barrier island beach community of 48,000. so once again galveston is rebuilidng, but this time around some residents want to do that in a way no city has tried before. they want to make galveston a healthier place to live. long time resident betty massey is the current head of the island's rebuilding committee. following hurricane ike she had an "ah-ha" moment. >> it wasn't good enough to just go back the way we were. that's not what we wanted to do. we wanted to have some vision for our community. >> reporter: massey's vision is a city that builds structures that encourage exercise and make it easier for residents to get healthy food. those lofty goals have been

endorsed by the centers for disease control, the institute of medicine and a growing body of evidence that shows things like bike paths, sidewalks and grocery stores can make a difference in health outcomes. some island residents think all that's just a bunch of talk, but not betty massey. >> it's not pie in the sky to rebuild a community with a healthier infrastructure than it is as well as the hardscape. it's not more pie in the sky to do that then it is for a town like galveston to build higher to stronger wind codes to more wind and flood resistant buildings. but let's also build a community that is also more resilient more sustainable. not just our buildings but the >> reporter: lexi nolen is director of the center to eliminate health disparities at the university of texas' medical branch in galveston.

>> what this map outlines is every place you can buy food on the island, so restaurants, even bars. >> reporter: she and her colleagues are using a computer generated mapping system to identify unhealthy areas of the city. >> we've identified a number of indicators that are related to community health. what is it in a neighborhood that helps to make that community healthier or less healthy? one indicator for instance is access to healthy foods. we know that when people have access to nutritious foods, affordable foods that they tend to have better diets. >> reporter: nolen has spent a lot of time focusing on neighborhoods like this one and what she thinks it needs. >> a park for kids, a recreation center, a senior center, elderly adults need a place to come together congregate, have fun, stay physically active. we need places where people have opportunities to work. economic development is a critical component of creating a healthy neighborhood.

>> reporter: one of the island's business leaders has no problem with building healthy neighborhoods, but jeff sjostrom who runs galveston's economic development partnership says a lot of business people are concerned about where they fit into the picture. >> i think businesses in general are concerned about the overall economy period. there are a lot of challenges that we've confronted as a community over the last two or three years from natural disasters and hurricanes. so at the end of the day everybody wants to know where's the money, who's going to pay for it, who's going to be responsible for it. >> reporter: in parts of the country where community leaders have brought grocery stores into food dessert areas. they've relied on millions of dollars from public/private partnerships to lure food companies into neighborhoods. in galveston no such partnerships exist and there is no funding to even develop a plan for grocery stores or transportation upgrades.

and there are other problems. texas a&m marine scientist sam brody, who's studied barrier islands like galveston says the sandbar the city sits on is constantly moving and with its vulnerability to hurricanes. all this rebuilding with health in mind could be washed away the next time a major storm comes through. >> a barrier island is a moving target. so think about trying to develop a sustainable resilient community for generations on a moving target. that's extremely difficult to do and then with throw in politics, economics, the national economy and some very important strategic and historic assets the island holds we create a storm of its own. >> reporter: after ten but some residents say no matter how difficult change must come. in some neighborhoods, there are no supermarkets, only mom and

pop convenience stores that sell junk food and liquor at inflated prices. earl williams lives in one of these areas. he's spent all 44 years of his life here and even though he loves it. he admits living here is tough. for a loaf of bread williams can walk to the corner convenience store, but getting fresh groceries? that's something else. since the williams do not have a car and there are no direct buslines. we volunteered to pay for a cab and asked to follow along on the six and a half mile drive to the nearest grocery store. >> my cab fare is normally around close to $15 total one way going there and then $15 coming back. so every time i go that's $30 that i'm spending on a cab just to go and get food for the house. and you know that's not including putting food away and the rest of it, so if we leave in the morning at 9:00 am we

would get back home probably around 2:30 or 3:00 pm, something like that and it takes up half the day. >> reporter: by the time all that's done, williams' food allowance is shot, so he would be thrilled to see a new grocery store close by. >> oh! i would love that. i would love it. then i wouldn't have to spend money on cabs and i could buy more food. >> reporter: nurse practitioner kate fiandt thinks access to a good grocery store would go along way to improving the health of her patients at a health clinic funded by the university in a low income area. >> they are working poor with major health problems, diabetes, 30% are diabetic, 50% have hypertension very chronic, very ill, sickest population i've ever seen in primary care. if we can invest money in keeping these people healthier not healthy necessarily but healthier better lifestyles, more active, better control of

their diabetes, less likely to get diabetes, better control of their blood pressure then they are not going to become more ill. so just on a very pragmatic level, it's you get a return on your investment >> reporter: economist and school board member norman pappous isn't so sure about that. he sees significant obstacles to making people healthier especially in low income areas. >> i think they are barking up the wrong tree, when they basically want to come in and create a utopia on a few square blocks of downtown galveston that is something that they are hoping is going to work and they are using our tax money to do it. i think there is a high probability it's wasted money. >> reporter: and, pappous has even more doubts about current plans to build mixed income housing on the same lots where public housing once stood before ike. >> they are not areas of high opportunity and they are areas of heavy concentration of unemployment and poverty.

>> reporter: u.t.m.b's lexi nolan knows there are big challenges ahead as she tries to convince city leaders to adopt a new mind set about rebuilding. >> what we are asking is that they look into what the health implications of their decisions are and take that into account when they make a decision. it's reasonable to say that a health decision is not going to win the day every single time. there are lots of other reasons why we make the decisions that we do. sometimes they are economic, sometimes they are political, but what we do expect is that information be considered in the mix. >> reporter: health policy what eventually happens here will be determined by a number of different government agencies with the galveston city council ultimately calling most of the shot. but however it turns out, health policy people will be watching. no city has ever tried such big ideas before.

>> brown: and to another in our "economist film project" series highlighting the art of filmmaking. every year during the chinese new year, 130 million workers return from their jobs in industrial cities for visits to their homes and families in the countryside. that's the subject of the documentary, "last train home". i sat down with the filmmaker recently. here's our conversation. >> brown: the film captures the scale of this epic journey in the chaos and confusion of train stations but it also narrows the focus to the human told on one particular family, a husband and wife working for years in a sewing factory far from their increasingly estranged children. the filmmaker lixin fan was a familiar raman for chinese tv before beginning to work on documentaries. last train home is his first

as a director. welcome to you. >> thank you, jeff, thanks for having me. >> brown: now at the beginning of this film you refer to this as the largest migration in the world. so tell me what drew you to the story and what were you trying to say. >> in fact, it is the largest annual human migration in the world so it means it happens every year before the chinese new year. when i was working for cctv, the chinese state broadcaster, i had a lot of chance to travel to remote areas in china . -- china. and i see for myself the poverty that are still existing all over the country. and whenever i travel back to beijing, sort of back to my little comfortable life, i really feel the disparity between the rich and the poor, that are just heartbreaking for me. so i decided that i wanted to make a film about the chinese migrant workers. and they are 200 million of them. i think they deserve a story of their own.

>> brown: so you, and as i said, you tell it through one particular family who gave you remarkable access for a long period of time, right? how did you find these people? and what did they allow you to do? >> i-- i went to the city of guongxo where most of the factories are, i walked around those factories and talked to many migrants. i have done some research and so i wanted to find a particular kind of family in which i was hoping that they were migrating for decades and maybe there is children and elderlies in their family so that their story can sort of help me portray many aspects of this migration, internal migration. and so i bumped-- after a talked about 50, 60 migrant workers, and their story really struck me when the mother, told me that how

she-- how heartbroken she was when she first had to leave her village and her baby, the daughter, who was only 8 months old back then. she told me that, i cried and cried. my sisters were accompanying us to walk to the-- to the outside of the village. and they all toll me to leave. but i know that i could not. i have to leave with my husband to go find work so that my baby can grow up, have a better life. it just ripped me. >> brown: so when we joined the film here, it is about, they've been working there for 15 years. this young child is now a young girl, a teenage girl, right. and there's another younger brother that she has. let's look at a clip that we have a couple of excerpts here. one is when the parents are calling home, and we see a little bit of the frustration there. and then another is from this scene i mentioned at the train station where

millions of people are trying to get a train at the same time, right. let's watch that clip. >> did you get your report card? did you do well, huh? so-so. you have to keep studying hard. we didn't get the tickets yet. it will take a few more days. i call you when we get the tickets. are you there? within we'll have to try and buy expensive tickets now. yeah, it's difficult to buy tickets anywhere. i will be so happy to see my

kids. i've been away for far too long. >> when we are at home we don't even know what to say to the kids. >> you know, i've seen that scene on the big screen and it's remarkable the sweep there, so many people. how did you shoot it, how long did it take to shoot it. how did you get-- how did you get all that? >> that shot, that thing you saw where you see a lot of the chaos at the train station was in the year 2008

where when southern china was hit by a snowstorm, a record snowstorm in 50 years. and putting the entire, well, putting half of countries railway system out of order. so hundreds of millions of migrants got stuck in the province, and we were with this family in the train station for three days and three nights. on one hand we need to keep our eye on them and keep following them and also we were trying to also get the big picture of what this migration, what is really the magnitude of this migration. i worked with a wonderful crew and there was no complaining, and the condition you can see from the film. >> brown: yes, because you had to get right in there with all these people. must have lost each other and lost your zubts along the way, right. >> yeah, we have to get right in. and when there is a chance, even the slightest chance we

need to get ourselves out to get the pan rama shots of the crowd. so we lost them at times, especially at night. and cell phone doesn't work there wall street too many people and the network all were jammed. so we came up with this idea because the characters, the parents were always wearing wireless mikes so my soundman give them a whole bunch of batteries and teach them how to change the battery every five hours before it drains. and we told them that whenever you don't see us around please talk to your mike, let us know where you are and we will go through the crowd to find them. so by doing this we lost each other and found each other, in the train station for three days. >> how much of telling this story is personal for you, having grown-up in china yourself. and as you say, sort of seeing it in part in your television work, and then wanting to tell the story.

i mean we hear constantly of this change in china, right. what is it for you? >> when i started to work for television as i see all the different aspects of this changing china, i more and more felt that the migrant workers are really the backbone of this country. i mean we all know that china is so heavily dependent on its export. the chinese economy is so heavily depend-- dependant on its export. behind all the made in china goods that everyone of us consume here in the world, are really the migrant workers. and you see how they sacrifice, in all those different ways. they are-- they had to leave their homeland and leave behind their loved ones to tour if a factory that is probably of the worst conditions and get very low wage and no benefit, no

welfare. and they, at the don't get much payback. and that's to me just not right. so i think that's essentially what, why i wanted to make this film. >> all right, the film is last train home. lixin fan, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> brown: there's more of our interview >> brown: there's more of our interview with lixin fan on our website. "last train home" airs on the pbs series "p.o.v." next tuesday, september 27. and you can learn about the "economist film project" or submit your own film at film.economist.com. >> woodruff:: and finally tonight, in a year of floods, fires and storms. we hear from poet and editor jeffrey yang. we caught up with him earlier this year at new york city's highline-- the elevated park on manhattan's west side. he talked about how poets have grappled with the power of nature over the centuries.

here's our encore look. >> the air consisted in believing that the earth was ours, when the reality of the situation is that we belong to the earth. >> my name is jeffrey yang and i work as an editor in new directions publishing. i've been there 11 years, i'm also a poet and for our 75th anniversary this year at new direction i edited this collection of nature poems called birds-- and seeds culled from 75 years of new directions publishing history. we've seen so many natural disasters this year, with floods and wildfires in this country, tsunami in japan, i think it's on people's minds a lot. i think poetry in general brings us to a certain kind of awareness about things. with nature poetry a lot of these poems might not come directly out of, say, a natural disaster. but a lot of the poems, i

think, relate to what is happening. and a lot of it is about how we heal in ways from these disasters. how does our mind function in nature and how is it a part of nature. a lot of these poems kind of speak to that as well. this is william everson's poem, we in the field. >> we in the field, the watchers from the burnt slope, facing the west, facing the bright sky, hopelessly longing to know the red. but the unable eye, the two small, intelligent, the insufficient organs of reception, enough to take and retain. we stared and no speaking, himself a deep loneness of incomprehension. >> the flesh must turn, the spirit air, transformation to sky and the burning, absolute oneness with the west and the down sun. but we being first stuck,

watched from the field, so the rising rim shut out the light, saw the sky change, the long wound heal, so the rains fell. he's writing from the perspective of a poet watching these fires coming. but unable to understand what is really happening, from what i saw editing this, the earliest poetry coming out of the chinese and the greek and on through is really there is this mystery that is at the heart of nature. of not being able to understand it. >> this is godfrey ben's poet epilogue. -- falling. the blueness is dying now, and the corals are peal as the water around the island. the drunken torrents are broken. grown alien to you, to me. our only possession, the silence of a bone washed clean by the sea, of a flood, the plain, the question, so the ashes tell you one day, life is the building of bridges over rivers that

away. >> that was poet and editor jeffrey yang reading from >> woodruff:: that was poet and editor jeffrey yang reading from his collection of poems about nature called "birds, beasts and seas." >> brown: again, the major developments of the day: markets plunged around the world on mounting fears of a global economic recession. the dow jones industrials lost nearly 400 points. the president of iran mahmoud ahmadinejad denounced the u.s. and western nations in a fiery speech at the u.n. the american delegation and others walked out as he spoke. an editor's note before we go: lost we said the speed of light is more than 186,000 miles per hour. please hold your letters, it is, of course, per second. and speaking of letters many viewers wrote about our inequality story last night saying we mistakenly suggested custodial nursing home care is covered by medicare. to clarify, the two nursing home residents we profiled were in fact receiving both medicare and medicaid which is known as "mass health" in massachusetts.

but it is true long-term nursing home care is usually covered by medicaid, not medicare. find more about tonight's stories and a preview for tomorrow on our website. kwame holman explains. kwame? >> holman: we have a photo essay about galveston's rebuilding. ray reflects on his reporting from the u.n. this week and we've posted full video of iranian leader mahmoud ahmadinejad's speech to the general assembly on our world page. today's morning line looks ahead to tonight's debate among republican presidential hopefuls in florida, something we'll cover on the broadcast tomorrow. that's on our politics page plus on art beat, jeff talks to a rolling stone editor about the official breakup of the popular rock band r.e.m. all that and more is on our web site: newshour.pbs.org. judy? >> woodruff:: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. we'll see you online and again

here tomorrow evening with mark shields and david brooks, among others. thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: supporting science, technology, and improved economic performance and financial literacy in the 21st century. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions

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