captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight: election day approaches. with less than three weeks to go, the campaigns focus on key battlegrounds. then, cashing in on covid. how some investors got word from the white house early on that things were worse than the public heard. and, flash point. the conflict between armenia and azerbaijan escalates as both sides accuse the other of violating a cease-fire. >> the de facto authorities in karabakh have long contended that they need to hold onto these areas in order to have a link to the republic of armenia

and as a security buffer with azerbaijan. >> woodruff: all tt and more, on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ >> when the world gets complicated, a lot goes through your mind. with fidelity wealth management, a dedicated advisor can tailor advice and recommendations to your life. that's fidelity wealth management. >> consumer cellular. >> johnson & johnson. >> financial services firm raymond james. >> bnsf railway. >> the kendeda fund. committed to advancing restorative justice and meaningful work through

investments in transformative leaders and ideas. more at kendedafund.org. >> carnegie corporation of new york. supporting innovations in education, democratic engagement, and the advancement of international peace and security. at carnegie.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: president trump and democratic rival joe biden were supposed to meet face to face

tonight. instead, they will wage a kind of ratings war, appearing at the same time, on different television networks. lisa desjardins begins our coverage. >> desjardins: in philadelphia today, another strange stage in the pandemic. former vice president joe biden will hold a town hall here tonight with abc news, the night when he was to have his second debate with president trump. that was canceled following the president's coronavirus diagnosis nearly two weeks ago. instead, vots get a network tv face-off, with trump holding a separate town hall at the same time tonight on nbc. >> i'll see you later on nbc! >> desjardins: there was some more traditional campaigning today. the president spoke in greenville, north carolina. >> 19 days from now-- think of that. 19 days. can you believe this? we're going to win the state of north carolina. we're going to win four more years in the white house. >> four more years!

four more years! >> desjardins: the crowd was enthusiastic for trump, and many openly defiant of health guidelines, not wearing masks and standing closely together. democrats' v.p. nominee, california senator kamala harris, was also to be in the tarheel state today, but the campaign canceled all harris events through the weekend out of caution, after two people working with her campaign tested positive for coronavirus last night. test test its campaign announced an aviation administrator no flew on biden he pleaj also tested positive for covid-19. the campaign says harris and biden did not have any recent close contact with the people who tested positive. last night vice president biden tested negative for covid-19. at the same time, there was good news for the biden campaign. last night, the democratic nominee announced another

record-breaking fundraising haul, $383 million in september. >> that's more than i've ever raised in my whole life! >> desjardins: the trump campaign hasn't yet announced its september fundraising numbers. biden's cash boost is part of a tsunami of donations reaching other democrats as well. in arizona's senate race, challenger mark kelly announced raising $38.7 million in the past three months, making him the second democrat this year to break the record set by beto o'rourke in 2018. the other was jamie harrison in south carolina, challenging republican lindsey graham. harrison raised an eye-popping $57 million in quarter three. the question is, how they can spend it all? it is now 19 days until the election. re than 17 million voters in 42 states have already cast their ballots, by mail or by early in-person voting. >> woodruff: that's a lot of

voters. meanwhile, a new pbs newshour/npr/marist poll shows former vice president joe biden with an 11-point lead over president trump in the race for the white house. for more, lisa desjardins join me now. know you have been looking at these numbers, what is behind this wide gap for joe biden and how much of it is republicans leaving president trump? >> we got some of fascinating datee here-- data, judy, polls can be flawed. he want to look the a things that can be beyond the margin of errors, it is not republican shifting, let's look at what we see, you lack at who is supporting whom. republicans and democrats are both supporting an overwhelming numbers looking at a graphic, 93 there, 96%, they are supporting thrair candidate. who is making a difference, independents, look at what in our survey we saw 57 percent of independents going for biden and fascinatingly, judy t is not just any independents who are

driving this, let's lack at another graphic a little bit deeper within independents, looking at men and women who call themselves independents, 48% of independents men for biden but look at that, 70% of women describe themselves as independents going for biden. so judy, that is where we see the most movement and where biden is getting the lift. >> woodruff: interesting. and lisa, i know the poll not only asked people for whom they plan to vote, but how they plan to vote. what did you see there? >> this is so important, judy. let's get right to this traffic. first of all people who say that th are going to vote on election day, 62% of them in our survey said that they are voting for trump. those who are voting early either in person early or by mail, let's look at that. the opposite. you see two thirds or more of those folks voting early are voting for joe biden. now speaking to a source in the biden campaign, judy, they feel good about this.

they say the trump campaign is wasting an opportunity by they say making voters scred of mail-in voting. but we all need to be aware that it could have an affect on election night results if so many of biden support ares are voting early and could be counted later depending on how each state works. >> woodruff: and i know we're going to be following all of that very closely on election night and up until then. but just quickly, lisa, with regard, i know you are also following the saddest of these coronavirus economic aid relie talks, tell us where that stands tonight. >> secretary of treasury mnuchin spoke with house speaker nancy pelosi for an hour and 22 minute this afternoon, one of their longer conrsations. mnuchin and the tru administration have agreed to what pelosi wants, he says on testing. but those two sides are still not on the same page. they will speak overnight and there is one more problem too. the leader of the republican senate, mitch mcconnell says

he is t close to where the white house is. he wants a $500 billion deal versus $1.8 trillion. so these talks continue. we'll watch them but they are still not there. >> woodruff: a lot of people waiting to see whether that comes together. lisa desjardins, thank you so much. >> woodruff: in the day's other news, senate republicans vowed to subpoena the c.e.o.f twitter for blocking a politically charged "new york post" story that's uncorroborated. it involved hunter biden, son of presidential candidate joe biden, and his business dealings in ukraine. president ump accused twitter of censoring news to help democrats. the company said the story violated a rule against spreading private formation obtained through hacking. the senate judiciary committee

now plans to vote one week from today on the confirmation of supreme court nominee amy coney barrett. the panel's republican majority set the schedule today, after a discussion that once again split along party lines. >> what we are seeing here is an exercise of just raw political power. you're moving ahead with this nomination because you can. but might does not make right. and the american people put us here to do what we think is right. >> the disappointment of our democratic colleagues is real, because they've been accustomed to the supreme court being policymakers. so, i understand their disappointment. but i think their loss is the american people's gain. >> woodruff: republicans are pushing to get barrett confirmed by the full senate before election day the u.s. economy is giving off

fresh signals that its recovery from the pandemic may be stalling. the labor department reported today that new unemployment claims jumped to 898,000 last week. 17 states reported sizeable increases. covid-19 infections in the u.s. are also surging again, with almost 60,000 new cases a day, spread across 44 states. that prompted fresh warnings today from infectious disease expert, dr. anthony fai. in an interview, he said things could get much worse, with cold weather coming. >> you don't want to be in that compromised position, where your baseline daily infection is high, and you are increasing, as opposed to going in the other direction. so we really got to double down on the fundamental public health measures that we talk about every single day, because they can make a difference. >> woodruff: fauci urged

americans to reconsider plans for thanksgiving gatherings that could spread the vus. in yemen, warring parties began a long-awaited prisoner swap brokered by the u.n. it involves some 1,000 men held by a saudi coalition and shiite houthi rebels backed by iran. today, the first of the saudi coalition prisoners held by the houthilanded in yemen's capital, sanaa, with emotional tarmac reunions. yesterday, theouthis also freed two captive americans. the president of kyrgyzstan resigned today after a week of protests. unrest in the central asian country started after his allies were declared the winners of disputed parliamentary elections. this is the third time that a kyrgyz leader has been ousted by popular uprising since 2006. thailand's capital, bangkok, is under a strict state of emergency over protests aimed at the monarchy and ruling establishment. despite that, ousands of pro-democracy demonstrators still rallied in the business district today.

many made a three-finger salute symbolizing defiance. >> ( translated ): a reform of the monarchy institution is calling for a change, not an abolishment. we want the monarchy to remain under a democratic system, just like every other nation. the elite system should no longer exist. >> woodruff: the demonstrations, led by students, have grown over the past three months, calling back in this country, more than 50,000 customers across northern california went without power today, in the face of extreme fire danger. pacific gas and electric imposed outages last night, fearing high winds could blow down powerlines and spark new flames. the state has already had more than 8,500 wildfires this year. the u.s. postal service is reversing changes that slowed postal service nationwide. it is part of a legal settlement

with the state of montana, and it ends changes that cut retail hours and removed some coection boxes and sorting machines. the agreement also gives priority to election mail. the u.s. justice department has brought its largest tax fraud case ever against an individual. software mogul robert brockman was charged today in a $2 billion scheme. federal prosecutors say that he used secret accounts to hide and launder money over 20 years. and on wall street, stocks had another lackluster day. the dow jones industrial average lost 19 points to close at 28,494. the nasdaq fell 54 points, and the s&p 500 slipped five points. still to come on the newshour: how some investors got word from the white house early on that things were worse than the public heard. with less than three weeks to go before election day, we visit the battleground state of iowa. we compare media coverage of the president's campaign to that of his 2016 run. and, much more.

>> woodruff: back in late february, when the pandemic was beginning to take hold in the u.s., the president and his team downplayed the risk to the american public. but, a new report finds that key advisers to the president were conveying a very different message to other audiences. and, some financial traders may have been able to profit in the stock market because of it. amna nawaz has more of those details. >> nawaz: judy, the "new york times" reported that in late february, two white house advisers, larry kudlow and tomas phillipson, privately told board members of the conservative hoover institution that there was uncertainty about the virus and how it could upend life in the u.s. that would later prove true, but neither the president nor his administration were saying that publicly.

and, the message delivered privately made its way a number of elite traders, who in tn, reportedly bet the economy would slow down. that would also prove true. william cohan is an author and former investment banker, who worked in wall street finance for 17 years. he joins me now. welcome the newshour, that memo from the briefingk we should mention someone who is in the briefings typed up some note, sent them out to a bunch of contacts, made its way to staff, additional contact, basically made its way to a number of money management firms within a day. if you are in the business of making money, you are an investor who sees that kind of memo coming from white house officials, what do you do, how does that inform your trading and why. >> so the question is what is your moral compass. what is your ethical compass. you get a memo like that and you know thapublicly these officials are saying one thing, ie the virus is no going to be

that bad. 15 cases are going to go to one, it is going to disappear like a miracle, if you are saying things like that publicly and you receive a memo privately that constitutes a briefing from those same officials who are much more worried and your instinct as a trader probably is to trade on that information, and make as much money as you possibly can, which is clearly what happened, what the implication is of "the new york times" article. but the question is should you be doing that. and that, unfortunately, is something that you only you and your morality code and ethical code can decide. as a legal matter it's much more complex because you're dealing with information that can move markets but not necessarily nonpublic confidential information of private companies. or public companies that obviously constitute insider trading. >> nawaz: i want to remind people about the public messages happening at the time. this is what is catching everyone's attention. those meetings we just talked

about, the private meetings in late february, the 24th, 259, and 26, publicly president trump tweeted this on february 24th. said the coronavirus is very much under control in the u.s.a., stock market starting to look very good to me. larry kudlow who we know is one of the advisors who conducted those private briefings went on cnbc on february 25th. he was asked about public warnings from cdc official, the virus could spread and this is what he had to say to that. >> we have contained it. i won't say airtight but pretty close to airtight. >> very different messages. the private one delivered as "the new york times" rerted and these public messages, why would an administration do that? >> as you know, we know amna from what bob woodward revealed in his book, you know, donald trump said that he was doing that to not get people all riled up, to keep the panic level low. but you know, frankly, if you are a trader, if you are a hedge

fund manager and you are getting ahold of that kind of information, your first instinct is to as they id to bet against mart ket, goshort, go short everything, to you know, especially-- essentially bet that the market will fall. and at is of course what happened. and if you do that, you make a lot of money. why on the one hand they would be saying privately that they are very worried and publicly th it saul under control? well, frankly t is extremely disingenuous it is frankly damaging. it's probably resulted in tens of thousands of more deaths than were necessary. and there, st rep ri-- reprehensible. >> you mentioned this earlier, but there is the question on everyone's mind. at the end of the day, what is the accountability? is there a legal issue, an ethical issue because we should remind people this was all happening and unfolding right before millions of americans plummeted into a recession. >> look, there should definitely be accountability for this. a working securities and

exchange commission, a well working securities and exchange commission would be all over this, trying to figure out who got ahold of those memos, who traded on it. what they got out of that, how much money they made. but i'm afraid am this administration all the people, many of the people who ran these agencies are beholden to done all trump and they don't investigate things like this. i have been writing since last year, last july and then again in october and again in january about suspicious trading that was going on at the chicago board of options. in something called e mini future options when people got ahold of this information that was moving markets before other people and then traded on it. and they made tens of millions if not hundreds of millions of dollars. but there's never been any investigation and unfortunately this is just another one of those examples. it is big news for a day but nothing ever happens about it. and the people who have made money are happy as clams.

and st not right and st unfair to the rest of the people without don't have that information. and frankly who are suffering from this covid virus that was not fully explicated and the damaging nailt of it was not fully shared by the people in highest post in the government who knew about it. >> nawaz: some important reporting from "the new york times" that absolutely begs more questions that is william cohan, author and form are investment banker joining us tonight. thank you for your time. >> thank you. >> woodruff: president trump spent last night rallying supporters in iowa, a state he won by ten points in 2016, but is now seen as a toss-up by the non-partisan cook political report. the state also has one of the closest-watched and most expensive senate races in the country. with more than $100 million in outside money pouring in, recent

polling shows the incumbent republican in a dead heat. andrew batt of ia pbs has our report. >> we're seeing more money pumped into these races this year than we've seen in presidential election cycles of the past. it is outrageous. >> reporter: the tone of senator joni ernst's recent campaign rally in iowa epitomized republican fears just three weeks before election day: growg concern about a blue tsunami of campaign funds aimed at iowa's junior senator. facing her first re-election since winning iowa by more than 9% and catapulting onto the national political stage in 2014, ernst is framing her current race as a litmus test with rural voters. >> it is important that you hear not just from those in the metro areas but also hear from those that live in the most rural counties, like in my area in southwest iowa.

oftentimes they feel neglected. even looking at the map where ms. greenfield has been and where she hasn't been, the neediest and poorest counties are those she has not visited. >> what's your name? hi, mary. i love waverly. >> reporter: with senator ernst spending crucial october campaign days in washington for supreme court hearings, challenger theresa greenfield has made a concerted effort to blunt the republican criticism th she spends too much time" safely" campaigng online during the pandemic. >> we certainly work real hard to get all over the state. physically all over the state, but virtually all over the state, too. >> reporter:nd she has increased her trips into some of those rural iowa countie previously won by both barack obama and donald trump. >> hey, guys, how are you? hello! >> reporter: greenfield, a former businesswoman and real estate executive, has never

held elected office, but was an early fundraising choice in 2019 by the democratic senatorial campaign committee. hr recent third quarter haul of more than $28 million shattered iowa record books. on a recent swing to waverly, iowa, greenfield emphasized main street business issues amidst a global pandemic and economic uncertainty. >> they're in dire shape. >> reporter: and, she is on the attack, claiming her own farm roots and working to undercut ernst's strength in farm country by blasting the senator's work with iowa's ethanol industry, in an ongoing battle with the trump administration's e.p.a. and oil companies. the tense dynamic between ert and greenfield on topics of" dark money" and the farm economy boiled over in their statewide debate oiowa pbs. >> heck, a bushel of corn right now is about $3.30. that's going-out-of-business prices. senator ernst, she sold out farmers for her big oil deals.

>> on one hand, she's saying "oh, no, we're not going to have dark money in this campaign." she's got the other hand behind her, saying "please hand me some dark money." >> reporter: on commercial airwaves, the messaging contrast from the 2014 republican primary to the 2020 general election is stark. >> i grew up castrating farms on an iowa farm. >> reporter: six years ago, state senator joni ernst promised to "make 'em squeal" in washington and take aim at the affordable care act. >> and once she sets her sights on obamacare, joni is going to unload. >> but my sister always had my back... >> reporter: this fall, her health care messaging is softer, and ernst is promising to defend a key tenant of the a.c.a., leading democrats to cry foul. >> no american should ever be denied coverage because of a pre-isting condition. >> just because you support the repeal of the affordable care act, doesn't mean you're against protecting people with

preexisting conditions. >> reporter:or greenfield, protecting the a.c.a. and social security are defining themes in the final weeks. >> and i stay focused on the issues we all care the most about, and that's health care, health care, health care, and certainly this pandemic and the economic crisis. >> reporter: it's a senate seat many iowa republicans never thought would be a tight race to the finish line with only weeks before election day. reporting from iowa for the pbs newshour, i'm andrew batt. >> woodruff: both president trump and former vice president biden were originally supposed to be debating tonight. but, as we know, the commission on presidential debates insisted on a virtual second debate. biden agreed, but mr. trump refused. instead, both men are now participating in separate town

lls airing on two different broadcast television networks, at the same time. tonight's dueling town halls sparked fresh criticism about how the mainstream news media are covering the election-- and whether or not they are being too deferential. those concerns date back to the 2016 presidential election, when then-candidate dond trump was given a disproportionate amount of airtime, compared to his democratic opponent hillary clinton. mr. trump drew attention for many reasons, but democrats and other critics say his sheer shock and entertainment value-- and the viewers they draw, higher ratings-- fueled lopsided coverage and let him float through the primaries without enough scrutiny. the "tyndall report" found that mr. trump alone accounted for more than twice the 2016 election coverage on the abc, nbc, and cbs evening newscasts

than did hillary clion and her campaign. a "new york times" analysis found he secured roughly the equivalent of $2 billion in free media coverage during that campaign. that was more than 2.5 times the free coverage given to clinton. >> the fake news... >>oodruff: the president's supporters, and many conservative voters, have long argued the press is unfair to their candidate-- a problem they say became much worse after trump unexpectedly won. they argue that much of the news media is obsessed with trying to take him down. but many journalists say it is the president's own headline- making statements, insults, falsehoods and frequent distortion of the facts that precipitate such extensive coverage. >> when mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. they're bringing drugs. they're bringing crime. they're rapists. >> woodruff: a number of studies show that immigrants and unauthorized residents do not

commit crimes at higher rates. a new documentary titled" enemies of the people," airing today on vice tv, takes a closer look at how the news media covered the president in the last election, and sits down with news leaders like cnn president jeff zucker. >> donald trump would say outrageous things or say things that weren't true, and it just became accepted-- "oh, well, that's what he does." not calling that out for more than what it was, and then holding the other side more accountable, that was probably a mistake. >> woodruff: another notable difference? a 2017 analysis from the columbia journalism review found that coverage of hillary clinton's use of a private email server dominated mainstream news coverage more than any other topic during the 2016 election. this time, republicans and some journalists say joe biden is the one not getting his fair share

of scrutiny. voters have one last opportunity to watch the president and the former vice president debate together, one week from today in nashville. yet another story broke late today, adding to the controversy over the fall debates. steve scully, the political editor at c-span who was supposed to moderate tonight's debate, was suspended by c-span for lying and saying his twitter account was hacked. scully made that claim last week after he exchanged messages with a former trump spokesman who is now opposed to trump. scully apologized. but president trump tweeted that "he was right. the debate was rigged... and the trump campaign was not treated fairly by the debates commission." let's take this moment to look at the news media's coverage of the campaign. james fallows is a writer and author, who wrote all about this for the "atlantic." and, susie banikarim is the director and producer of the

documentary we just mentioned. she's the executive vice president at vice news. vice new, we welcome you to the newshour, jim fallows what do you make of d-- abc had scheduled a town meeting with joe biden and nbc scheduled a town meeting, president trump, at the exact same time. >> in my view this was a very, very serious misjudgment by nbc which i think, i don't know whether this will have any lasting political significants, but i think it will be seen as a real miscalculation on their part. the reason is one of the lessons the news media looking back four years ago was yus their attraction to the spectacle of donald trump, covering his rallies in 2015 onward. we have seen that recently with the coronavirus, the coverage of the the helicopter from walter reed, the only reason to run these events head-to-head is for the spectacle value. seeing who is going to win the ratings value, et ceta, et

cetera. i think nbc could have given donald trump a time after joe biden, the next day or whatever. so i think this was an unfortunate judgment on their part. >> woodruff: susie what about that, you work with the networks, you know how these decisions are made. what do you think happened here. > i think this is incredibly disappointing but it is not a surprise. what trump's real skill is is knowing how to draw attention away from a story that is not working for him. so he didn't do well in the first debate. he really didn't want to do the second debate and was getting criticized for that. and now anybody is talking about is nbc and not him and the things that aren't working in his campaign, right. and when nbc agreed to do there they just played completely into his hands. they let him control the narrative and he has already, you know, talking about how they e fake news on twitter. so it is also just so disappointing that they would give him this kind of

opportunity to use them and also malign them at the same time. >> which does raise the question, jim fallows as we mentioned, there is sco much criticism of what the media did to enable donald trump in 2016. how do you see coverage this year >> i think that the two bick problems i tried to write about in the atlantic from the previous cycles coverage, one was this attraction to spectacle, sus yee banikarim was saying, as you did in the setup piece, the other one was the difficult the media in dealing with both ciderrism frk one person is i saing something that is true and somebody else is saying something that is simply beyond the realm of reality like the u.s. is doing fine with the pandemic, et cetera, it is difficult for the media to try to have our staard pose of sent rich while having these two conflicting views. i think more of the media have been trying on this second front to deal with both upsiderrism

than have been trying to resist the spectacle of donald trump. i thinkait is an evolutionary process but basically i think donald trump has played the media more than the media have been aware of being played. >> susie banikarim, what about that, it is something that all of us in the media struggle with, of course, not wanting to take sides, wanting to cover fairly but you are covering a candidate the likes of which we have never seen. >> yeah, i think it is just an incredible push to balance which is naturally how we are taught to think about things as journalists, but the reality is sometimes two thunkings are just not equal and it is our job to cosexualize that for people and help them process it, an when we don't do that, when we sort of just give equal weight to everything, at the don't have anyway of understanding that at the same time as trump is saying that he wants amy coney barrett confirmed so she can weigh in on the electi if it goes to the supreme court, that the media is

spending a lot more time asking biden about-- and those two things aren't equal, they are really different issues and really different erosions of democracy. an when we play into that, when we sort of push the balance just because we don't know another way to seem objective, we are doing a disservice to the audience. >> woodruff: jim fallows, talk for just a moment about what are the values that come into play here? i mean there is no more equal time for television, for broadcast networks to have to abide by. so what are the standards that journalists should be thinking about? >> so i think back in the earlier days of journalism when i was getting a start, there were certain norms that we could expect politicians to separate within. there were as you say the legal requirements of the fairness doctrine where broadcast networks had to put on things from some opposing rties. and most journalists could

assume that most politicians would try to avoid saying things that were proveably untrue. as we move into different terrain wheres no norms don't apy in the same way, i think there is a new movement that is necessarily under way in journalism to say our two loyalties should be to the process of democracy, and to observable truths. and sometimes this puts us in a difficult position of saying we think this side is saying something that is true and this side is not am but our larger, longer term loyalty should be to democracy and to the truth as we can best determinet. >> and susie banikarim, that does take as susie suggests away from what many journalists wer taught. and that is you try to give as equal as fair treatment and time to all candidates as you can. >> yeah, but i think it's all the thinking there is a certain sort of pattern that we

established that donald trump just doesn't adhere to, he is unwilling to adhere to these norms and he uses them to manipulate the media. so when u see that you are being played or manipulated, it's time to change the playbook and add just to what is happening. to some degree i think what donald trump really took advantage of in 2016 is that political journalism had become very akin to entertainment, had become very sports like, constantly tacked about who was up and who was down. and you know, if we just continue in that same pattern, we're going to just continue to have elections where people aren't getting good information, right? and i think this is the mont as we go into what is going to be a very difficult election week and where a lot of information is going to be coming in and we're going to have to be processing it and helping people to understand it, to really take a step back and ask what is the role we play in making sure people get the best information, information they need to really assess things accurately.

>> so jim fallows, what is it that viewers, consumers of news who care about this election and want the st possible covage, what should they be demanding right now from the news media, and especially from television? >> so i think it will be awkward for me to say this right at this moment. but i personally apprecie the effort that your program makes to try to say, you know, to represent different sides and arguments but to say sa at this moment we think certain sides are more grounded in reality. i think for readers, viewers, listeners, there is a tremendous array of material available now and i guess theain thing that the public can do is similar to what we in the media can do which is to try to avoid this-- the distraction of the spectacle minute by minute by minute. that if we find ourselves as citizens or as reporters being in a mode of a cat chasing a laser dot t is exciting in that

instant but we are noted deciding about the things that matter in the long-term. there is a lot of material out there to listen to, to watch and to read. so seek it out. >> woodruff: we're going to have to leave it there, we thank you both so much, jim fallows, susie ban kairmk we appreciate it. -- banikarim, we appreciate it. >> thank you, judy. >> thank you. >> woodruff: as the war over the ethnic armenian-enclave of nagorno-karabakh continues between armenia and azerbaijan, the push for a cessation of hostilities accelerated this week-- but that's hard to tell on the ground. with the support of the pulitzer center, special correspondent simon ostrovsky reports. >> reporter: the fighting here is approaching its fourth week, despite attempts by moscow to mediate. hundreds are dead, thousands displaced, here on the southeastern fringe of europe.

yesterday, russian foreign minister sergei lavrov made another offer, after armenia and azerbaijan agreed last week to a cease-fire that did not cease fire. >> ( translated ): all the agreements that have been discussed lately, which were being taken seriously by the parties,ssume the relinquishment of five districts and peacekeeping troops. >> reporter: at issue are seven districts of azerbaijan that surround the nagorno-karabakh region, that have been under the control of ethnic-aremnian forces since the first war here between the former soviet republics ended in 1994, after the u.s.s.r. dissolved. the de facto authorities in karabakh have long contended that they need to hold on to these areas in order to have a link to the republic of armenia and as a security buffer with azerbaijan. but, that calculation may have changed, as ethnic-armenian forces sustain high losses in this new round of fighting that

started with an azerbaijani surprise attack on september 27. the russian foreign minister said that under the proposal, the status of karabakh and control of areas linking it to armenia would be decided at a later date. >> ( translated ): let me show you guys, come, i'll show you-- ( explosions ) >> reporter: reactions were mixed in the capital of nagorno- karabakh, stepanakert, which sustained a steady stream of bombardment in the first weeks of the conflict, destroying alexander hagopjanian's brand- new stoneworks. >> ( translated ): it would be reasonable to relinquish five districts. it would not be reasonable to talk about all seven. we cannot lo our link to mainland armenia, and there can't be an artificial buffer in between us, like the one that was artifially created by the soviets. >> reporter: as mediation continues behind closed doors within the framework of the so-called minsk group, chaired by the united states, russia and france, the leaders of the two warring nations have ratcheted up their public rhetoric. >> ( translated ): at this crucial moment, weill not back

down, the armenian people have only one thing to do: unite, mobilize all the potential we have, halt the enemy with a decisive blow and achieve a final victory. >> reporter: meanwhile azerbaijan's president confirmed that turkish f-16 fighter jets were indeed parked in azbaijan, but said they were only there for support. >> ( translated ): turkish f-16 jets are here. they came here for military exercises. after these exercises, and after the armenian attacks, they remained here. but they are on the ground, not up in the air, and none of them were used in this war. >> reporter: sounding equally war-like? the man who supplied those fighter jets, and mercenaries from syria, turkish president erdogan. he spoke yesterday with russian president vladimir putin, who holds a mutual defense treaty with armenia, but also supplies weapons to azerbaijan, stoking fears the conflict could expand, pitting a nato member against russia. for the pbs newshour, i'm simon ostrovsky in stepanakert.

>> woodruff: streeart now hits gallery walls in new york. it began in mexico with a trio of muralists in the 1920s. jeffrey brown traveled to mexico city-- before the pandemic-- to explore the movement's influence then and now. it is part of our ongoing coverage of arts and culture, "canvas." >> brown: in mexico city, along bustling streets, well-kept parks, and giant walls of low-income housing: signs of a vibrant public art scene. >> the art movement of the world is street art. >> brown: cynthia arvide is author of "muros somos," or "we are walls," a look at this rebirth of mexican street art. the artists here, she says, are part of a generation largely exposed to public art online, influenced by international graffiti stars like banksy.

some of their themes are distinctly mexican: colors, pre-hispanic symbols and imagery, local plants and animals. some focus on the country's problems: drugs, violence, poverty and corruption. >> mexico is definitely a country of contrasts. you have these vibrant colors side by side with this really grim, violent society. it's happening, it's alive, with all of the good, all of the bad, all of the in-between. and i think artists, they feed their art from that. >> brown: in recent years, the government has played a role in is movement, offering up wall space for works with positive, unifying messages. but muralism here also looks to an extraordinary past, and one of the world's great art movements. it began a century ago, at the end of mexico's bloody revolution, when a new government looking to unite a fractured nation commissioned the likes of diego rivera, jose clemente orozco, and david

alfaro siqueiros to help create a sense of shared identity. you can still see it in spectacular form at the ministry of public education, where rivera painted thousands of square feet of frescoes in the mid-1920s, highlighting a world of workers, domestic life, conflict, and continued political volatility. at another "mural mecca"--" san ildefonso"-- we met art historian renato gonzalez mello. once mexico's national preparatory school, this is home to rivera's first commissioned work, "the creation," as well as a number of orozco's key works, including one called "the trench," depicting revolutionary soldiers. >> ( translated ): the murals are historical paintings. historical paintings are still considered the highest form of art. and when this project began, they were obviously thinking about explaining what the new order was. they represent a part of society that had never been represented officially, that had never appeared in paintings, nor

photography, nothing-- that had beenxcluded from the national image. >> brown: by the end of the 1920s, mural commissions in mexico were declining, and the" big three" painters moved north, where they began to influence a generation of u.s. artists. that's the focus of a major new exhibition at the whitney museum in new york. it's now reopend after temporarily closing," vida americana: mexican muralists remake american art" has some 200 works, including side-by-side comparisons. curator barbarhaskell. >> this show proves that the mexican artists had the most profound influence, far exceeding the french during these two decades. >> brown: the most? >> absolutely the most. they allowed american artists to get a new conception of what art was, that it was something social, that it wasn't just about form and color, that it really had to relate to people's lives and to tell stories that

were accessible and modern. >> brown: diego rivera famously created a 27-panel mural in the cotyard of the detroit institute of arts, funded by edsel ford. jose clemente orozco received his first u.s. commission in 1930, at pomona college in california. he painted a dramatic image of the greek titan prometheus. nothing like it had been seen in the states, and his work caught the eye of a young jackson pollock. jackson pollock sees this-- >> and he changes his work. >> brown: pollock also attended a workshop in new york led by david alfaro siquieros, who encouraged unconventional techniques. >> doing things like, they would put canvas on the floor and throw paint splatter paint on it, throw things like cigarettes and pieces of wood on it. it liberated the idea of how you could make a painting. >> brown: an influence of style, but also subject matter, as here in a large painting by the american artist charles white. >> the idea that the muralists had presented indigenous rural

population as being the bedrock of mexican identity... >> brown: changing mexican history gave him an idea. >> exactly. so, charles white, the idea that you would insert african americans into the sweep of american history, was something revolutionary. no one had ever done that. >> brown: back in mexico city, today's street art, where the influence of the past is still seen. >> they were trying to-- to make the common man appear on these works of art. and these street artists do the same. they bring, like, ordinary people out into the walls and they put their faces on them. so i think it has this parallel. >> brown: one leading contemporary mexican street artist, edgar flores, known as "saner," first saw an image of orozco's "trench" as a boy, printed on a mexican peso. he didn't know it was from a mural until he saw the real thing. >> they took me to the san ildefonso museum and there was that mural: impressive, large, with other colors, and it was very dramatic.

it was practically like seeing someone's suffering. and to try to understand how this connection of the bill and the mural was very impressive. >> brown: today, saner's own work can be found on walls around the world-- including his hometown of mexico city. he wants to explore political and social issues of his day, he told us, in a way that is positive-- and public. >> public space is very sacred for me. you can paint violent scenes, you can paint aggressive scenes, but people don't need that anymore. instead, i try to make a connection to the positive that society can be. >> brown: big problems, big solutions-- and very big art. for the pbs newshour, i'm jeffrey brown in mexico city. >> woodruff: pediatric nurse practitioner deborah fisher spent the early part of her career working in intensive care units. that experience made her feel that more needed to be done to improve end of life care for children. fisher now specializes in providing palliative care at children's national hospital in washington, d.c. this is her "brief but spectacular" take on an important subject that can be hard to talk about.

>> there are times that i'm asked what my career is-- "what, what do you do for a living?" and i have to say that, sometimes, i don't tell them the whole story. i don't give them the specialization. i say, i'm a pediatric nurse actitioner. and then, whenever i've told them what my specialty is, even when i worked in oncology, families, people would say, "oh, that must be so sad." and then conversation would stop and they'd leave. because they didn't know what to ask, and they didn't want to hear it. this is really not about death. and that's what everyone seems to assume, that, "oh, all children with cancer must be suffering and laying in the bed." they might have a bald head, but these children are really living their life, and they're trying to have the best life possible. and we help them to do that. >> i'm a pediatric nurse practitioner, and i've been e for over 21 years. now, i am in pediatric palliative care. i was interested in pediatrics back in nursing school. i really loved being with the kids, and i loved being able to

care for them. to treat suffering was very important to me. i felt like that could be done better. i also felt like the conversations weren't always clear to these families, and they didn't understand what was happening and what their choices really were. now, for palliative care, you are attending to not just the physical suffering, but you attend to the emotional, the psychological, the spiritual suffering. how do we provide that good quality of life for that person who doesn't know how much to be scared? and they don't know how much time they have, and they don't know if they can stay in the hospital or come home, or if they're going to graduate from high school. there's so many unknowns with pediatrics, and you want to be able to provide them with choices and options. we know that we want to be able to support families and help children to live at the best and the fullest of their capacity for however long they're going to be with us. i felt like there was a need to improve end-of-life care.

there was a need to improve honesty and how to teach parents and to support them in having honest conversations with their children. there's so much of focus on life, and people don't realize life continues up through the moment you die. and how you're going to handle that time is very important. when we think about children and ing honest with them, we think about, "how can i possibly talk them about death and dying?" and people are afraid. they are fears that they're going to make the child sad or that they'll tell the child something they don't want to know when, the fact is that these children already know. the four-year-old that i keep thinking about is a child i took care of many years ago, and we did so many different things, so many different treatments for this child. he kept relapsing, and he was not going to survive, and his mother was having a really hard time with that. and she didn't know what to say to him, and was really finding it difficult for her to even be in the room, because looking at

him, she felt like-- she was crying and she was afraid. she was upsetting him with the crying. and the lot of us, we knew that he was not going to be there long, that he maybe was going to live a couple more days. we sai you know, we're really enjoying seeing you. and it's been really fun. and thank you for letting me be your friend and to take care of you all this time. and he would look at us and say, you know, i'm going away on a trip. you know, "i'm going away on a trip." and so, he knew he was going somewhere and he was not scared. and that was the best thing, to be able to share with that mom, was to say, you know, he's been telling us this, this is what he's saying. so, he knows. he knows what's happening. and he's not scared. he's saying goodbye to us. he's not scared. i've witnessed so many beautiful things, that i feel like it was such an honor and a privilege to be there with these children in their last moments, and to see them with peace on their face. it's not sad to me. we don't have a cure for death and dying and terminal illness. and in the meantime, we need to

be able to do our best there too and so that's what we're doing in palliative care. it's really about life. my name is deb fisher, and this is my "brief, but spectacular" take on providing palliative care for children. >> woodruff: and you can find all of our "brief but spectacular" segments online at www.pbs.org/newshour/brief. and that is the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online, and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe, and we'll see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been providedy: >> life well-planned.

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. hello, everyone. welcome to "amanpour & co." >> repubcans are scrambling to confirm this nominee as fast as possible. >> from judge to justice. we askhat could amy coney barrett on the supreme court mean for the health care of millions of americans? and -- >> we are now seeing an increase in the number of reported cases of covid-19. >> the world health orgization track as troubling second wave. the director of w.h.o. tells us why he thinks lockdowns should be a last resort. >> a simple truth. the shorter your sleep, the shorter your life. >> the abc's