captning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productio >> lehrer: gd evening. i'm jim lehrer. president obama took responsibilityor the systemic ilures that allowed a terror suspecto board a plane with an explosiv >> brown: and i'jeffrey brown. on the newshour tonight: analysis of thpresident's stement on the high-level review of security lapse from twmembers of congress and two counteterrorism experts. >> lehre then, ray suarez updates the h1n1 flu pdemic

and the vaccine campaign this see -- flu season nerally lasts until may and although flu is way do, we don't kw what the future will hold. >> bro: we look at violence in professial sports after basketball player gilbert aras is suspended for bringing ns into the lockeroom. >> lrer: and gwen ifill talks to biogrher joan biskupic about supreme court stice anton scalia. >> hsays i read text, i read the conitutional, i'm an originast, i do not let my religus views come in. and i don't t any other personaliews come in. >> lehrer: that's all ahead tonight's pbs nehour. major funding for e pbs newshour is providedy:

>> what makes us an engine f e economy? plants across america. nearly 200,000 jobs create we see beyond cars. >> cvron. this is thpower of human energy. >> were intel, sponsors of tomorrow. the national science fouation. supporti education and rearch across all fields of science and engiering. and with the ongoingupport of these stitutions and foundations.

and... this program was me possible by the corporation for public broadcastin and by contributio to your pbs statn from viewers like you. thank you. >> lehrer: t official story of how the airline bo plot eluded u.s. security was ma public day, and at the white house, president obama orded changes in t handling of information on potential threats the report said the gornment had sufficient iormation to potentially disrupthe plot. it faulted u.s. intelligenceor failinto focus more resources on the al qaeda grp that claimed respsibility for the attempted attack. and itaid the c.i.a. and the national countererrorism center did not searcall available databases for the nigerian charged with e attempted bombing. newsho correspondent kwame holm begins our coverage.

>> holma president obama stepd to the lectern in the white use state dining room two days after he shary criticized u.sintelligence for major failings. toy, he elaborated: >> fir, although our intelligence communi had lened a great deal about the al qaeda affiate in yemen-- caed al qaeda in the arabian peninsula-- we knew thathey sought to strike t united states and that theyere recruiting operatives too so, e intelligence community did not aggresvely follow up on and prritize particular streams of intelligee related to a psible attack against the homend. secondthis contributed to a larger failure of analys, a failure to connect theots of intelligence that existeacross our intelligence community. third, this in turn fed to shortcomings in the watch- listing system, whicresulted in this person not bei placed on the no-fly list, thery allowing him to board at plane

in amsterdam for detroit. in sum, the u.s. governmt had the information scattered throughout the system to potentially unver this plot and disrupt the attack. rather than a failure to colct or share intellince, this was a failure to conne and understand the intelgence that we alrea had. >> holman: athe president oke, officials released deassified results of the investigation soar. amg the new revelations: e 23-year-old nigerian spect, umar farouk abdulmallab, already was airbne when u.s. customs and border protection official flagged m for extra screening. it was to have ten place once he landed detroit. in light of such disclures, mr. obamsaid it's clear a number of things need to be done: >> today, i'directing a series of additional corrective ste across mtiple agencies. broadly speakingthey fall into four areas. firs i'm directing that our

intelligce community immediatelbegin assigning specific responsibility fo inveigating all leads on high- priority teats so that these leads are puued and acted upon aggressily-- not just most of e time but all of the time. we must foll the leads that we get, and we mu pursue them until plotare disrupted. and that means assigning cle lines of resnsibility. second, m directing that intelligence reports, escially those invoing potential threats to the unitestates, be distbuted more rapidly and more widel we can'tit on information that could protect the americ people. third,'m directing that we strengthenhe analytical process, how our analysis...ow our analysts process a integrate the inlligence that they receive

my intelligence adsory board will examine sting through vast intligence and data in our infoation age. and, finally, i'm orderingn immedie effort to strengthen thcriteria used to add individus to our terrorist watch lists, especially the - fly list. we must do betr in keeping dangerous pele off airplanes, while still facilitating air travel. in short they ll help the inteigence community do its job even better an protect americanives. and finally i'm ordering an immediate efrt to rengthen the criteria used to a individuals to our terroriswatch list. especially the no-fly list. weust do better in keeping dangeroupeople off airplanes, while still facilitating air travel. >> holman: the secity problems e president outlined today ha caused political headaches for the white house.

the's been criticism of his tional security team, especially homeland secuty secretary janet napolitano, who initially saidhe "system worked" in the aliner attack. >> now, at ts stage in the view process, it appears tha this incident was t the fault of a single individual or organization, but rather a systemic failurecross organizations and encies. moreover, i am less inrested passing out blame than i am in learning from andorrecting these mistakes to makes safer, for, uimately, the buck stops with me. as president, i have a soln responsibility to protect ou nation and our people, andhen the system fls, it is my responsibility. >> it s a failure too connect, intrate and unrstand the intelligence we had. we didn'followup and pry torize a stream of

intelligence indicatinthat al qaeda a in a did abian pen insurance wsuit sought to strike our meland because no one team or tas force was signed responsibility for doing that followup investation. the intelligence fell through the cracks. this happed in more than one organization. >> brennan concluded by conceding the enormous challeng the national curity team faces. >> ievery instance, over the past year, the intelligence community, th homeland secury community, the law enforcent community has donen solutely outstanding and stellar b in protecting this homeland and diupting plots that havbeen directed against us it was in this one inance that we did not rise tthat same level competence and success. and therefore the presiden has told us we must do better. i told the president tod i let him down. i am the president assistant fohomeland security and counterterrorism. and i told him that i will

do better, ande will do better at thscene. >> secretary nap o nounced the deployment of at least 300 advanced imaging scannerst u.s. airpts but she also said it'still difficult physicallyo screen passengers coming from overse. one new propose e new proposal: a system for fast-tracking names on ta terrort watch list. abdulmallab was on a watch list, but his was just onef more than half a million nam. al-qaeda in the arabian peninsula s claimed responbility for the attempted bombing. today, government officis in yemen said abdulmutaab was originally recruited in lond. thyemeni deputy prime minister said the suspect met with al qaeda operatives in shwah province. and that meeting may have included the radical amerin- born cleric, anwar al-awlaki he's also be linked to the fort hoo texas, massacre. abdulmutallab is crently being

heldt a federal prison in michigan. he w indicted yesterday for attempted murder and other crimes. >> lehrer: fr views now on the president's statement and review: richard clarke w the white houspoint man on counter- rrorism in the clinton administrati and in the early days of the george wbush administrati. he's now a consultan ju zarate held a similar post later in the bush ministration. he'sow with the center for strategic and internional studies, a a consultant for cbnews. and from congress, californi democrat anna eshoo serves o e house intelligence commtee; and we hope to be joined by republican pete olson of texas. he is a member of thhouse meland security committee.a- r. clarke, fit of all, did you hear anything today that surprised yoor shocked you , words that some people said they might beo clined with what came out today? with a lot of littlehings that shock me. i think the big thing that shocked me, that they said ey did not have a system

for following threat reports and revolvinthem. you don't ju have threat reports comen and you say isn't that interesting and then you move on a the next day you red more, y take the reports that co in every day and put them into a system to hav resolution, toollowup, find out if they arerue, doomething about it. there used tbe a system to dohat. the fact that they don't have one now and tt they are instituting onnow and that the president of uned states has to orr t i did find a lite shocking. but overall, what was shocking was how well the administration did in frankly, only and quickly examining its own shortcomings. from a public management perspective, this s really well don lehrer: do you agree, mr. zarate? >> to a certain extent. i think dick is right. but i think what found mostelling was the fact that t administration laid bare the fact that thereas sttegic warning, that there was a threat grong from the al qaeda group in yemen, al qaeda in the arabian peniula.

and that that group, not only was ahreat to our interests in yemen and to the yemeni government, but was already lking about and a asping to attack the meland. and thiss something we have been worried aboufor some time, that an al qaa gional affiliate would not only be a threat regically -- regnally or locally but wod become a platformo attack the uned states that is why we are worried abt american solis moving into some ol -- somalia and geing training and perhaps coming back. so the fact that t -- intelligence community and counterterrorism cmunity was actual aware of that growinintent and perhaps pability and their search foop ratives actually was surprising to me. because the failure then was then say we have the strategithreat. what are the tactical piec that we needo put together toay fit that intent and capability. lehrer: do you agree with that, mr. clarke that th d the information. they just didn't putt together? >> well, they had not only informatioabout the individual bomber, but as long since they had strategic waing.

they sat wh the president before cistmas and said we have a n problem. it something called al qaeda in the arabian peninsula, aqap. it's in yemen. and they are plaing attackon the united stes. so they knew t strategic contex and they didn't , by their own admissio they didn't do t followup to say okay f that's tru what do we do tactically to find tse guys. >> lehr: let me ask congresswoman eshoo on this issuof the collection. the president sa it, . brennan said it and these o gentlemen have also said it they had th informatn and that's a good thing. t the problem was the gap in connecting them is that how you see it as well? >> i do. and i think thathat is what is so stunninto the americaneople. at our intelligence community actually had pieces of this. in otherords, there were warning signs, the red flags were outthe bells were ringing. and yet they were t connecte what i am struck by isow

forthcoming e president has been. to put the informationut there on the tab, to acknowledge th we do have shortcings but very importantly, h he has directed the executive branch, the intelligence community in thiinstance and e corrections that need to beade. and i think that they are spot on. but i am more than detecte that the psident is angry about th. we were lucky because once again, avege citizens are the ones tt stepped in. but we can rely on luck. and while they thereere reforms adopted after r country was attacked, yo know, we do have to ok for needles in a hey sta. but wean't keep building hey acks where we can't find things. and so the d does have to beonnected. i think the present was more than seris. d i also think that it was

important when he sa, this not a time for parsanship but for citizenshi we a can do something here. and hope that we will all make note of that. i think it's a vy impoant thing that he said. i was certnly struck by it >> lrer: mr. clarke, you buy the ideahat the presidt said and the congresswoman just underlined it asell, that this was not a problem involvinindividuals. this was a problemnvolving a system that didn't work rather than people who we incompent or made the wong dgements, et cetera? >> i think what the whit house said todayhere may have been a few people tha made a few mtakes at low leve. but the system should ha caught those mistas. and there should he been -- i thght we had inveed in software that would is caught thes mistakes. ansoftware, knowledge, management softwe that would have said there a piece ofnformation over here and a pce over there. >> lehrer: go rough that. how might that, if it had rked, what -- i don't mean in minute detailut what would haen? >> so basically the w softwares supposed to do

something like ts. it gs a piece of infoation. and it doesn't havto go t and find a human being to do this, an alyst. >> lehr: let's say they found sothing about al qaeda in the yemen. >> in this case th find the name of this fellow om his father. and they say welhe might be in yeme the software should by itself go out and see there any meion of a nigerian in yemen, number one. is there any menti of anybody with a name like this, two. and if the softwarhad done at, they would have found him. because ere was previous reporting. the twpieces of inrmation, if you looked at them alone, they weret shocking. but if you puthe two pieces of information together, would you y aha!, this guy is the terrorist whis about to do something. i ought we had software that would do thatthat could go into ltiple database was a human in e loop. apparently we dn't. >> lehr: did you think that kd of software existed mr. rate. >> thakind of software

does existn parts. but there arstill databases that areegmented and where informatn is kept separate ere you rely on human anysts to go through and pick out data that may b relevant th underscores what the president was saying, whic is that you need a syste th has analysts and the stem large, prioritizing with respe to the volumes of infortion that come in. ople need to realize you get thousands of teats a day. the nation counrterrorism center since the bush administration established ithas three times a day threats,nteragencies procses to review the thres. has matrixs, so to dk's int there is a certain point pryor at thisization but at the end of the day there a han factor. hun analysts have to look at the informati. there has to be a sense of prrity and urgency to a certain extent. and what shocking here, think, iwhat was reeel -- revealed. and do could commend -- commend the adminiration for laying bare what they have found, is the ft that you had thstrategic threat and you haall of these

bitsnd pieces. you haneedles in the hey stak not just a needle. and thosneedles weren't gaered in the context of this growing strategic threat. >> lehre congresswoman hoo, from your perspective, mber of the house intelligence cmittee with oversight of all of is wee been talking aut, did you think til chris mass day thathis kind -- christmas day th this kind of information, the kinds of dots would haveeen connected, eitr the combinion of human input and man evaluation plus the soware that richard clarke says he thoht existed an maybe dn't? >> most frankly, i would n ve been able to guarantee at they would be. because it is a ve large, complex system. we he an enemy that is mber that is entrreneurial. they have franchises in different rts of the world. they don't deal wi lists of $550,000 mes or an nctd c. they use the intert. now here at home my congressionadistrict is

the home of silicon lley. we have chnologies and are continuing to produc technologies that arable toake very large quantities of information and bring abouwhat is needed. and i think that we are no where we need toe in terms the technology inside our system. and i think that that is sothing that is going to be needed. and of coursthat always hato be coupled with human inlligence. nothing takes the place that. >> lehrer: speak osystemic failures, we've had one until nowith congress enomenon ol on -- olson o is in texas. and i undersnd now you have not bn able to hear this entire discussionut you've heard, diyou hear the last answer in this whole id from your perspeive as a member of congress, wereou surprised by what the storthat was to today about what tually happened, what lead

to this near disaster? >> yessorry for the technical difficulties. but i was surprid by the informion which lead to basicallthis attack upon r country. agaiit's indicative of kindf a nine ten for lack of better term mentality. where did have the informatn in the intelligence communitybut agn didn't connect the dots. and let individual whos wanted to rm our country with a bomb, getn an rcraft. and the on response we had at that moment was to ve pele waiting to greet him when he landed in deoit. and th's simply unacceable. i look forward to working with the ainistration and my colleagues to make re something like ts never haens again. >> lrer: congressman let me ask you this. you didn't hear them, but th mr. clarke and mr. rate, right, sorry, and congresswomaeshoo said -- gave compliments to the president and th administration for comin out forthrightly now and

ying what went wrong. as aepublican, do you agree with him on at? >> mean, i was happy that thpresident came out and stepped up to the ple and said that the buck sto with him. that's critilly important that we get leadership fm the top. and i applaud him for dog at. but again need to make sure nothi like this ever ppens again. we had all the information out there to connect these dots togetr. wead a father calling from his home in africa, calling anmbassador letting them know that my son is ing someplace whe i don't think he wts to go and i'm afraid of what he is goi to do. and that is just one emple of the informati we had. but still, this invidual, mr. abdulmutallab got on an aircraft with a bomb a god bless our country again at he didn't set it o when he tried to. >> lehrer: mr. zarat see, i got it rht then are you abouto fix this, about what erybody says. all right, now let's f it. do you have a feeling at it can be fixed and whathe

president outlined a what secretary napolitano, mr. brennan talkedbout will, in fact, fix it? >> think the right direction and rtainly the right sts in light of the current case and theurrent case study and the thing that we discovered that went wrong. i worry kn that we not lude ourselves that there is a perct system. lehrer: there is no such thing. >> there no su thing as a perft system. and in particular when are you talking about watch lists and noly lists. we are still deang with a name base system. largely relyg on the fact that people e their real namehen they check in, use their re passport. but know that the bad guys are constany novating, constantly fiing ways around our screening. may use alses, false passpos,. and we have to have a dual system of iense telligence gathering with the types of skraening tt wi allow us to find the hien explosives. and system is perfect, unfortunately. lehrer: how do you feel about thfixes, mr. clarke? >> we've got a good stem.

it can be made bter. the great ws here is that the esident of the united states is down in the weeds trying to make ibetter. i sh i had that when i was serving. but i think thscary news today is thial quite in the arabiapeninsula has her people like this guy. >>ehrer: a lone guy, we han't heard that much about. >> yeah, they have other what we call clean skins, people who we have no idea thathey are involved. soheir names are not in the database. aqap, parently, has more of these people. they are not necessari arabs. and th are still trying to atck the west outside of yemen. that's t big news. ishat this is an ongoing threat. so we have to make the system better very quickly. >> lehrer: in a word congresswoman eshoand ngressman olson, do you share mr. clarke's scareine here? >> well, this is- the most serious ofituations becae we're talking about our national secity. but whatever needs to be

donei believe that we have t only the capacity, we have the intelligence, we have t genius and we have the will. it wilnever be perfect but we c certainly improve upon it. and i think what the president has called for when implemented wilgo a long way toward that but w can't rest because the ene is very smart. >> lehrer: okay, i tnk at is a yes then, congressman olson. >> did what riard clarke highity looed ishat the scary part to yoas well, that theseeople are still t there and they are going to try and try a try again? >> yeah,nd ala in yemen is a growing problem. i was in afghastan last moh. and meeting with ourroops there, talki with our peonnel. they've done aood job ating back the al qaeda threat in that area. but it has moved. and it's moved to yemen. and that is critically importan becoming a strategic place we neeto be involved . again the scary thing fr my perspective is we had all e information.

very eerily reminiscent of nine noon. weidn't put it together and welmost had a terrible tragedthat killed hundreds of americans. >> lehrer: thank you a four vy much. again our apologies to you congressmaolson that we got to you so late. thank you. >> that's my apologyack to you, jim. anks. >> lehrer: thankou. >> brownand still to comon the newsur: is the swinelu coming back, and should you get vaccited? a basketball star and s guns; and the life and constitutn of supre court justice scalia. thatollows the other news of e day. here's harsreenivasan in our newsroom. hari. >> sreenivasan: the was anotr airline security incident overnht; this time, in miami a dea air lines flight was ready to take off for troit when a passenger began yelling "i'm palestiniannd i want to killll the jews". the plane rerned to the gate and the mawas arrested. he was identified as mansor mohammed asaof toledo, ohio. f.b.i. officls said today the was no evidence of any rror plot. it turns out missing guard triggerethe shutdown sday

night at liberty internatial airport in newar new jersey. airpt surveillance video was released tod. it shows a gua leaving his security checkpoint. momentlater, a man ducks under a rope into a secured area t say good-bye to a woman waing r a flight. the securityreach closed the newark terminal for six urs, delayinglights and scrambling schedules across the country in brussels, belum, today, members of the european ion debad whether to use full body scanners at airportsbut there were sharp divisions. at the same ti, italy joined the u.s., britain d the netherlands and announceit will install the scanns soon. >> we havelways said that the security com before everythi. the right to life r those who fly, for those who travel is a ndamental right that we want to protect. with the introductioof these instruments, these body scanns, we have decided as you have hed to introde them at the airports of milan, rome d venice, starting at

minimum with the. >> sreenivasan40 of the scannersre in use across the u.s., but there are plans order doze more. the afghan wing al qaeda has claid responsibility for the bombing that killed sen c.i.a. emoyees. the claim s made in a statement on aaliban web site. the boer was a jordanian man, mam khalil abu-mulal al- balawiwho was believed to have turned against al-qaa. his wife said day her husband was a martyr whoated the u.s. thousandof coptic christians rioted today in egyp it started aftereven people re shot dead as they left a midnight mass. they'd been celebratg the arril of christmas on the coptic calendar. protesters began sshing hospital buses when offials delayed turng over the bodies for burial. the riots lasted severalours. christia make up about 10% of egypt's mostly muslim population. scores of people have en killed in trib fighting in sudan. a regional official said tod at least 139 tribal members ed in clashes in mote southern sudan. scores more were wounded.

it is estimated trib violence in the region killedome 2,500 people last year alone. the u.s. environmental protection agency nts stronger andards governing smog. lisa jackson pposed standards to cutown on ozone emissions. as a resul hundreds more counties would likely be i violion of air pollution rules, but they have up 20 ars to meet the new limits. former preside bush had blocked the tougher standas. on wall street today, the do nes industrial arage gained 33 pnts to close over 10,606. the nasdaq fell one int to close at 2,3. those are me of the day's main stories. i'll be back at the enof the prram with a preview of what you'll find tonight the newshour's web sit but for now, back to jim >> brown: next, a loer-room incint involving guns escalates in a suspension for tional basketball associatio star gilbe arenas, and raises questions once again about violence and profeional atetics.

>> brown: the n.b. acted 16 da after an incident at the verizon center in waington, d.c. arenas has admitteto bringing hand guns into the wasngton wizards team lker room, a violation league policy and, possiblyof d.c. law. but he and teammate javaris ittenton deny they actually pulled guns on eacother in a digreement over a gambling debt. the n.b.a. and the wards initially frained from taking any tion as they waited for criminal investigationto be compled. but on tuesday, commissioner david stersuspended arenas indefinitelynd without pay. in a statent, he said: >> brown: the "ongng conduct" referred to a series of evts. on new year'day, arenas wrote on his twier page:

"i wake up ts morning and seen i was thnew john wayne." then on tuesy of this week, enas joked about commissione stern: >> who do yofear more, stern or the aual authorities? >> iean, stern is... is... mean... ( laughs ) t, uh... >> reporr: that same night, arenas was ptographed pointing his fingers-- if they were gu-- at his teammates before a game in philelphia. the arenastory is just the test example of athletes getting in trouble oveguns. cleveland cavaliers guard delonte west w arrested in maryland last september, allegedly, forpeeding on a motorcycle, and carryingoaded handguns and a loadeshotgun. and former nionafootball leaguelayer plaxico burress is serving two years in jail afr he aidentally shot himself with a handgun. had no permit for the weapo but there are also exampleof athletes bouncg back from criminal violations. last fall, michael vk returned to pro football after servg 19

months iprison on a doighting conviction. and for more on all this, m joined by: harry edwards, a profess emeritus of ciology at univerty of california, berkeley. he advises both the b.a. and the n.f.l.; and mike wise, sports porter for "the washingn post." mike wise, stilln the -- fill in the picture aso who gilbert arenas is i understand that th stems from a gaming incident, what do we know? >> well, the fortuna thing about th, jeff s that bottom line,ilbert arenas is wt i would say, the unique nba athlete. where he rolls his windows down. people are his friends. and he's not one of these elite guys that des behind hitinted windows, so to speak. so -- so that rt of it, he has no malice, gbert arenas, you till can bring loed guns in the locker room. this -- this disagreement started in a cargame on a team flight back fm phoenix during aest coast

trip where javas countries endon d arenas got into it. crtendon owed somebody else money andt escalated into gilbertrenas wanting to play a practical jo on crittendon he ys and put loed guns in front of his locker. and with the note ck one. javas seeing this, not sure what was going on, according to twoeople in the room, reported today in "thwashington post," founhis own gun. put in a clip, cocked e weapon and never pond it at him but scared the bejesus ot oboth of them and everybody that w in the locker room so that where we stand today. >> reporter: allight, now harry edwards,oes this strike you as an abeation when you look from diance at this. or is it part of -- >> oh, absolutely t. reporter: what do you see? >> i h spoken with commsioner stern as early as thr and a half years ago concerng the evolution of this situation.

the ct that both the nfl and the a and other sports were goingo inherit the problems and issues that were erging in the tritional african-american community in particular. but as a part of the gun culture in american ciety in general. this suation has been acerbated by the fact that you have 7% of the polation of black males who are contributingo probably 43% of the people prison in a society that imprisons a eater proporon of its population than any other ithe world. these people, % of them are evtually released back into theommunity and they bring that prison cuure backith them. and at a certain point, olence, guns, this kind of thing comes to be defineas cool. you ne the gun. you have thave the gun. and it trafers into athletics. >> reporter:ell, mike wise, yodeal with a lot of these, escially young athletes. these are high paid, perhaps ving in something a bubble. they live in a bubble? and how does that cultur

transfer? what dyou see? >>ell -- i think dr. edwards think thon the head better than anyone. the is almost, i want to say, faux gangsterhat has come about in ny of the elite sporting events. and what it is, it'suys that aren't en from the hood, guysike gilbert. and gilbt will tell you hielf i have been to the apartment complex where grew up. his father showed it to me. this is a ddle class aparent complex it is not down and out. so he wasn't raised in compton. heid not come from the hood. but there seems toe this nnection, this need to remember that and instead of just saying well, itould be nice to live on the oth side of e fence for once in while. and i n't know where that comes from. and it needso stop. >> reporr: professor go ahd, you work with the leues, what can they do, what kinof mentoring or what do theyo to prevent it. >> well, first of all there

is a trendous amount of effort put intprograms to address this iue. i know that both bil hunter and commissione stern have focused othe whole issue of thigangster type of culture and agery. the fact that ns and so forth will not be lerated, cannot be tolerated, in these very passione kinds of sports tivities. we've been very, very luck schools have been sh up, fa food places, even mortuary churches, courthous and so forth have all been suect to thesshooting incidents. we have avded that in spt more by luck than by effort. t both david stern and roger goell in the nfl have made an effort to try to educate about this situation and ma make unequically clear that they will come down ju iciously but they willome down very, verhard on any gun issue and i thk that is what david stern going to do. >> reporter:ike wise, is

this partilar suspension, in this paicular case, was at a surprise or is that what y see happening, mmissioner attorney stepping down hardo make a point. >> wl, the sad thing is i don't think commsioner stern would have acted if gilbert arenas had showed mo contrition after the event. think that much of his behavi after the incident exacerbated how he fel about public perception,or that matter. den what the brady group, a n control group obviously after e former chief of staff, that was shot during the agan assassination attempt comes out against gilbert arenas making pocpistols, at some int david stern is shutting gilbert aecentas down to not furthe embarrass hielf, the league or his organization. and i think he really woul ha waited for the law to make the determination, if

nofor his behavior afterwards. >> i don't think -- yes, i don't think the is any question that coissioner stern was intereed in finding oufirst of all, what the judial disposition would be towds it far as the law s concerned. t again in conversations and correspondenthat i have had with coissioner stern, he made it very, ry clear that he was acuty aware of where thithing could lead we have situation in this country ere over the first five years of the afghanistaand iraq wars, just under 5,0 americans were kled through all kinds of metds, of all genders, races and so forth. over that same fe years close to 27,000 ack males were killein this society by gunfire ane. that meant that the average black male had a better chance of surviving the streets of kabul or baghd than in the streets their urban community this culre has evoed a standard of violence thacommissioner stern was very mucaware of.

and deite the fact that he was waiting fothe judicial disposition of ts situation to work ou he wagoing to come down very hard. heade that clear early on. >> reporter: all rightwe do have to leavet there. harry edwardand mike wise, thank you bo very much. >> tnk you. >> tnk you. >> lehrer:ow, health officials are still ging americans to get vaccinated against the sne flu. ray suarez has o health unit update. >> we ha 100 doses of injectle vaccine. suarez: the crowds that lin up for hourset an h1n1 vaccination in the fall at clinics nationwi are long gone, d the rush to get vaccinated has slowed, but iit all too soon? there is a sense that its over, but 's too soon to say that itsver, because it is eay in the flu sean still, and h1n1as been very difficult to prect. >> suarez: dr. thomas ieden of the nters for disease control says there'still plenty of time to get vaccined, plenty of vaccine for everybody, an

there might be ather wave of flu. >> flu is probably the lst predictable of a infectious diases. it is contuing to spread from person tperson. it's continug to make people sick, there's still time to get vaccinated. it's only rly january; flu ason generally lasts until may. analthough flu is way down, we don't know what thfuture will hold. >>uarez: and while the h1n1 vacce is now easy to come by at this cvs minute clinic in rginia, this week, only a handful ofeople had turned up to take advantage of a replenished supply. >> lots of vaccinefewer people. >> suarez: nurse practitner anne poenhert sa that's a stark contra from the fall. >> in mid-octor, minute clinic medical clinics around t country did receive small supply of h1n1 vacne, and we were able to ge that to as ma people as we could within the prioty groups that the c.d. determined. it was a really quick, incredible experience, whe we

would have amany as 100 to 500 vaccines in y clinic, and they uld be gone in a day or two. >> suarez: john and i schell-- both in their 60s-- said ty hadn't been able to get e vaccine before becausehey weren'in any of the c.c.'s priority groups. but now that vaccine is bein made avaable to everyone, they were eager to t vaccinated. >>e travel some, and we're so at church. yore just with a lot groups of people. and we felt itas important that wget vaccinated, not only protect us, but to protect other people from tching it from us. >> suarez: butot everybody is scrambli to get their h1n1 shot, fromnxious mothers... >> at the ginning, they don't tell you about the conseences, and i'm woied at a long-term problem. >> suarez: ... to college studts. >> i'm n that worried about getting sick. >> suarez: and accordi to dr. michael osterholm, director the cent for infectious disease research andolicy at the university of minnesota, that's not good. >> unfortunately, right w, most of the rld believes that h1n1 pandemic of 2009 over and done with and they he

written s obituary. we very well cld be in for a third wave in the coming months. and unfortunely, because of at sense that it is over wit we are not getti people vaccinated. we estimate thatin this country alone,hat at least half the popation is still vulnerle to the disease, because they eitr weren't vaccined or they weren't infected in the firstwo waves, so we have aob ahead of us to get vaccinatedn a time when it esn't appear that risk is imminent. >> suare america has experienced e h1n1 pandemic in a wide range oways, from the relatively small numbeof cases across the upper midwest to e eastern hotspots of nejersey, delaware, and virginia nearly 20% of the 435 stents at episcopal high school i alexandria, virgia, got the viru they're back nowfter winter break. how many oyou are sure you had h1n1 how many of you got the ccine en it was available? >> i got iafter.

>> suare they all live on campus. many headed me when they got ck, others went to the clini to convasce. >> so,rom the middle to late in octoberwe filled nearly to capacity on a couple of occasions. >> suarez: dr. bruce krauts the school's physician. so when yourumbers started to ri, you had operate like a little hospital. lets te a look at one of these rooms. >> we doubled the capaty using the bunk beds stem. during ourpike in h1n1 actity, we essentially filled these 24 beds a couple of occasion >> suarez: after repead messagesome and lectures for faculty and students, 60% the student body got the vcine. and kraut says hwishes he could get it higher stil in case another wavof flu breaks. with plentof vaccine available, t new recipients are coming o at a time. and luily, none of the

students who came down wh the virus had to be spitalized so today, at episcopal, righ ere with the oil and vinegar on the dining roomable, hand sanitize but the urgency use it seems to have worn o. in geva, right before new year's e, the director general of the worldealth organization had upbeat report of the state of play inany countries. >> the long erdue influenza pandemic is so merate in its impact, it's probablthe best health news of the decade. suarez: there have been som 47illion cases of h1n1 nationwide, and while for me older amerans, h1n1 has caused severe illnessmany people over 60 have an immunity from earer flus. >> but for children and youn adults, the te of death is at least five times higher that regular flseason. and for children, at lst, it has been abad as the 1968 pandem. so, by all mns, it has not

been a 1918, ihas not been a 1957, so f. but it's a disease tt has made many people si, many of them severelyll and has, sadly, killed more than 10,000 americans. >> suarez: nearly 1,0 of those who have died are chilen. so, has h1n1 lived up tohe scary advance billing thatame roaring out ofexico in the spring, or is it variety of flu that was easy to catch b didn't really tu out to be virulent? >> this pandem was much more seleively hitting younger populations and causinthe kinds illnesses we have not seen in myublic health career. >> suarez: and osterho says if you consider theremature deaths among young f sufferers, not oy is the impact magnified. >> it is very ear that this pandemic haseen much, much more severe th any seasonal flu years we've d in modern histor and actually begins to have impact likehat we saw with previous pandemics in 17 and 1968.

>> srez: professor osterholm and drfrieden are uncertain about a third wave of disease, d won't rule it out. they strongly agree on prention over a roll of e dice. >> get vaccinated. >> get your h1n1 vaccine. >> suarez: hospitals coped schools managed, vacci producers pushed millionof new doses t the door. h1n1 is still outhere; so is the asonal flu. both will still be a teat for monthso come. >> lrer: finally tonight, a nelook at a pivotal supreme court stice. gwen ifi talked to a reporter o has been covering antonin scalia on the bench for re than t decades. >> ifi: joan biskupic, the auth of life an morning of life of antonin scal, thank you for ining us. >> tha you, gwen. >> ifill: it is so interestin everybody thinkshey know what they belie about antonin scale yag, what go we know aut him that is ght and wrong. >> wl, certainly very conservative but how he

came that conservative, many people dot knowment th don't know the kind of usehold he grew up in. very strict roman tholic. the soof a man who was a translator, a textualist w looked at documents d took th by their words which the justice now do to strongegree in his own life. he was an onlyhild and not ly was he the only child of two striving italian americans, he wathe only offspring of his generion. his mother was one of seven, no cousins, no other children the his father one of two, so he grew u someone who was que the center of tention which cabe quite enabling, you would thinyou should always be the center o attentn, but also a buen. so he waa young boy and became a manho felt the need to ove himself. >> ifill: how dihe get at nick name nino. >> well, wheyou have a name like antoni and he was named after his grandfathewho was antonino, so ninbecame an easy nick name frothat.

>>fill: you have been coring the supreme court d justice scalia is not one known to givinterviews but you got to him talk you for thisook. >> i did in fact he at rst wouldn't. he said, he acknowledge td that we had a rocky relationship over my t decades coveringhe court which you are goinhave with your zubts often. and said talk to my colleagues, talk to my mily, talk to, you know, form clerks but i'm not talking to you. but in time what happened, as i got into his persal story and found lots of od information in judicial archives, immiation arches, his home in trendton, new rsey and thenhere he grew up in queens, we started swappin information. and onthing lead to another and hi about a dozen sit-do on the record interviewss with him >> ifill: you sa immigration, are you talki about at ellis island business his father ca in through els island. his father came to ameca as a youngeenager knowing rdly any english. and then went ono get a ph.d in romance languages at

columbia universy and taught forhree decades. and his father was qui a force in his life. so tracing back th story and the riving immigrant story was quite helpl to coming to understand justice scalia. >> ifill: you talk about the forces in his life we know hinow as perhaps the world's most famous coervative, originalist, unyielding. >> uh-hu >> ifill: where did that come from? >> you know, his ownather was pretty unyielding. and wasomeone who read xts. he actually translated lot of texts as professor of romance nguages. he grew up in a strictoman catholic famy. again, the siving first generation family. no o remembers him in his st as being anything other than conservative. and you know when you say to him justice scalia when di you first become an originalist, he will s it is like saying wn did you first start eat -- --, he doesn't rember not being an originalist and knows there is a prejodifficult cast sometimes to . >> ifill: whatoes that mean. >> to define it for ople, someone whtakes an

originalist approach to e constitution looks back to the 18th century dfters and how they understood the law and how theyanted it derstood at that time. rather than to play it -- apply a 21stentury overlay to ias, for example, the late wilam brennan famously d to think of it a living, evolving constitution. and on the curnt court justice steven brier embodies thaa lot in the way he talks about how t nstitution should be read to meet society'needs today. what justice scaa says to that is if y want to meet society's needtoday and it is not in the constituon, pass a law i'm not stding in your way, pass a law, do it legislatively. ifill: have to say i was really surprised tdiscover his best frid on the court is o of the court's most liberal members stice ginsburg. >>es, quite a feminist, a woman who really madher namen terms of equal rights as an advate for the aclu, no less, and tn now mes on to the court. and is a liberal. as justice skiia is certainly t. but what s says, gwen, is

i love nino although iould like to strangle him sometimes. >> ifill: we're alfamiliar with theituations where that mht be true. i wantou to read a little sectioof the book which tells us a little bit abt the way in wch justice scalia behaves on thbench. he is very talkative. he is ry lively and he's que the jokes ster. >>kay, lels's see. to some extent scaa's behaviorn the bench was just an exaggeted form of what other justices were ying to do with their own erys, argue with each other, something that occu surprising little off the nch. mostly, however, scalis frequentnd sharp inteentions seem the result of an iesistable impuls that's him. he is always sort of impulsing l over. his appetite for debe was so strong that hcould hardly stop himself om entering t frey. when he heard counsel gi confusedrguments or arguments he thought wrong he jumped in. when he heard question from a colleague g unanswered, he leaped too. some of this w just because time was short. and he believed should not wasted on bad argumentation.

so of it seemed to show him as t schoolboy who knew the answer and blted it out. now thout the need to raise his handor permission. even thoughe had gone to, you know, was raised in era some catholic school, some public scols where yoreally had to mind the teacher there sothing about him that doe't seem to mind the teacr. >> ifi: but you mention his tholicism, a very big part of who he is. and also shapes what he believes as ll. >>t does. in fact, i, there a chapr as you know that tks about the "passions" of his mi. it lks at his great passion foroman catholicis in fact, theld-fashioned roman catholicism. likes to say that vatican ii was notn his hit parade he thinks the people suld be praying theosary, going to all the holy da. >> ifill: he was ratr distanced to find a pari that suits his. >> i le his moth-in-law's comment to hi don't you people live around churches because th were always driving find the right ki of church and at best often the tin mass. but he also has a certn passion for the repudiion of "roe versus we" and i

pair those two but i l him sathat despite his seriousness about religion which will acknowledge he is very serio about his religion, that his decions on abortion and the sepation of church and state really andriven by those. he says read text. i read the constitutn. i'm an originalist. i do not let my regious views come in a i don't let any other personal views comin. now --. ifill: did you believe that. >> well, what i do is i le crics respond to that and i think face t he's ve conservative. it's hard to see tt despite f he was of a dierent religion or denominati that he wouldn feel as passionately against row, v wadbut his man catholicism is in the picturin terms of what many ctics feel. >> ifill: he is how old? >> 73. >> ifill: no sns of retirement >> no gns of retirement. although at one point i id to his wife, nowe is in good hlth, right. anthere was enough of a pause that iot a little nervs. he does still smok he smokes maboro lights, he smokes, drink eats a lot. but his rents lived into

their 8 0s. and he see vigorous. so i think he has least a decade more onhe court. >> ifi: legacy? >> wel you know that is a good question. because heertainly has been a for. but can a rce that is so extreme one side really dure. i'm sure his great writing willndure. t will what he says in the law endure. justicginsburg his close friend on the court thinks not. >> ifill: joan bkupic, author of american oginal, injure book about justice antonin scia, great read. thank you very much. >> brown: again, the mor developmen of the day: the administration repord intelligence agencs had sufficient information tha could have let tm disrupt the aiiner bombing plot. president obama said, ultimately, the failure stop the attacks his reonsibility. the newshour is always onlin hari sreenivan, in our newsro, previews what's there. hari. >> sreenivan: npr's julie vner explains the issues at stake as the housend senate try toeconcile their competing health care reform bil.

all that and me is on our web te, newshour.pbs.org. jeff. >> bro: and that's the wshour for tonight. i'm jeffrey brown. >> lehrer:nd i'm jim lehrer. we'll see you line, and again he tomorrow evening with mark shields and david ooks, among others. thank you d good night. major funding for e pbs newshour is prided by: >> what the world nes now is energy. the energy tget the economy humming agn. e energy to tackle challenge like climate cnge. at if that energy came from energy comny? every day, chevron inves $62 miion in people, in ideas-- seeking, teachin building. fueling growth around e world to move usll ahead. this is the power ofuman engy. chevro >> thiis the engine that connects abundant grain fr the americaneartland to haran's best selling who wheat, while keeping 60 billion poundof carbon out of the atmospre

every year. bnsf, the engine thaconnects us intel. supporng coverage of innovation and theconomy. and by toyota. and thwilliam and flora hewlett foundation, woing to solve social and environment problems at homend around the world. and wi the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possle by the cporation for public broadcastg. and by contributio to your pbs station from viewers likyou. thank you. caioning sponsored by macnl/lehrer productions captned by media cess group at wgbh access.wgbh.org