captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> lehrer: good evening. i'm jim lehrer. senate democrats reached a compromise on health care reform. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill. on the "newshour" tonight: will the public insurance option be a casualty of that deal? >> lehrer: we assess the agreement and look at the political battles ahead. >> ifill: then, what's at stake for the u.s. and the world at the climate talks in copenhagen. judy woodruff reports. >> lehrer: alleged terrorist david coleman headley was arraigned in federal court in chicago.

we'll go to sebastian rotella of the "los angeles times" for the details. >> ifill: our series on the nation's economy continues-- ray suarez reports on some of the challenges facing tractor country. >> i thought i could weather the storm but i've had enough, you know. i've done enough bleeding that i want to quit before i'm bled out. >> ifill: that's "patchwork nation," tonight from sioux city, iowa. >> lehrer: and pianist richard glazier: keeping the gershwins' music alive. >> to the younger generation, they're discovering something completely new. and music and song that are e mortal and timely that will live for generations to come. >> lehrer: that's all coming on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour is provided by:

the national science foundation. supporting education and research across all fields of science and engineering. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> lehrer: the health care debate in the senate reached a potential turning point today. democratic leaders reached agreement last night on dropping the so-called "public option" from the bill. "newshour" health correspondent betty ann bowser begins our coverage. >> reporter: president obama today praised democrats for

trying to resolve a key stumbling block, even though their deal would drop something he's championed: a government- run insurance option. >> the senate made critical progress last night with a creative new framework that i believe will help pave the way for final passage and a historic achievement on behalf of the american people. i support this effort especially since it's aimed at increasing choice and competition and lowering cost. >> thanks everyone for being patient. >> reporter: news of the deal came late last night from senate majority leader harry reid after nearly a week of closed door negotiations involving 10 moderate and liberal democrats. >> we have a broad agreement. now i know that people are going to ask to be given every detail of this. >> reporter: in fact, reid offered few details. but it was widely reported the deal would replace the senate bill's government-run option with a system of private, non- profit health plans.

they'd be administered by the office of personnel management, which already manages health policies for federal employees, including members of congress. the proposal would also expand medicare to uninsured americans 55 to 64 years old. the program is now open to those 65 and older. >> this is a consensus that will help ensure the american people win in a couple of different ways. one, insurance companies will certainly have more competition. and two, the american people will certainly have more choices. >> reporter: and democratic aides said if private insurers won't participate, some form of a public option could yet kick in. reid has a lot of work to do to get the 60 votes he needs to pass the bill. he must win over liberals disappointed at losing the public option and appease fiscal conservatives in his party who

are worried about the nearly trillion dollar price tag of the all eyes are congressional budget office. the c.b.o. will have to calculate the costs of the newly revised measure. and wisconsin democrat senator russ feingold-- a leading liberal-- said he has serious concerns. and you know i am interested in seeing what the c.b.o. office numbers are, for example. the public option under the majority leaders bill saves $25 billion. and we're gonna lose those savings. that's an example of questions i'd like to get answer for before i feel confident that this will work. >> until its score, we can't talk about the specifics fellow democrat blanche lincoln of arkansas, a fiscal, conservative-- said today she too was waiting to see more details. >> there are lot of things on

the table still, and until we hear back from c.b.o., it's going to be hard to see what i can support as well. >> reporter: republicans lined up against the latest democratic plan, especially the expansion of medicare. minority leader mitch mcconnell. >> we all know medicare is going broke now. in seven years, they're going to take $460 billion out of it-- not to make it more sustainable but to start a new program for a whole different set of americans, and now they want to expand coverage even further. it hardly makes any sense to me. >> reporter: meanwhile, groups representing doctors and hospitals-- who've backed reform in general-- also questioned the wisdom of expanding medicare. rich umbdenstock is president of the american hospital association. >> the ability of people under 65 to buy into medicare certainly helps on the coverage side, but it greatly concerns hospitals on the revenue side because medicare chronically underpays hospitals. our latest data shows that

medicare pays 91 cents on the dollar. so this is moving more people into a program that underpays hospitals. it really compromises hospitals ability to continue to offer the level of services they want and need to provide. >> reporter: majority leader reid hoped to quiet the doubts and stay on schedule for getting the senate to vote on the final bill by christmas. >> ifill: major questions remain about whether this latest deal will get health care reform passed. joining us to look a little more closely at the policy and the politics, are amy walters, editor of "the national journal's" political daily, "the hotline." jacob hacker, a professor of political science at yale university, and one of the leading proponents of the public option. and matt miller, an author, columnist and fellow at the center for american progress. welcome to you all. jacob hacker, how real is this broad compromise, a term that harry reid used? >> well it certainly is a broad compromise but i think it's a complex one. it has a lot of moving parts and

a lot of details we don't know yet. the way i would describe it is in sort of dickinson terms is the detail of public options. the public option one, the public option within the exchange and available to americans day one for competition for private insurance plays to give people a choice, that public option has been replace the, in my mind with an inadequate substitute, a national system of private plans. but public option two, which was never on the agenda before, a buy-in to the actual medicare program for 55 to 64 year olds is an enormous positive development. it's actually the original idea, if you will, for the public option, simply letting people get into the medicare program that provides broad secure coverage at an afford knowledge price. >> ifill: the original public option is not necessarily alive but this new one mightily. >> yes what i would say is this is an interesting turn in the

debate. the discussion until now is figuring out ways to hobble this public option that's available on a broad scale. this new development in the debate basically takes the national public option that would have been available to all americans within the exchange and replaces it with non-profit plans that i don't think are going to be able to provide the choice and competition that president obama spoke about. but the new development is that we also have in this package a medicare buy-in for 55 to 64 year olds. >> ifill: matt miller, what do you think about that. whatever happen to the robust public option we were talking about before. is this a desirable outcome? >> i think it is. because i think the whole focus on the public option has been over blown in my view in the debate. i think the left has put too much emphasis on it as a kind of panacea and i think the right has demonized it in a way that's totally unjustified because the estimates shown it will reach a couple million people out of 300 million americans. the real progressive achievement that i think liberals and

democrats should embrace that this deal represents progress to is that for the first time, individuals in america will have access to group health coverage outside the employment setting. that's the big thing that america uniquely lacks that every advanced country has. if you combine that with the ability for a ban on insurers from discriminating is with folks with preexisting conditions, the prevention of anyone ever from going bankrupt from medical costs in america, again a shameful thing in a wealthy country like the united states, this political molecule that harry reid has worked to craft would represent the biggest progressive achievement in decades and while the public option debate is important, i think it's a bit of a side show compared to those core achievements that liberals should cherish. >> ifill: political molecule. that takes us right to you, amy. very nice segue. does he get even one more vote out of this. >> it's all been, and i think you're exactly right. we've been talking about a lot about terminology and i think

that whatever we call this final bill, whatever's in this final package, they're going to call whatever they would like to call it mostly they'd like to call it done. and i think that's the most important piece here when you look at this. the point is getting the 60 votes. we knew there was always going to be the deal making that needed to happen to get something done whether we're going to call it a public option, whether we're going to call it something else. we knew that to craft something it was going to have to get those 60 votes. the concept of a public option that's been demonized for moderates worried about the re-election or worried about being culled out as being overly involved getting the government overly involved in healthcare, worried about those things, they don't want to voted for something -- >> ifill: you just saw the wait and see coming from the democrats we've been watching most closely the ones saying they don't know. was there something for them in this? >> it sounds like, at least that they are saying that they're at least open to the prospect to have a mary

landreua and blanch lincoln still willing to take a look and see. remember all of them are going to hold these because they know they're the 60th vote. so why do you want to give away the store right now when you have all the cards make sure you learn how to play them very well. there's a reason they've been doing that quite well. the other piece that i think is really important, the longer this stays out and the longer that we're all sitting around talking about the sausage making the more frustrated americans become in this process both with congress and with the bill. if you look at where the president's approval rating is right now in the handling of healthcare, this is a bloomberg poll that came out today actually dropped 7 points since september in terms of his handling the approval on this issue. so whatever is going on, i think that the number one issue for the majority leader harry reid is to really get this thing done. >> ifill: jacob hacker let's talk about the medicare part you like so much. is it going to cost a lot of money and won't that lose votes? >> well no.

i mean it's going to be a stand-alone medicare buy-in so that means it would be self financing. the people who are paying premiums to buy into medicare will be fully funding their coverage. that actually raises a bit of a technical concern. it's just how to you insure that coverage is affordable. there are two parts to what's being discussed and we don't know all the details yet. the first part is actually to allow people to buy into medicare prior to the creation of these exchanges in 20 1. so prior to the creation of the exchanges in 2014. that's a positive development, it's something that's concrete that people will be able to see it changing lives very early in the reform process. >> ifill: you were on capitol hill today talking to people about this. did people say to you great, this is done? >> no. i can tell you that no one feels like it's done. there's still a long way to go. there is a sense, i think, that, you know, we're nearing the end of this final stage of the debate, but we're still very long way to go. >> ifill: and the beginning no doubt. matt miller, the other thing that happened this week was the

passage in the senate anyhow or the defeat in the senate of the anti-abortion amendment that was until house. the leaving aside for a moment whether the house will suddenly change its mind about this issue, was this significant or symbolic what the senate did? >> i think the politics of the abortion issue as it relates to this debate, again in my view is a real side show because we already through the federal government's tax subsidy for employer provided healthcare, most of those player health provided programs give will discretion for services they seek in their own best judgment. that mean the federal government is devoting hundreds of billions of dollars a year subsidizing program that now we're seeing a big fuss on capital hole capitol hill whether the penny can be segregated in some ways the women don't use it for purposes they intend. i view this as this is not what the debate should be about and whatever they need to do to sort of sweep it away is good for the country. >> ifill: which takes us back to the politics of it. is the essential part political

of the debate, amy. >> what's interesting already in the house though, you saw that the pro-choice faction in the house was willing to compromise on this to say we are going to vote for a bill that has restrictive language on it on abortion. knowing that there's a deal that we're going to cut it, when it comes back to us, it will be stripped out. so when the senate passed one that was more liberal, that really sent a signal that we're going to get what we ask for. but bottom line is, the compromises that need to be made are going to be made individually and the votes taken on individual amendments are going to find their way price to price in the campaign commercials next time. regardless how these members vote on the final bill how they're voting along is going to be taken into the equation of the re-election effort. the way they're going to try to paint themselves as being advocates on this issue. all democrats, i think, i would believe, want to get this thing done because they do know that having a majority and not passing this, they've come this far and get nothing accomplished

would be the worst possible thing for them. but they have to show these each individual members and more so in the senate they've played a role in tailoring this to the needs of their state. >> ifill: go back to the public option, jacob hacker. one of the things olympia snowe the modern republican asked for a long time ago in this debate was a trigger. something that is for some reason people aren't able to get coverage. the government option would be triggered to take it, to fill that gap. this seems to be part of this compromise. >> that's right. though the details again are not entirely clear. it look as if the trigger in this proposal is that if this new complicated way of the federal government contracting with private plans to provide national private plans that are regulated to the federal level, if that doesn't work, then you would fall back to some kind of public option. but even that is not entirely clear. and i think actually, and matt wrote a very good column about this, actually think that bringing the trigger back on to the agenda would be a very important way to create more

heat for the insurance industry. offer we're going to be giving a how much amount in subsidies requiring people to get private insurance coverage. we don't have strong guarantees that private insurance premiums are going to be in line going forward. >> ifill: this is the trigger would force them. >> there would be something more robust than this, this proposed private insurance alternative that's on the table right now. so i'm strongly of the view that the way to strengthen this would be to say, look, okay, and i just want to say the insurance companies clearly think this is a big win for them. there was an insurance industry inside every blog. we win. administered by private insurance companies, no government funding. well, if they've won this round, the question is can we put in place a trigger that says if they don't perform up to expectations, then in the next round, there's a public option that isn't restricted to people over 55. >> ifill: are they right? part of the insurances companies that they've won on this round defining it the way they did. >> there's no question the

private insurers prefer not to have the fully robust public option. i agree with jacob there needs to be something in the system that's a forcing device not just for the insurers but the local regional august law peas among hospitals and position groups. the real drivers the people don't understand with healthcare cost isn't just the insurance companies, it's the regional market power of the provider groups that no politician wants to take on or talk about. it's the missing aspect of the cost debate that we'll be dealing with for years. >> ifill: is there time, is there part time pressure on harry reid at this point as we move along? talk about break throughs every couple weeks ask then we're back here. >> then the piece was set up he wants to get this done pie christmas. there's talk he wants the president to be able to sign this before the state of the union and then we move on to talk about what, i don't know the economy maybe, unemployment and those things. it's literally tied up in the house saying we don't care what the senate's doing we know we've got to talk about jobs and unemployment. that's what we're going to do. they want to be able to move on

to other you topics. as i said every day this is out here, it's not just the president's numbers on this issue dropped, the support for the issue continues to drop. right now again proposed changes to the healthcare system this is in the bloomberg poll an 38 say they approve what they're hearing right now about what's going on in healthcare. the longer it sits out here the less popular it becomes. and harry reid himself up for re-election, new poll came out this week, not only are his numbers bad in the state, but his handling of healthcare. >> ifill: this particular issue. >> this particular issue, not good either. so i would definitely want to get this done if i were in his shoes. >> ifill: amy walter, jacob hacker and matt miller, thank you all very much. jim. >> lehrer: now, for the other news of the day: here's hari sreenivasan in our newsroom. hari? >> sreenivasan: a huge storm blasted nearly two thirds of the united states today with ice, snow and heavy rain. it shut down airports and hundreds of schools and was blamed for at least 12 deaths. kwame holman has our report.

>> reporter: a winter wonderland it was not. as the pre-winter storm stretched eastward today, snow fell at the rate of an inch an hour in parts of new england. >> it was definitely a lot worse than i expected. >> reporter: and that was just the latest. the season's first system unloaded three feet of snow in parts of northern california, earlier this week. by tuesday, much of the midwest was blinded with white-out, blizzard conditions. across state after state, roads were iced over, leaving drivers skidding out of control. >> it's treacherous conditions a lot of slide-offs, a lot of accidents. >> reporter: overnight, plow trucks tried to clear more than a foot of snow in places like madison, wisconsin, where at least one plow got stuck itself. and a second round of snow slammed the upper midwest and great lakes today. >> i just do a little at a time because i'm getting too old to do it fast. >> reporter: snow driven by 50- mile-an-hour winds piled up drifts in much of the midwest

and brought airports to a standstill, with hundreds of flights canceled. >> i'm actually headed back to los angeles, but this blizzard-- it just won't stop going, and right now, all the flights are canceled and i can't get home. >> reporter: farther south today, the storm took the form of heavy rain that flooded streets in virginia. and high winds blew over mobile homes in south carolina. and in the northeast, snow began falling last night and continued into the morning. commuters in new jersey were among many thousands who faced a treacherous trip. >> i probably did about 30 miles per hour the entire time, i have automatic four wheel drive, but other cars in front of me kept spinning out. >> reporter: the storm system was expected to cross maine tonight and begin making its way into the atlantic by tomorrow. >> sreenivasan: the u.s. general who executed the troop surge in iraq warned today afghanistan will be tougher in some ways. general david petraeus now leads the u.s. central command. he told a senate hearing he

expects to see progress, albeit slowly, as 30,000 additional u.s. troops deploy. >> afghanistan is no more hopeless than iraq was when i took command there in february 2007. indeed, the level of violence and number of violent civilian deaths in iraq were vastly higher than we have seen in afghanistan. but achieving progress in afghanistan will be hard, and the progress there likely will be slower in developing than was the progress achieved in iraq. >> sreenivasan: petraeus would not estimate how many years it might take afghan security forces to assume control. in iraq, prime minister nouri al-maliki appealed to his countrymen to be patient, after the latest bombings. at least 127 iraqis died yesterday in a string of suicide attacks on government sites in baghdad. more than 500 others were wounded. maliki gave a nationwide address on iraqi state television. he said all security strategies would come under review.

>> ( translated ): i call on the iraqi people for more patience and steadfastness and to proceed with the path of unity, confrontation and challenge. they try to spread chaos and spread hatred and sectarianism and to confront what iraqis have achieved in terms of security gains as a result of their struggle, efforts and patience. >> sreenivasan: later, state t.v. reported maliki had ordered a shakeup of top security officials. and a special parliamentary session was scheduled for tomorrow, to focus on the security lapses. in economic news, bank of america announced it has repaid all of the $45 billion in federal rescue money it received. that frees the bank from government restrictions, including curbs on executive pay. and on wall street today, the dow jones industrial average gained 51 points to close at 10,337. the nasdaq rose more than 10 points to close above 2,183. the state of massachusetts is one step closer to filling the seat of senator edward kennedy, who died last august.

attorney general martha coakley won the democratic nomination tuesday over three other candidates. and republican state senator scott brown won his party's nomination. they'll face off in a special election on january 19. and in georgia, former state senator kasim reed was officially declared the next mayor of atlanta. election officials confirmed it after a recount. reed beat city councilwoman mary norwood by 714 votes in a runoff. she would have been the city's first white mayor since 1973. those are some of the day's main stories. i'll be back at the end of the broadcast with a look at what you'll find tonight on our web site. but for now, back to jim. >> lehrer: and still to come on the "newshour" tonight: the terrorism indictment in chicago; our patchwork nation series; ray suarez on the state of the economy in tractor country; and the music of piano man richard glazier. that's after a judy woodruff report on the global warming negotiations in denmark. >> reporter: ithe climate change summit in copenhagen looked to be just another chance

for diplomats to talk, but get little done. today came a rallying cry from one of the top members of the u.s. delegation. the head of the environmental protection agency lisa jackson is in denmark. >> if we do not act to reduce greenhouse gases, the planet we leave to the next generation will be a very different place than the one we know today. >> reporter: other countries have gone out of their way to show the debate is urgent, the stakes high. leaders of the maldives-- a chain of islands in the indian ocean-- staged a cabinet meeting under water to emphasize fears of rising sea levels that could literally wash away their nation. nepal's cabinet took to the frigid heights of mount everest to declare the melting himalayan glaciers pose a threat to them. all this in the face of growing evidence from scientists that global warming risks more hurricanes, coastal flooding, disease and massive population

migration. the best way to head that off, they argue, is by reducing the amount of carbon humans spew into the atmosphere. but because that entails costly changes in the forms of energy used, there's no guarantee the 192 countries meeting these two weeks will reach a deal. already, major players, including the u.s., have begun to stake out their positions in copenhagen. president obama has pledged to cut overall u.s. emissions by 17%, relative to 2005 levels, by 2020. today he met privately at the white house with business leaders and environmentalists with a stake in the outcome. >> there is a lot riding on this and i think there is a chance to do something very important here. >> reporter: todd stern is the lead climate negotiator for the u.s. he says this summit is different from previous ones.

>> fundamentally, what is going on in this negotiation is an effort for the first time to have the major developing countries participate in the regime. that has not happened before. we are talking about china and and we are talking about those countries putting their own policies on the table in an international agreement, standing behind those policies and having those policies significantly turn down their own emissions curves. >> reporter: in fact, stern says success hangs especially on china's further cooperation, something now uncertain. before the summit began, china-- the world's largest polluter-- pledged to voluntarily improve energy efficiency. india has made a similar pledge, but experts point out the total volume of carbon emissions for both would continue to rise, albeit at a slower rate. shyam saran is india's top climate negotiator. >> we will try to push the envelope as much as we can and

try to see that we get as good an outcome as possible. i think there should be an appreciation of the fact that despite being a developing country, despite not having very many resources available to us, we are actually spending very good money on many of these. >> reporter: but even as pressure mounts on india and especially china, most look to the u.s. to take a leading role. the u.s. offer of carbon cuts comes with new money for developing nations. but other countries and environmentalists say the proposed emissions cuts are too small, stern disagrees. >> by 2025, that number would go up to close to 30%-- by 2030, it would be 42% reduction below 2005 and it would just march up from there so it's a very, very significant offer that we are putting on the table. it is really involves seismic change in u.s. policy. >> reporter: the proposed cuts

in emissions match legislation approved by the u.s. house, but stalled in the senate. and congressional approval of a global treaty is by no means assured. >> i have expectations that this is not going to accomplish the kinds of things organizers want and i'm very pleased with that. >> reporter: republican senator john barrasso of wyoming serves on the senate environment committee. he is fighting the current climate bill, and is not supportive of an international agreement. >> i am most focused on the economy of this country at this time. and i don't think we ought to handicap ourselves at a time when china is certainly going to economically at a time that, even if we did everything that every environmentalist would want that still wouldn't really have an impact globally on carbon emissions. >> reporter: opponents of an international deal are drawing plenty of attention to a recent scandal that some are calling "climate-gate." e-mails between top scientists hacked from the computer of a british lab have raised serious allegations that researchers conspired to exaggerate and

possibly manipulate the evidence of global warming. researchers deny that, but the scandal has cast a cloud over the summit. >> i think there is great skepticism among people all across the country when they heard about these emails. you know this climate gate. and they are saying "what's true here? and what's not true?" so i think people are very suspicious about this and especially when you look at the kind of investment that the american people are being asked to make and the kind of sacrifices in the hopes of saving the planet 100 years from now. >> the underlying core science does not change because of this flap. there is science from all over the world to show the basic underlying realities that the accumulation of greenhouse gases causes the world to warm and that warming has a whole

assortment of dangerous potential impacts. >> reporter: president obama will come to copenhagen armed with evidence the u.s. is getting serious: an e.p.a. declaration this week that carbon dioxide endangers human health, and must be regulated, even if congress doesn't act. it's what environmentalists had wanted for years. activist mike tidwell of the chesapeake climate action network say a tough deal is what's required. >> this is a nation of laws and if we want to change to change this nation, we must change laws, ala civil rights movement, >> reporter: tidwell has limited his own carbon footprint. he drives a hybrid car, gets electricity from solar panels and heat with a corn fueled stove. but he says that is not enough. >> individual changes count, they do raise awareness, but we will never solve the climate crisis one refrigerator at time,

one household at a time. instead of wagging our finger at aunt betty to go buy more efficient light-bulbs, wouldn't it be great if the next time when she went to buy light bulbs there were only energy efficient light bulbs and you get there through policy and statutes. >> reporter: for that policy, tidwell and others are pinning high hopes on copenhagen. >> lehrer: he is american born, lives in chicago and has roots in pakistani as well as american high society. today, david headley was arraigned in federal court in chicago. he is charged with being a key plotter in the pakistani terrorist attack in mumbai, india, last year. for more on the story we go to: sebastian rotella, national security correspondent for "the los angeles times" and tribune newspapers. he previously covered international terrorism from europe. >> thank you, it's a pleasure.

>> lehrer: now, you entered a plea of not guilty today, right. >> yes, thieght that's correct. >> lehrer: what exactly is he charged with doing. >> he's charged with acting as a scout doing an intensive reconnaissance by the packing stink terrorist group carrying out the attacks using a cover as a american businessman. in mumbai opens a front business there and is scouting video taping the targets that were ultimately hit by these commando teams that killed 1 70 people. he's accused in a follow up plot this year of doing the same kind of scouting in denmark for what would have been a plot to attack the newspaper that published the characterrures of the prophet moaned some years ago. he's accused of that successful attack and follow up plot of the same nature. >> lehrer: getting back to the specifics in a moment. who is this guy. he was born in chicago, lives in chicago now. >> he was born in the states. he lives in chicago now but actually born, his mother's from

philadelphia. grew up in pakistan went to military school there and comes back to the states as a teenager. so he's really born and partly bread ibreadth in the states. he's an interesting profile from extremists and other cases. he's older for one thing. he's 49. he's a businessman or at least a cover as a businessman. >> lehrer: what kind of business. >> an immigration business, immigration consulting business that had offices in chicago, toronto, new york and opped one opened one in mumbai. >> lehrer: any evidence he actually did anything. >> some people came to the states for the business. it was basically a front but seemed to have unlimited resources to travel. he's also someone who is accused of having trained in the extensive camps that was operated out of pakistan earlier in the decade and where many westerners were trained and then sent out on plots against the west. >> lehrer: this is a serious group, is it not, this pakistani group. >> i think it is. some would say it's as or more dangerous than al-qaeda in a

sense it's formed originally with connections to pakistani security services and the struggle against india and for kashmir and its target has been above all india but it's evolved. and it has kind of a para military commando stale flavor to it because a lot of the people who have strained the recruits are people connected to the pakistani security forces. >> what was headley trained to do? he wasn't trained to be a commando he was trained to do what? >> it appears he did repeated trips to the camps so it appears he did different types of training but it's clear that this is someone who had some kind of training in trade craft in techniques of espionage. this was someone who was able to talk his way in, for example, to the offices of this newspaper in denmark pretending to be wanting to sell ads for his business. he's someone who had training that appears in para military activity but also very sophisticated surveillance espionage activities as well. >> lehrer: what's known about his motives? what's behind all this?

>> there are intercepts and telephone conversations in the charging documents that suggests he's true believing idea lawlg and a fundamental and extremist and he revered for example kashamidi from al-qaeda and extremist commander he met and plotted with during the course of his trips to pakistan. so there does seem to be this ideological fundment eist radicalization. >> lehrer: what's the level of his education. >> he's someone who had this military school education in pakistan but has a troubled youth, trouble with drugs and things like that. but clearly someone who is worldly and is well traveled and the accusation is quite accurate and he actually changed his name at some point. his original name was-and changed his name to david so he could travel more freely and effectively with his american

passport and poses something other than a pakistani american. >> lehrer: he clearly is hatred i guess is the word for the united states. do we know where that came from? did that come from the training or did he bring it to it or do we know? >> it's one of these things. every case of radicalization is somewhat different but certainly there's conversations when he talks about the classical sort of jihadi narrative of the u.s. at war with muslims. yes again this is someone who like others here in the states, come from emigrant backgrounds, came to the states, were not raised in abject property by any means but there's perhaps a mix of experiences that he has may have in many cases radicalization business of the question of seeking an identity. that identity becomes an extremist hard core one. >> lehrer: what's your reading whether there are more like this guy. is he a unique, for all the reasons you just outlined. is he a unique figure for this? >> i would say he's a unique figure in some of the facts as alleged in terms of the

sophistication of what he did. in terms of radicalization here in the states, unfortunately i would say this year has shown us there's a flurry of cases that suggests there's quite a few of americans who are plugging into this radical discourse who are traveling to pakistan to train and plot with al-qaeda and its allies and also others who are becoming radicalized here without benefit of foreign training attempting attacks at home. he's not unique in that sense unfortunately. >> lehrer: how did the fbi get on to him. >> it's not completely clear but it seemed they started tracking him after mumbai. don't forget there are americans killed in the mumbai attacks. >> lehrer: the fbi participated in the investigations. >> and was very key in determining some of the myriad international links. there were connections to italy, connection to the states. so it seems that it was quite a bit of physical evidence, intercepts and things like that that focused on him. they clearly track him particularly during these trips to denmark and his communications back to his handlers in pakistan.

>> lehrer: is he an american citizen? >> is he indeed. >> lehrer: is he eligible for the death penalty if this thing goes that far, is that as series a crime. >> he's. is he is charged with killing the 170 people in mumbai so he could face the death penalty. >> lehrer: what's the next step. >> the next step is to see how this case goes forward. there are reports and it's even clear from the documents he's talking about this that there's some cooperation going on. the next step would be to see if this goes to trial and at what level and what his, how far his cooperation goes. but i would say i would assume he's going to be prosecuted in these cases. >> lehrer: sebastian, thank you very much. >> my pleasure. >> ifill: now, "patchwork nation," our on-air and on-line collaboration with "the christian science monitor." ray suarez has been traveling the country, examining how recession and recovery are playing out in different communities from coast to coast. tonight, he takes us to tractor

country, the agricultural community of sioux center, in northwest iowa. >> reporter: every fall, a thick blanket of corn and soybeans covers this rolling farmland in sioux county, iowa. in a normal year, it would all be harvested by mid november and on its way somewhere, but an unusually wet fall has put farmers like randy vander schaff and his son nate behind schedule. so they worked overtime to get their crop out of the field before today's ferocious snow. until recently, grain farmers had been riding out the global recession pretty well, but the price of corn has plunged 46% in the past year, so they're bracing for hard times. john hansen is grain manager at the local farmers cooperative society. >> this community is fairly optimistic. you may find people in different parts of the country a little bit more pessimistic, but people here are pretty much... will

hunker down, as they say out here in the west and get through the tough times. so when the good times are there, things are a lot better.- > reporter: it hasn't hurt that corn prices reached record highs in the preceding two years, due in part to government subsidies and high global demand for grains and ethanol. good years allowed many farmers to save up. and that's important in a county where 97% of the land is used for agriculture, and in a state where one in six jobs is tied to that industry. through 2008 and into 2009, as the recession deepened and the rest of the economy continued to shed jobs at a breath-taking rate, employment remained pretty stable in tractor country. even now, here in sioux center, iowa, unemployment runs about half the national average. a drive through neighborhoods surrounding the small downtown reveal a prosperous community. homes are well kept. there are virtually no "for

sale" signs. the real estate bubble that brought down local economies across the country did not inflate in tractor country. and amenities, like a new golf course and a football field are surprisingly posh for a population of 6,700. the city recently spent $9 million building a 60,000 square foot all-season recreation center. mayor dennis walstra and city manager paul clousing say that, while other communities around the country are struggling with budget deficits, sioux center is in good shape. >> we're real fortunate in this community to... to have had the cash to... to do a lot of things that other communities can't do. we've always believed what our mother says, you've got to put a little bit away for a rainy day. and we've been able to do that. >> reporter: walstra says a quiet generosity helps people through bad times. >> because the community is so close-knit, everybody knows everybody, say "well, yeah, we

can use you maybe for 20 hours a week, or 30 hours a week in this job." >> reporter: but, a once homogenous population, dominated by dutch americans, is changing. mexican immigrants do more of the day to day work on farms and in meat packing plants. still, sioux center is similar to other agricultural communities, says dante chinni, director of the patchwork nation project. >> these places in general-- they live in a different world than the rest of us, the economies function differently. they don't get the big boom, but they also don't get the big crash. but, you know, they've ridden this out when the rest of the country has sort of taken a dive. the question is how long can they hold on, you know. when the trough is like this for a little bit, maybe they're okay. if it stays down there, even the steady line that they're on at some point has to take a dip. >> reporter: one sign of that dip is already showing up at the weekly tri-state livestock auction. dairy farmers are culling their herds, providing a steady stream

of what these bidders come looking for: cheap meat. but, in an agricultural economy, one person's gain is another's loss. relatively high prices for grain, used mainly for livestock feed, combined with a lower consumer demand for expensive dairy products, have put the squeeze on dairy farmers like darin dykstra. >> we have built up a cushion, but it's amazing how fast you can see money go out the door, you know. i mean, you can make money fast, but it seems like you can lose it even faster. >> reporter: a third generation dairy farmer, dykstra says this year has been tough, but instead of selling off some cows, he's cutting back on lots of little things. >> like one of the things that i did different was with my vitamin/mineral package... was take some of the ingredients out that we thought with the nutritionist saying we can probably take this out. you don't look at these things all the time when things are

good, but when things get bad you look at every little detail and just tweaking the little things is going to save you hopefully thousands of dollars that are going to keep you in business that much longer. >> reporter: small hog farmers, working even closer to the margins, like mike schouten, have had the toughest time. >> americans aren't buying the cuts of meat like they used to. you know because of the financial problems our country's going through and other countries aren't importing our products like they use to because of the worldwide recession that's going on. >> reporter: a new disease, popularly called "swine flu," has hurt business as well. >> you know, people have the perception that by eating pork they're going to get the flu and that's not the case at all. this flu scare has definitely had a major financial impact on the swine industry. >> reporter: after 11 years of hog farming, schouten is calling

it quits. >> i thought i could weather this storm, but i have had enough, you know. i've done enough bleeding that i want to quit before i'm bled out. >> reporter: luckily, schouten also has a full time job, with benefits running the a.g. department at nearby dordt college. still, stories like his are starting to worry folks in sioux center. >> i can tell you of two, three now that are going bankrupt. and they aren't going to survive this. so what's going to happen pretty soon-- the only way we can get out this thing is to get... cut production. and that's going on right now. >> reporter: on a typical morning, farmers gather at doc's to discuss crop and commodity prices over coffee. on this day, they talked with us about how hard it is for family farmers to stay in business. >> just getting a tractor, a combine, a planter, a field cultivator, maybe a spreader,

you've got a million dollars, boom. and now you haven't got seed, fertilizer, help... nothing. >> reporter: you've got to live in debt. no one has a million bucks. >> either that or have an awful rich daddy. >> reporter: what insulated farmers earlier in the recession was simple enough: everybody's got to eat. but they recognize the recession is finally pounding on their doors. >> we have to get our working people in our nation working. if we get that going, the farmers here will produce food for the world. >> reporter: so, even though bucolic life in sioux center seems far away from imploding banks, a jittery stock market, and the elbows-out hustle of american life-- people in tractor country are hoping the economic recovery they've been hearing about will take hold soon. >> ifill: you can find a lot more about the "patchwork nation" project on our web site, including an interactive map of

"tractor country" communities across the nation. ray's series continues tomorrow, when he'll take us to the boom town of eagle, colorado. >> lehrer: finally tonight, a musician who's "crazy" for gershwin. jeffrey brown has that story. ♪ >> reporter: it was, says richard glazier, the 1943 film, "girl crazy" that did it. >> i saw "girl crazy" when i was nine years old, and i just fell in love with the voice of judy garland and the music of george and ira gershwin. >> reporter: movie musicals led the young glazier to the piano. first, classical training and then a devotion to the music of a golden period of american song. particularly the gershwins-- george the composer, ira the lyricist. ♪

>> it is so purely and uniquely american and represents us in our best light. to the older generation, these songs of george and ira gershwin evoke memories, evoke places, evoke times, evoke feelings. to the younger generation, they are experiencing something totally new, songs that are immortal. >> reporter: now age 47, glazier performs their music for audiences around the country. recently, here at the smithsonian museum of american history. and he conveys his enthusiasm by sharing his own personal story of a nine-year-old boy who decided to write a fan letter to ira gershwin. >> what is a nine-year-old kid going to say to ira gershwin? we wrote, "dear mr. gershwin, may i please have a picture of

george to hang in my room?" where are we going to mail the letter? we don't know where ira gershwin lives. we're from indianapolis, indiana. well, my aunt suggested we mail the letter in care of the society of composers, authors and publishers, i think one lincoln plaza, new york, n.y., something like that. and ask them to forward the letter. four months later, an eight and 1/2 envelope arrives in the mail. >> reporter: a correspondence ensued, culminating in an invitation to visit gershwin's home in los angeles and play the famous piano where the brothers composed some of their most famous works. ♪ glazier, sitting with us now in the "gershwin room" at the library of congress in washington, surrounded by mementos of their work, was then 12. >> he asked me to go over to play the piano, which is behind me. this is where they composed "they can't take that away from me," "a foggy day," "loved walked in," "shall we dance," "nice work if you can get it," "let's call the whole thing

off", "love is here to stay," not to mention "porgy and bess." and i knew that when i went over to the piano. >> reporter: ira gershwin asked for "embracable you." he... and now we, got it. ♪ >> lehrer: again, the major developments of the day: the senate's health care debate reached a potential turning point, after democratic leaders agreed to drop the public option. a huge storm blasted nearly two

thirds of the united states with ice, snow and heavy rain. it was blamed for at least a dozen deaths. and the commander behind the troop surge in iraq-- general david petraeus-- warned the war in afghanistan will get harder, before it gets easier. the "newshour" continues now online. for a preview of what's there this evening on our new web site, back to hari sreenivasan in our newsroom. hari? >> sreenivasan: on our web site today: how could health care reform affect you? all week we'll ask experts to weigh in on the real-life impacts of the different proposals now on capitol hill. earlier today, i interviewed amy walter of "the hotline" about the politics of the health care push. and we talked about one of the winners in yesterday's primary race in massachusetts. it sets the stage for a special election to fill the senate seat that was occupied by the late edward kennedy. that's on our new blog of news and insight, "the rundown." and on jeffrey brown's "art beat" blog, you can find his full interview with pianist richard glazier plus his performance of "embraceable

you." as always, we are at newshour.pbs.org. gwen? >> ifill: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm gwen ifill. jim? >> lehrer: thanks, gwen. we'll see you on-line, and again here tomorrow evening. i'm jim lehrer. thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour is provided by: >> what the world needs now is energy. the energy to get the economy humming again. the energy to tackle challenges like climate change. what is that energy came from an energy company? everyday, chevron invests $62 million in people, in ideas-- seeking, teaching, building. fueling growth around the world to move us all ahead. this is the power of human energy. chevron.

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