him are inclined to think, what am i complaining about? 95-year-old guy here going to work every day. i think i'll shut up. >> yeah. a great work ethic. see you at 11:00. on our broadcast tonight, help for homeowners. something happened today that may let a lot of people hold on to their homes, but it's already making other people angry. new questions tonight about pope benedict's role in a sex abuse case. the latest crisis for the catholic church. together again and who would have thought it? john mccain calls in sarah palin for help. the high cost of a staple at the american dinner table. why now. d wait until you hear who is making a difference in one hard-hit community. "nightly news" begins now. captions paid for by nbc-universal television

good evening. in this era of government money propping up banks and car companies, and in the wake of new health care reforms, tonight there's a new approach coming to help struggling homeowners who are at risk for losing their homes. the government's been trying to do this since the bush administration, without success, but for the first time the government will help shrink the actual mortgage. the problem is it's angering some of the homeowners who lived by the rules and paid their mortgages despite hard times. now, as you might imagine, they're wondering why their tax dollars should be used to rescue their neighbors who are overextended and in trouble. we begin tonight with diana olick at the white house. >> reporter: good evening, brian. americans have collectively lost more than $5 trillion in home equity. under pressure from borrowers and using big banks as a model, the government announced a plan to get some of it back.

it's an acknowledgement that the $75 billion mortgage bailout has fallen short, helping fewer than 200,000 homeowners lower their payments permanently. today, a new approach, expanding the program to target unemployed and underwater borrowers, those who owe more than their homes are worth. >> it's very important we try to do what we can to prevent the preventible foreclosures. >> reporter: the headline, the government will pay lenders to refinance and lower the principal for borrowers who pay on time but are deeply under water. in exchange, the federal housing administration will guarantee losses using t.a.r.p. money. >> it will help the fha, the overall market and the taxpayers, overall. >> reporter: the program pays banks to reduce loan balances on second mortgages like home equity lines. >> it will be cheaper to write down a portion of it than to hold it on thealance sheet today as it stands and risk the default of that mortgage.

>> the white house is expected to unveil a new plan today. >> reporter: barely minutes after the news leaked out today, a wave of outreach hit the blogosphere. writes one, "i'm so disgusted of this never-ending bailout of people who acted so irresponsibly at the expense of those who didn't." says another, "those who did the right thing are watching those that gambled without a concern now gaming the system and winninthe lottery." in hard-hit california, this woman owes $450,000 on a home worth only $280,000. she fears this voluntary program will not help her avoid foreclosure. >> i fit into all the guidelines to have my loan modified, but they don't have to do it, so i really don't have any faith that it's going to happen. >> reporter: now, as for unemployed borrowers, the administration announced a program to give them a three-nth reprieve while they look for a new job, lowered monthly payments based on their unemployment benefits. when they get a job, they have to pay it back. >> diana olick at the white house, thanks.

anger over this economy, the way things have been going in this country generally lately, it's shaken up the political world. any and all incumbents may be in grave danger this year. that includes the last man who ran for president for the republican party. john mccain is in trouble in arizona. so much trouble, today he was forced to call in reenforcements. his old running mate sarah palin. our own lee cowan is in tucson for us tonight. lee, good evening. >> reporter: well, good evening, brian. as political reunions go this was awkward, after all the two haven't spoken all that much in the last year and a half or so. sarah palin seemed to be trying to do the best not to upstage her former boss, all the while knowing it was in large part her this crowd came to see. it's been 16 months since they shared a campaign stage. some things never change. >> we're going to take it on on november 10th when we take control of the house and the

senate. >> reporter: although the podium and signs were john mccain's, it was sarah palin who stole the spotlight. >> arizona, do you love your freedom? >> reporter: she revelled in the opportunity to blast the administration. >> fidel castro likes obama care, but we don't like obama care. doesn't that kind of tell you something? >> reporter: and she drew cheers for blasting the media. >> this bs coming from the lame street media lately about this, about us inciting violence. don't let a distraction like that get you off track. keep fighting hard. >> reporter: how the tables have turned since 2008. while mccain's voice remains a strong one on capitol hill, sarah palin's seems to echo almost everywhere else. >> i am so glad to be here. >> reporter: the darling of the conservatives and the unofficial head of the tea party movement, she has everything senator mccain needs, loyal, conservative followers who hang on her every word. >> i wish she would have been

running for president myself. >> she has a very good way of connecting to the average person. >> reporter: sarah palin's conservative credentials were so valuable to the campaign they were willing to give her just as much time as the senator himself. >> she energized america. she still does today. i am proud of sarah palin. >> reporter: an awkward repairing, but one that still draws a crowd. brian, this was actually the first of three appearances the two will appear at together. the last one is a fund-raiser at the very same hotel where the two ended their presidential bid back in 2008. as for sarah palin, she is back on the road tomorrow, headlining a tea party event in nevada, in the hometown of senate majority leader harry reid. >> lee cowan out of tucson, arizona, tonight. there is big election news out of iraq tonight. results of iraqi elections that were held nearly three weeks ago now were finally announced today. it's important news, not only

for iraq itself, but also for the u.s., all those u.s. troops scheduled to leave iraq this summer. our chief foreign correspondent richard engel is here with us at our studios in new york. richard, you were saying earlier today, people rooting for the u.s. side of the equation would be dancing in the streets of baghdad at this result. what did you mean by that? >> reporter: this was an incredibly significant today, perhaps the most important one in several years in iraq. ayad allawi won these elections. he is a shiite, but he's secular, he's pro-american and very anti-iran. the current government in iraq right now is a religious state that leans toward iran. so if ayad allawi can hold on to this position he gained today, he still has to form a government and face off challenges by the current prime minister, then we could see a major chge in direction in iraq. >> dancing in the streets with those cement blast walls in the background, a reminder it's still a dangerous state. >> reporter: it certainly is.

some of those blast walls are going to start coming down as u.s. troops begin to leave. american forces are already starting to take some of the blast walls down. they are going to have to grind them up. it's going to cost billions of dollars to leave iraq. >> richard engel, thanks for that. today russia and the united states, the world's two largest nuclear superpowers, have reached a new agreement on further reducing nuclear weapons. president obama and russia's president medvedev spoke this morning by phone. this new treaty, which if approved by the senate will be signed next month, takes over where the so-called start one treaty left off. you recall start one was key to ratcheting down the tension over nukes back during the cold war. turning now to health care reform. president obama will sign the final version of the health care bill on tuesday. today speaker of the house nancy pelosi put her signature on it. after that, her staff then

brought out a large birthday cake to mark her 70th birthday. one of the things the speaker made a point of doing today, the budget projections that show the new law reducing the federal deficit over the next decade, something the president pointed out. but not everyone is convinced that will really take place. we get more tonight from our senior investigative correspondent lisa myers. >> reporter: the president insists that health care reform will actually improve the nation's bottom line. >> we achieved the biggest reduction in our long-term deficits since the balanced budget act of the 1990s. >> reporter: the congressional budget office found the plan would reduce deficits by $143 billion over the next decade, and much more after that. but some experts who are strong advocates of reducing the deficit complain that washington has used creative accounting, unrealistic assumptions and gimmicks to make the plan appear to add up when they fear it will actually increase red ink.

david walker was the government's top accountant and now sounds the alarm about the exploding federal debt. >> i believe that based upon realistic assumptions, the proposed reform legislation will end up making our financial condition and fiscal imbalance worse, not better. >> reporter: among the unrealistic assumptions, he says, that medicare payments to doctors will be cut by 21%, when in fact, congress has vowed undo that. cost, about $250 billion. another concern, $70 billion in premiums collected to pay benefits for a new long-term care insurance plan are counted to pay for health reform. >> this is an egregious gimmick to create a new insurance program and take the money that's supposed to be set aside for that and use it for something else. >> reporter: then there were $500 billion in medicare cuts which were counted twice, to pay for health care reform and shore up medicare, which is trillions in the hole. these experts worry about making expensive new health care

promises on top of trillions we can't pay for. >> washington is talking about adding a new wing on to a health care house that is structurally unsound, mortgaged for more than its worth and headed for foreclosure. >> reporter: the budget director insists there is no fuzzy math. >> focus critics don't change the fact this is the largest reduction in decade and is the first piece of legislation that gets at the heart of our long-term fiscal problem. >> reporter: a debate with profound consequences as red ink grows by the hour. lisa myers, nbc news, washington. the director of the u.s. census bureau today apologized to a caller who dialed into his appearance on c-span to complain about the race designation negro on official census forms. robert groves said he was sorry if anybody was offended by the term. he explained earlier this year

research showed 50,000 african-americans, most of them elderly, wrote in that term on their last census form and it was included this year to be sure everyone could find a so-called identity box to check on the form. he said it probably won't appear in the next census form in the year 2020. on wall street today, the dow ended the day pretty close to where it started, up just over nine points at the closing bell. when we continue on this friday night after a break, the growing sex abuse scandal right now hitting the vatican. is it putting this pope's legacy at risk? with moderate alzheimer's. it was tough news to hear. everything changed. mom. ♪ i didn't know what to do. that's when i asked my doctor about exelon patch. he said it releases medicine continuously for 24 hours.

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their car seats. now we turn to the latest crisis for the catholic church today as holy week approaches. the influential national catholic reporter published in this country urged pope benedict to answer growing questions about what it called mismanagement of sexual abuse cases in the '80s. there are other new published reports tonight the vatican is denouncing as a smear campaign. our own jim maceda has the latest. >> reporter: it looked routine, but meeting with the president of guatemala in the pope's private apartments. but was anything but usual today facing questions about his role in a sexual abuse scandal that engulfed the catholic church. in today's "new york times," more revelations suggesting in 1980 in munich, the pope, then archbishop joseph ratzinger, was informed by memo that a self-confessed priest would be allowed to continue his pastoral work, even with young boys.

the church is fighting back, rejecting the "times" article as pure speculation saying cardinal ratzinger had no knowledge of the german priest's reassignment and his deputy made the staffing decision, taking full responsibility for the erroneous decision. that's little comfort for some 300 german victims whose story of clerical abuse that have come out since january. 40 years later this man is still shaken when asked to describe life in his catholic boarding school in bavaria, pope benedict's home region. "the priest really abused children, sometimes every night in the dormitory." with every new case, the crisis grows, adding more cracks to the church's and the pope's credibility. some vatican insiders say only total transparency will work. >> it will be really, really hard to take, cold turkey, total medicine, do it now, get it out of the way. >> reporter: even if it means replacing bishops with a new generation of leaders.

>> whether that means reassigning bishops or priests, asking for resignations or publically rebuking individuals, the bar here is that the church has to restore credibility for its own people. it hasn't done that yet. >> reporter: until it does, some vatican experts say the biggest crisis in the church's modern history will likely spread. jim maceda, nbc news, london. today, the actor dennis hopper who's gravely ill with prostate cancer was on hand to accept an honor as a permanent part of hollywood, the unveiling of his star on the walk of fame. wearing bandages following a fall, hopper said hollywood has been his home and schooling. dennis hopper is 73 years old. a pioneer in sports broadcasting died. chet simmons ran nbc sports and was the first president of espn.

he is credited with inventing the term "instant replay" and start the "sportscenter." he hped to launch and greatly influence a whole lot of careers. chris berman, and not one but two gumbels, bryant and greg. chet simmons was 81 years old. we are back now with gumbolts. your

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we are back now with something you probably experienced first hand. sticker shock in the grocery store, specifically the produce aisle. question is why are prices so high right now? our report tonight from los angeles. >> reporter: ann gentry feeds her family fresh or organic foods. >> most of our diet is made up of vegetables, fruits and whole grains. >> reporter: she runs a successful vegetarian restaurant in los angeles. produce is her passion. when prices grow, gentry feels it. >> i try to shop wiser. i'm going to more stores now than i did before. >> reporter: these days she noticed a spike on everything from celery to strawberries, and she's not alone. >> the prices keep going up. >> reporter: nationwide, watermelon is up 90%, green

peppers up 109% and tomatoes almost 200%. blame it on mother nature bringing citrus growers a florida freeze, heavy rains in california and mexico, and the earthquake in chile disrupted imports of grapes, apples and plums. >> this is a once in a decade type situation. we got thrown a lot of curve balls at once. >> repter: this man's family has been in the market four generations. >> it's very hard to find good quality. >> reporter: roberts is raising prices just enough to break even. he is worried he may have to close the shop opened by his grandfather. >> right now we are hanging on by a thread. >> reporter: ann gentry decided not to raise prices yet. her motto, health is priceless. >> whatever the price i have to pay, i'm going to pay and do it. >> reporter: she is committed to

sowing the seeds of good health, but hoping to reap some price relief. nbc news, los angeles. when we come back, a bank turned hard times into an opportunity. when we come back, a bank turned hard times into an opportunity. host: does charlie daniels play a mean fiddle? ♪ fiddle music charlie:hat's how you do it son. vo: geico. 15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance. to finish what you started today. for the aches and sleeplessness in between, there's new motrin pm. no other medicine, not even advil pm, is more effective for pain and sleeplessness. new motrin pm. chances are your soil is like this: compacted, drained of nutrients. it'll hold your plants but it'll also hold 'em back.

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in our "making a difference" report tonight, as everybody waits for real economic recovery, we heard a lot about small banks and whether they are lending enough to small businesses. tonight, nbc's john yang tells us about a midwest bank that wants to lend a small business a whole building. >> that was the original night depository. >> reporter: if you are a small business owner looking to expand, bank president dale lewis has a deal for you. a 3,000 square foot building in duluth, minnesota, rent-free for two years. all you have to do is bring six new jobs to its strained neighborhood. >> i want to make something happen, and jobs is a great impetus to make something happen. >> reporter: slow business led lewis to close the 90-year-old building her grandfather built and move operations to another branch. >> i want to see the building occupied. i want to see it used. >> reporter: this is what lewis

is trying to prevent. nationwide, 17% of commercial retail and office space is vacant. that's the highest rate since they started keeping track of it in the late 1970s. some say scenes like this could trigger a downward spiral of neglect. >> it just takes one. >> reporter: rob west is head of a local development group. >> it is a new business that creates new momentum, creates excitement, interest and enthusiasm. >> reporter: back in the 1900's this neighborhood was a company town built by u.s. steel. the mill closed in 1981, spelling the end for most local businesses. >> we will have people that support whatever businesses we can bring into here for this community. >> at least three companies are interested. lon larson says saving two years rent could speed the growth of his environmental engineering concern. >> i could put it to work. >> reporter: lewis wants the

building to be as important to the neighborhood as it once was. >> i love the building and i want someone else to love it, too. >> reporter: hoping a little love and a few more jobs can revitalize a struggling community. john yang, nbc news, duluth, minnesota. and a quick update on a story dr. nancy snyderman reported for us on the days after the haiti earthquake about all those amputations in that disaster. among those watching our report on the air, a 6-year-old boy whose father is the ceo of a pennsylvania company called ability prosetics and orthotics. the young man turned to his dad and asked what he was doing for the people of haiti? last night the company donated $500,000 of prosthetic limbs to the haitian ambassador to the united states. that's our broadcast for this friday night and for this week. thank you for being with us. i'm brian williams. lester holt will be here with you this weekend. we hope to see you right back here on monday night. in the meantime, have a great weekend.

good night. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com