kwame holman explains. >> holman: ray reports on a vietnam veteran on a hunger strike aimed at bringingo the rise in military suicides. back in tampa, members of the foreign press told us how they cover the u.s. presidential race. gwen ifill has five things to look for in charlotte next week. and on "need to know" this evening, in part two on winning a key swing state-- tonight, the democrats' strategy. find a link to "the battle for ohio" on our web site, plus much more at newshour.pbs.org. judy. >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. "washington week" has a special edition from north carolina later this evening. we'll see you from charlotte and here on monday, and the next day we begin our primetime and online coverage of the democratic convention. have a great weekend. thank you for joining us tonight and all week. good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: bnsf and from carnegie corporation >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... >> this program was made

kwame holman explains. >> holman: the countdown is on. nasa's rover, named "curiosity," arrives on the red planet early monday. on our science page, we look at the nine-month journey, the purpose of the mission, and how difficult the landing might be. plus, you can pose questions to economist larry kotlikoff, author of the wildly popular blog post "34 social security secrets you need to know now." submit yours on our making sense page. all that and more is on our web site, newshour.pbs.org. judy? >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. on wednesday, we'll look at the outcome of the republican senate runoff in texas, which pits a tea party conservative against an establishment candidate. i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill. we'll see you online, and again here tomorrow evening. thank you, and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> bnsf railway. >> and by the bill and melinda gates foundation. dedicated to the idea that all people deserve the chance to live a healthy, productive life. a

kwame holman explains. >> holman: take the 12-question quiz on our politics page. it's part of a partnership with the pew research center that will play out on air and online over the next two weeks. plus, "this american life's' ira glass and comedian mike birbiglia talk about their new film. that's on "art beat." and tonight's edition of "need to know" looks at the republican effort to win swing state ohio this fall. find a link to "the battle for ohio" on our web site, plus much more at newshour.pbs.org. judy. >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. our colleague gwen ifill's "washington week" has a special edition from florida later this evening. we'll see you from tampa monday- - online, on the newshour, and with our prime-time convention coverage. have a nice weekend. thank you and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: bnsf >> and by the bill and melinda gates foundation. dedicated to the idea that all people deserve the chance to live a healthy productive life. >>

here's kwame holman. >> holman: the u.s. government will not prosecute goldman sachs or any of its employees in the financial meltdown of 2008 and 2009. the justice department announced last night there's not enough evidence to bring criminal charges. in 2010, goldman agreed to pay $550 million to settle civil fraud charges. the wall street firm was accused of misleading buyers of its mortgage-related securities. for the record, goldman sachs is a sponsor of pbs online. on wall street today, the dow jones industrial average gained more than 42 points to close just under 13,208. the nasdaq rose 2 points to close near 3,021. for the week, the dow gained nearly 1%. the nasdaq rose nearly 2%. hundreds of mourners paid final respects today to the six people gunned down sunday at a sikh temple near milwaukee. they were joined by the governor of wisconsin, and the nation's top law enforcement official. >> for hours they filed through the oak creek high school jiminizeium in solemn lines. sikh men wor traditional turbines of their f

kwame holman has the details. >> holman: economist larry kotlikoff offers eight more dos and don'ts. ways to maximize your retirement benefits-- it's one of our all- time most popular online features. find the latest edition on our "making sense" page. that and more is on our web site: newshour.pbs.org. >> ifill: and again, to our honor roll of american service personnel killed in the afghanistan conflict. we add them as their deaths are made official and photographs become available. here, in silence, are 15 more. >> woodruff: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. on thursday, we'll look at the justice department's call to unseal secret interviews with former fighters in northern ireland. i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill. we'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening. thank you and good night. major fundg for the pbs newshour has been provided by: 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. th

here's kwame holman. >> reporter: a suicide attack in eastern afghanistan killed three nato troops and. two taliban bombers struck in kunar province, an insurgent stronghold on the pakistan border. in all, 15 nato troops have been killed in the afghan fighting so far this august. in the u.s. presidential campaign, the major candidates traded fire today over welfare and health care. republican mitt romney stepped up his accusations that president obama has weakened welfare reforms. romney spoke at a rally in des moines, iowa. >> with a very careful executive action, he removed the requirement of work from welfare. it is wrong to make any change that would make america more of a nation of government dependency. we must restore-- and i will restore-- work into welfare. ( applause ) >> reporter: the obama campaign insisted again that the president simply granted states more flexibility to deal with welfare paperwork. and in denver, the president addressed a largely female crowd and talked about what romney's vow to repeal health care reform would mean. >> mr. romney is running as the candi

kwame holman tells us more about her brushes with the stinging creature. >> holman: how did diana nyad to defend herself and what went wrong? we have that story for science thursday on our science page. on the rundown, margaret reflects on the team tapped to advise mitt romney on foreign policy and what its membership suggests. also there, gwen ifill answered your election and political convention questions today in a live chat. and if you speak another all that and more is on our web site: newshour.pbs.org. jeff? >> brown: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm jeffrey brown. >> woodruff: and i'm judy woodruff. we'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening with mark shields and david brooks, among others. thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: and the william and flora hewlett foundation, working to solve social and environmental problems at home and around the world. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contribu

here's kwame holman. >> reporter: severe drought conditions have spread across even more of the u.s. breadbasket. that's the latest finding from the drought monitor report by federal agencies and the university of nebraska. their weekly map shows areas of extreme or exceptional drought-- marked here in red and burgundy- - grew by 2% from the week before. the lack of rainfall has hit producers of corn and soybeans especially hard and pushed world commodity prices sharply higher. more bad news for the nearly insolvent u.s. postal service. it lost $5.2 billion from april to june, much more than the same period last year. the bulk of thloss came from the projected cost of health benefits for future postal retirees. last week, the postal service failed for the first time ever to make a scheduled payment for those benefits. syrian troops and rebels hammered away at each other today around the besieged city of aleppo, syria. bombed-out sections of the city still were being targeted by government air strikes. and the damage was so heavy both rebels and government tanks reportedly were forced

here's kwame holman. >> holman: president obama took on his newly nominated republican opponent todayr health care. the president made a campaign stop near the university of virginia in charlottesville. he said mitt romney would try to repeal the health care reform law and take away coverage from seven million young people, if he's elected. >> he calls my healthcare law obama care, i call his plan romney doesn't care. he's running on the romney doesn't care platform. this law is here to stay. the supreme court has spoken we are moving forward that is what is at stake in this election. >> holman: today's stop was part of the obama campaign's focus this week on trying to re-energize support among young voters. two new reports on the u.s. economy offered small signs of hope. the commerce department said growth in the second quarter was slightly better than initially thought. and, the federal reserve reported moderate expansion, in much of the country, during july and early august. but the news barely moved wall street today. the dow jones industrial average gained just four points to clo

coming up after this but we want to take you now to the other news of the day and for that here's kwame holman. >> holman: the storm named "isaac" was downgraded today to a tropical depression, but it gave no respite to thousands of people along the gulf coast. the system dumped new downpours and raised new alarms in its slow transit from louisiana toward arkansas. inch by inch, the rain kept up across louisiana and mississippi's gulf coast. the coastal areas bore a continuing storm surge-- two days after landfall. and the rising water ultimately created a major new threat in mississippi. the lake tangipahoa dam-- about 100 miles north of new orleans-- became dangerously stressed threatening to send a torrent down the already swollen tangipahoa river. meanwhile mandatory evacuations were ordered for about 60,000 people, most in louisiana. officials also began a controlled release of water from the dam. and there were more emergency evacuations and rescues in areas outside new orleans. >> we had to break through the ceiling and come through the attic, and they took us out of the attic, into the

here's kwame holman. >> holman: apple moved today to capitalize on its legal victory over samsung. a federal jury in california awarded apple more than $1 billion on friday after finding samsung infringed on a series of patents. today apple asked a judge to ban eight samsung smart phone models from the market. apple stock briefly hit an all- time high today, and finished with a gain of nearly 2%. but otherwise, wall street mostly struggled. the dow jones industrial average lost 33 points to close at 13,124. the nasdaq rose three points to close at 3073. in afghanistan, there were conflicting accounts after 17 civilians were beheaded sunday night. it happened at a party in the musa qala district of helmand province. local officials said the taliban killed them for flouting a ban on music and dancing. other reports said the victims got caught in a gunfight between rival taliban commanders. to the east, two more u.s. soldiers were killed in an incident involving an afghan soldier. but afghan officials said in this one, the afghan's weapon went off accidentally. the u.s. military has d