i'm ray suarez. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. 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 by the alfred p. sloan foundation. supporting science, technology, and improved economic performance and financial literacy in the 21st century. 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. captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions

. >> brown: ray suarez examines a call to keep some research on the deadly bird flu secret. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> computing surrounds us. sometimes it's obvious and sometimes it's very surprising where you find it. soon, computing intelligence in unexpected places will change our lives in truly profound ways. technology can provide customized experiences, tailored to individual consumer

. >> suarez: and i'm ray suarez. on the newshour tonight, we get the latest on the blasts from deborah amos of npr in beirut. >> woodruff: then, after a week of partisan wrangling and an agreement on extending the payroll tax cut, we get the analysis of mark shields and david brooks. >> suarez: in our second report from morocco, we examine the nation's struggle for greater democracy. >>> it was the arab isn't ittime democratcratic position. >> woodruff: jeffrey brown talks with author daniel yergin about how the demand for more and more energy has shaped political and economic change around the globe. we as a country today are twice as energy efficient as we were during the era of the energy crisis. if we weren't we really would be in trouble. >> suarez: and fred de sam lazaro tells the story of an unusual christmas celebration at a minnesota church. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> intel. sponsors of tomorrow. >> and by bnsf railway. and

. >> suarez: and i'm ray suarez. on the newshour tonight, we get the latest on the blasts from deborah amos of npr in beirut. >> woodruff: then, after a week of partisan wrangling and an agreement on extending the payroll tax cut, we get the analysis of mark shields and david brooks. >> suarez: in our second report from morocco, we examine the nation's struggle for greater democracy. >>> it was the arab isn't ittime democratcratic position. >> woodruff: jeffrey brown talks with author daniel yergin about how the demand for more and more energy has shaped political and economic change around the globe. we as a country today are twice as energy efficient as we were during the era of the energy crisis. if we weren't we really would be in trouble. >> suarez: and fred de sam lazaro tells the story of an unusual christmas celebration at a minnesota church. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> intel. sponsors of tomorrow. >> and by bnsf railway. and

. >> suarez: and i'm ray suarez. on the "newshour" tonight, we debate the magnified importance iowa plays in the nomination process with historian richard norton smith and political analyst jeff stein. >> brown: then, paul solman looks at some of the defining moments in his coverage of the economic downturn this year and we examine the challenging path back to a robust economy. >> suarez: another in our "american graduate" series on the nation's high school drop- out crisis. tonight spencer michels reports on a california program designed to keep girls in school by encouraging science studies. >> science is probably one of the easiest things to get them interested in. science is a place where we can do some things that are fun, intriguing, challenging. >> brown: and we >> brown: and we look at the visa holdup for thousands of iraqi civilians who provided valuable assistance to americans during the war. >> brown: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> comp

ray suarez has that story. >> suarez: in three separate waves across the country, egyptians will choseew parliament, which in turn will write a new constitution. all this comes nearly ten months after after a revolution that ended in hosni mubarak's ouster. citizens in cairo and alexandria already have voted. today it was the turn for voters outside the capital. charles sennott of our partner global post, the international website, is covering the voting. charles, thank you for joining us. charles, thanks for joining us, stroub the places where voting is under way? are people happening with electing a new government? showing up in large numbers to vote? >> we were out in the polling districts in giza today. i was in a neighborhood that's largely islamist and we were also in a more wealthy neighborhood. there was definitely evidence that this was heavy turnout as there was in the first stage of this election. and everyone we spoke with seemed to be pleased with the way it was going. we did not see any major problems. we saw minor violations like people handing out leaflets. you're not s

ray suarez has our conversation. >> suarez: for decades, the fact that a sizable majority of americans were married shaped our politics, where we lived, where we worked, and what we thought when we heard the word "family." recently, the pew research center took a look at all of us over 18 and found just 51% are married, down from more than 70% in 1960. stephanie kuntz has been chronicling the changes in marshal for a long time. and is director of research on the county of families. we moved in 50 years from almost three-quarters of married adults to barely half. what happened? what's pushing those numbers? >> well, one of the things that you have to bear in mind is that 1960 was probably the most atypical year in 150 years. the age of marriage was at an all-time low. half of all women were married before they got out of their teens and the rate of marriage was an an all-time high. so what's happened since then, primarily what's driving this is the rise in the age of marriage. it's now up to 26 for women and 28 for men. and that's actually a good thing because the longer a wom delays ma

ray suarez has our report. >> suarez: the normally tight security at fort meade, maryland, outside washington, was tighter still today. it was the first court appearance for army private bradley manning, accused as the prime source for the wikileaks document dumps. the army intelligence analyst, who turns 24 tomorrow, faced an article 32 hearing, a military grand jury proceeding. prosecutors hoped to show there's enough evidence to court martial manning on 22 charges, including espionage and aiding the enemy. it all stems from the largest disclosure of classified information in u.s. history. >> the first casualty of war is the truth. >> suarez: in three installments, the web site founded by anti-secrecy advocate julian assange posted a fraction of the many thousands of classified documents it was given about the iraq and afghanistan wars, and a trove of state department cables. >> this is bushmaster 7. roger. engage. >> suarez: among the most incendiary releases-- video from a u.s. attack helicopter over baghdad in 2007. >> oh, yeah, look at that, right through the windshield. ( laughs ) >> s

ray suarez has the story. >> suarez: september 1957, little rock, arkansas, three years earlier the u.s. supreme court had ruled segregated schools unconstitutional in the landmark brown versus the board of education decision. nine black students attempted to enroll at little rock's all-white central high school there they were confront odd by an angry mob and were turned back by a detachment of the arkansas natnaral gu d. as the students left, one of the more indelible images of the civil rights era was captured. two young girls, both 15, one black, one white. one resolutely ignoring the hate speech all around her. the other shouting racial epithets. for more than 50 years that picture has haunted both women. elizabeth and hazel brian. the intersections of their lives is the focus of a new book, elizabeth and hazel, two women of little rock by david margolick, a contributing editor at "vanity fair". i recently talked with him at alexandria, virginia,'s black history museum. >> david par golic, welcome to the program. >> thank you very much. >> suarez: the striking thing about the story

ray suarez has the story. >> suarez: negotiations dragged on for nearly 36 hours past the deadline inban, south africa. in the end, leaders at the 17th united nations framework convention on climate change mostly agreed to keep talking. among the decisions they did make, the delegates extended the 1997 kyoto protocol, set to expire at the end of 2012, for five years. called for a new binding accord to be created and ready to be implemented by 2020. and set a green cmate fund. it would use public and private money to help developing nations combat the impacts of climate change. here to discuss what came out of durban and the future of global climate talks are nathan hultman, director of environmental policy for the school of public policy at the university of maryland. he is also a fellow at the brookings institution and was in durban for the conference. and samuel thernstrom, senior climate policy advisor for the clean air task force, a non- profit group dedicated to reducing air pollution through private sector collaboration. he was a former member of the white house council on envir

public schools. >> warner: during a season which, for many, centers on religion and spirituality, ray suarez talks to one author about his search for divine meaning. >> suarez: keeping with this country's appetite for inventing and reinwitting yourself, today's americans choose their own religion in much higher numbers than ever before. writer eric weaner who calls himself an agnostic by default set out on a worldwide personal quest about his own beliefs and shares what he found in his book "man seeks got: my flirtations with the divine." as we enter the final stretch of this holiday season, eric weiner joins me now. welcome. >> thank you. >> suarez: as many of these stories over the years, this one begins with a health scare. how would you describe your religious posture before the beginning of your journey? >> i didn't have much of a posture. i was raised as a secuar jew. we maybe went to synagogue once a year. i like to think of us as gastronomical jews, about the food and not really about god, not about religion. and essentially whatever religious or spiritual inklings i had were suppres

ray suarez reports. >> reporter: friday prayer in morocco, on africa's northwest corner. thousands of worshipers gather in a large mosque in the city of bouskoura, to pray, and hear prayers and preaching from the local imam. with few variations, this is a familiar scene, repeated weekly across the muslim world. on this december day, the weekly message from imam mohammed ziani isn't what you expect to hear at friday prayers. >> ( translated ): dear brothers, aids or the hiv virus is one of the most fatal plights our generation is facing because we do not talk about it. >> reporter: the taboo topic of h.i.v.-- the virus that causes aids-- particularly how to prevent it and treat it rarely surfaces in such a public way in muslim societies, let alone at the mosque. imam ziani, and religious leaders across morocco are trying to change that. >> ( translated ): it is the duty of any imam or preacher to teach. god said this in the koran, we have a sworn oath to allah to clarify and teach, so this is my mission. it would be a sin for me to neglect that responsibility. >> reporter: