. >> woodruff: ray suarez, in fort hood, texas, looks at the army's new program designed to provide better treatment for wounded warriors. >> if you've got a service-related injury, if you've been wounded in combat, are awe a patient, are you still a soldier? the army's warrior transition units try to find a way for you to be both. >> lehrer: and mark shields and david brooks provide their analysis of the news. that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: and with the ongoing support of these instutions 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: president obama held a televised news conference this morning at the white house. the east room back and forth included questions about the economy, the middle east, and religious tensions. newshour correspondent kwame holman reports. >> holman: it was the first formal news conference since may, and from start to finish, the session lasted an hour and 17 min

. >> suarez: and i'm ray suarez. on the "newshour" tonight, economic writers louise story of the "new york times" and roben farzad of "bloomberg business week" weigh the pluses and minuses of the deal. >> brown: then, kwame holman looks at the down-to-the-wire scramble as congress pushed to adjourn just weeks ahead of the midterm elections. >> suarez: judy woodruff talks to speaker of the house nancy pelosi about the battle over tax cuts and the stakes for democrats in november. >> our members left congress last night. they are confident that they would return in the majority. >> brown: special correspondent miles o'brien reports on a mississippi community's plan to use stimulus money for mass transit in rural areas. >> suarez: betty ann bowser updates the johnson and johnson story as company executives and the f.d.a. come under fire on capitol hill for a string of recalls, real and phantom, this year. >> brown: and we visit a project in pittsburgh that offers foreign writers whose lives are endangered, a new start,

ray suarez has that story. >> suarez: in an out door cabin on a glistening lake in maine people gathered in camp as they did in many places over the weekend to remember september 11, nine years ago. >> this cross is given to us last year by one of the firefighters. this was carved from steel of the trade center that went down. >> suarez: several of the families at the remembrance had their lives transformed by that day. it set them on a long journey that would eventually bring them to a weekend in the maine woods. this has been a summer camp for boys since the 1920s. after the 2001 terror attacks, kiev reached out to the families of victims from the world trade center and the pentagon. and now he's helping reintegrate veterans with their families as they return from iraq and afghanistan, the wars that followed that terror attacks. >> there you are. >> suarez: the camp brings enlist men and women and their families here after the summer kids have gone home. giving them a chance to talk, play, relax. >> did you see that? >> suarez: he entertains for up to a week. this isn't a therapeutic c

takes the story from there. >> suarez: siobhan gorman joins us. she has been covering this story for the "wall street journal." in your reporting, what have you found out about what kind of attacks were contemplated and how far along they were in the planning. >> well, what i've been told is that the leading theory is that we would be looking at these mumbai-style attacks where you'd have armed gunmen going at perhaps multiple targets, so-called soft targets, hotels or subways or things like that. and i was told they were sort of in the early planning stages where there were people on the ground trying to get things rolling . >> suarez: all the countries involved that have been mentioned, france, the united kickdom, germany, worry, do they, that not all the active plans may have been rolled up? that there may still be cells out there? >> yeah. my understanding is that there's still quite a bit of activity on the ground from law enforcement and security officials in europe to try to not only get their arms around the plot but also see if there are

ray suarez has our story. >> suarez: the minister's announcement came at a press conference late this afternoon. >> i will be flying up there on saturday to meet with the imam at the ground zero mosque. he has agreed to move the location. that, of course, cannot happen overnight, but he has agreed to move that. we felt that that would be a sign that god would want us to do it, that the american people do not want the mosque there and, of course, muslims do not want us to burn the koran . the imam has agreed to move the mosque. we have agreed to cancel our event on saturday. >> suarez: the pressure on pastor jones from around the world had been increasing on him throughout the day. just this morning, president obama added his voice to those of international leaders asking jones to call it off saying it would be a "recruitment bonanza for al qaeda." >> as commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the united states, i just want him to understand that this stunt that he is talking about pulling could greatly endanger our young men and women in uniform who are in iraq, who are in afghanist

ray suarez has the story. >> suarez: the israeli- palestinian conflict was the focus of the president's remarks before the united nations general assembly today. mr. obama urged the leaders of 192 member states to support the peace process, just weeks after his administration brought the israelis and palestinians together for direct negotiations. >> if an agreement is not reached, palestinians will never know the pride and dignity that comes with their own state. israelis will never know the certainty and security that comes with sovereign and stable neighbors who are committed to co-existence. the hard realities of demography will take hold. more blood will be shed. >> suarez: palestinian authority president mahmoud abbas listened to president obama's remarks, but israel's seats sat empty in observance of a jewish holiday. days from now, the slowdown on new construction of jewish settlements in the west bank is set to expire. the israeli government says it has no intention of extending the temporary freeze. and the palestinians have threatened to leave the peace talks as a result. toda

ray suarez begins our coverage. as mexicans are observing the three-day holiday, their country is fighting a vicious drug war. violence between the mexican government and the drug lords-- and among the cartels themselves -- surged after president calderon deployed 45,000 army troops and federal police to fight the drug trade in 2006. since then, at least 28,000 people have been killed in the fighting. last week, u.s. secretary of state hillary clinton likened the violence to an insurgency, the strongest language yet from the u.s. government. >> we face an increasing threat from a well-organized network, drug-trafficking threat that is, in some cases, morphing into or making common cause with what we would consider an insurgency, in mexico and in central america. it's looking more and more like colombia looked 20 years ago. >> suarez: at the height of colombian violence in the 1980s and 1990s, rival guerrilla armies and drug gangs killed political figures and civilians. the u.s. has poured billions of dollars into th

on the "newshour" tonight, ray suarez walks economists isabel sawhill and harry holzer through these record breaking numbers and assess the impact the recession has had on the poor. >> lehrer: then, "atlantic" magazine reporter jeffrey goldberg and latin america analyst julia sweig talk about their recent conversations with fidel castro. >> warner: betty ann bowser reports from new orleans on an effort to establish clinics for people who lost health care after hurricane katrina wiped out the city's charity hospital. >> the storm, the flooding was horrific but it really was an opportunity for us to try something new and better for our patients. >> lehrer: gwen ifill has a conversation with online editor and liberal commentator arianna huffington on her new book about the declining middle class. >> warner: and jeffrey brown talks with composer and musician herbie hancock, whose 70th birthday tour fuses jazz with global beats. >> taking what happens and trying to make it work. that's something i add life >> lehrer: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs news

and as ray suarez reports, violence and the potential for fraud loom over the process. >> suarez: inhir province this week, a whole new meaning to campaign "trail." a different breed of election worker hauled ballots to remote villages for tomorrow's parliamentary election, when 2,500 candidates will vie for 249 seats. in afghanistan, with its rugged mountains and few paved roads, the four-legged ferries are a necessity. >> ( translated ): we've walked for five hours to carry this election material back to our area by donkey. it's so our people can participate in the elections and cast their votes. this will enable them to be hopeful for a peaceful, prosperous, happy and safe future after this election. >> suarez: that fervent hope has been tested by a surge in violence. an independent afghan group, financed by western nations, reported at least 1,350 attacks in august alone. that's more than double the same period in 2009. the election was postponed from may due to security and logistical concerns. and now, the violence and intimidation threaten to limit turnout, with the taliban wa

ray suarez has the story. >> suarez: the appeal to the drug cartels from the major newspaper in juarez was dramatic. "what do they want from us?" asked the front page editorial in "el diario." that editorial and an open letter from the newspaper's reporters came three days after a young photographer, luis carlos santiago, was killed and an intern seriously wounded as they were walking to lunch outside "el diario's" offices. santiago was the second journalist from the paper to be killed. declaring the cartels the de facto authority in the city, the paper asked for guidance on what to publish and not publish. the editorial put into words what is already practiced among some mexican news organizations in areas where the drug war is most intense. nearly 29,000, including 30 journalists, have died in the past four years. the death toll in ciudad juarez, on the texas border, is more than 6,000. for more, we go to angela kocherga, the mexico bureau chief for belo television. angela, a dramatic thing in any case but certainly on the front page of the newspaper it is impossible to do our job in