Monday, November 09 2009

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Monday, November 09, 2009

Religious Diversity in the Military a Casualty, Too?

When Major Nidal Malik Hasan was identified as the alleged shooter in the Fort Hood killings, some American Muslims immediately feared a backlash. Army Chief of Staff George W. Casey told NBC's Meet the Press on Sunday that he does not want diversity to become another casualty of the events at Fort Hood. For a look at what some American Muslim servicemen and women are feeling, we turn to Jamal Baadani, first sergeant in the U.S. Marine Corps and founder of the Association of Patriotic Arab Americans in the Military. For further analysis of last week's Fort Hood shootings, we turn to John Allen Williams, professor of political science at Loyola University, in Chicago.

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Takeouts: Health Care in House, Corporate Apologies, Colts' Squeaker

  • Washington Takeout: Our Washington correspondent, Todd Zwillich, takes a look at the healthcare bill and what the paper-thin margin of victory in the House portends as the bill heads to the Senate.
  • Business Takeout: We get a story of a quest for corporate redemption from Louise Story, finance reporter for our partners The New York Times. John Reed, former head of Citigroup, is apologizing for his role in making the company so big and is now calling for reforms that would force the financial goliath (along with others like it) to split in two.
  • Sports Takeout: Ibrahim Abdul-Matin recaps Sunday's NFL action, including the Indianapolis Colts' squeaker agains the Houston Texans to hang onto their perfect record so far this season.

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This Week's Agenda With Marcus Mabry and Chris Hogg

Here's a preview of the coming week with Marcus Mabry, international business editor for The New York Times, and Chris Hogg, BBC correspondent in Shanghai. This week: a look at how the Army moves forward after the Fort Hood shootings, President Obama's upcoming trip to Asia on Thursday, and what's next for health care reform now that House Demorats' House bill has passed.

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Capitalism, 20 Years After the Berlin Wall

Twenty years ago, the Berlin Wall came tumbling down in what seemed to be a victorious day for capitalism. We look back 20 years while countries around the world today continue capitalist experiments and attempt to weather the current economic crisis. Meanwhile, a new BBC World Service poll says that only the U.S. and Pakistan believe capitalism is working today. We speak to Harvard history professor Niall Ferguson, author of "The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World."

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Multiple Deployments' Toll on Military Families

The stress of multiple deployments is taking its toll on many military families. In the aftermath of the shootings at Fort Hood, where hundreds of children live, and as we approach Veterans Day later this week, we look at the stress military families live with every day. Lucianne Buch's husband recently retired from the Army after three deployments; her 11-year-old stepson began showing the effects of stress on the day his father was first deployed.  She says multiple deployments are trying on her family and many others at Fort Polk, Louisiana. New York Times Motherlode writer Lisa Belkin also joins us, along with Angela Huebner, a professor of Human Development in the Child and Family program at Virginia Tech, who says that this kind of stress is resting heavily on military families across the country.

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In House, Health Care Reform Squeaks Past

Late in the evening Saturday, 219 Democrats and one Republican voted to pass the House version of health care reform, squeaking the historic bill past and sending the debate on to the Senate. For a look at the wrangling necessary to get the contentious legislation passed, we talk with Trudy Lieberman, contributing editor at the Columbia Journalism Review and healthcare blogger for CJR.org, along with our correspondent in Washington, Todd Zwillich.

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Takeouts: College Football, Wall St Pay, Listeners on Religion

  • Business Takeout: Louise Story of The New York Times explains why we'll be seeing windfall bonuses and pay on Wall Street in the next few weeks.
  • Sports Takeout: Ibrahim Abdul-Matin recaps the weekend's college football action, including Ohio State's win over Penn State.
  • Listener Takeouts: We hear your reactions to the question of whether psychiatrist and alleged Fort Hood shooter Nidal Malik Hasan's religion should factor into the conversation about his actions.

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Mental Health Support in US Military, After Fort Hood

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who allegedly killed 13 people and wounded 29 others during a shooting spree at Fort Hood in Texas last week, is an Army psychiatrist, trained in treating combat stress in soldiers. That has raised questions about how the job of counseling affects military health professionals. Olga Peña, managing editor of The Killeen Daily Herald, joins us with the latest from Fort Hood. Bret A. Moore is a clinical psychologist who served in Iraq for 27 months; he left the Army in 2008 for a number of reasons, among them the growing possibility of burnout. He says that mental health workers in the Army, like all soldiers, are not required to seek counseling, but they do have the choice to seek help if they wish. Nelson Ford is the CEO of LMI Consulting and a former undersecretary of the Army.  He says the Army is doing a fine job of improving its response to mental health problems.

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Two Germans Remember East and West After the Wall Fell

Twenty years after the Berlin Wall came down, we talk to Ros Atkins, host of the BBC's World Have Your Say, live from Berlin.  We're also joined by two Germans – one from the West and one from the East – to tell us about how their lives changed that one day. Christoph Niemann was a teenager in the West who remembers the day vividly. These days, he regularly rides his bicycle over the line where the wall once stood. Luise Stauss lived in East Germany at the time; she says she always felt like she stood out when she went to the West after the wall fell.

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Listeners on Religion and Fort Hood Shootings

Last Friday, we asked listeners about the relevance of religion in the discussion of the alleged Fort Hood shooter, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan. Is the fact that Hasan is Muslim something to mention or ignore?

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