At a memorial for victims of the Fort Hood shootings, President Obama said the killer will "be met with justice in this world and the next." We focus on the legal challenges for the alleged shooter, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, in this world. Hasan will probably face a long and complex trial, but only after an equally complex assessment of his mental health. We speak with Eugene Fidell, who teaches military law at Yale Law School and is president of the National Institute of Military Justice. We also speak to New York Times national security reporter Scott Shane, who gives us the latest on the case.

• Washington Takeout: The Takeaway's Todd Zwillich says Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid may face sharp criticism and intense pressure from groups on both sides of the abortion debate, when the House health care bill and the contested "Stupak amendment" goes to the Senate.
• Business Takeout: New York Times finance reporter Louise Story takes us through the recent boost in charity at Goldman Sachs – where's the money's going and why the boost now?
• Listener Takeout: Listeners respond to our question on whether America does enough for its veterans.

The White House has a plan to have states compete for cash prizes for their school systems, funded from $4 billion in stimulus money. It's being called the "Race to the Top." To explain what the program could mean, we speak with Beth Fertig, education reporter at WNYC. She is also the author of the book, “Why cant u teach me 2 read?: Three Students and a Mayor Put Our Schools to the Test.” For a skeptic's view, we also speak to Jeanne Allen, president of the Center for Education Reform in Washington, D.C.

On the eve of President Obama’s visit to China next week, a new report alleges that a sprawling system of “black jails” has been used to detain Chinese citizens petitioning for redress from the government. The report, called “An Alleyway in Hell” [pdf, 737.06 kb], is just out this morning from Human Rights Watch. It describes Chinese citizens being abducted off the streets of Beijing and other cities with no charges. The citizens were imprisoned in state-owned hotels, nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals, where the conditions are often brutal. We speak to Phelim Kine, a researcher for Human Rights Watch.

The government has worked to help soldiers who have lost limbs on the battlefield since as far back as the Civil War. More recently, the Vietnam War inspired a huge jump in the development of prosthetics. Grant Elliot, a researcher at the MIT Media Lab Biomechatronics Group, tells us that we're experiencing another big period of advancement as veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan come home. We also speak to Will Borden, who lost his leg in a 1993 car accident and says he's benefiting from this research.

Read a blog post by Takeaway correspondent Femi Oke, who visited a prosthetics lab at the VA Medical Center in New York.

President Obama takes off for an eight-day trip to Asia tonight. He’ll visit Seoul, Singapore and spend three days in China, where the agenda will include some of the biggest global challenges of the day: global warming, the economy and nuclear proliferation. But his first destination is Tokyo, where he’ll meet with new Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who has recently called for a more “equal” relationship with the United States. We speak to Kenneth Lieberthal, director of the John L. Thornton China Center at the Brookings Institution; along with Martin Fackler, Tokyo bureau chief for our partner, The New York Times.

• Washington Takeout: The Takeaway's Todd Zwillich says many people were surprised when the American Medical Association took a position that the U.S. military's policy towards gay service members – 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' – is harmful to the health of gay servicemen and women.
• Business Takeout: New York Times reporter Louise Story joins us to discuss frustration over executive compensation at AIG and other bailed-out companies.
• Sports Takeout: Our own Ibrahim Abdul-Matin talks about tonight's Bears/49ers matchup in the NFL, as well as a controversy below the Mason-Dixon line over a fight song at "Ole Miss."

A case brought to the Georgia Supreme Court this Tuesday might decide whether Georgia can afford to levy the death penalty any more. Jamie Weis has been sitting in jail for four years waiting for a trial because the state can’t afford to give him adequate representation or his Sixth Amendment-guaranteed right to a "speedy and public trial." Yesterday, Jamie presented a pre-trial appeal — drop his charges, or at least the possibility of the death penalty. 

To find out more we spoke with Emily Green, a reporter covering the justice system for Georgia Public Broadcasting, and Robert McGlasson, an attorney at law who represented a previous death-penalty defendant in one of the most expensive cases in Georgia history. (You can read other stories in our "Deep Cuts" series on states' budget shortfalls.)

We're looking at a confrontation between high-tech and low-tech in the waters off East Africa. Several thousand Somali pirates in speedboats are causing massive disruption in vital shipping lanes. But the U.S. military has a new use for a weapon now seeing frequent use in in Pakistan and Afghanistan: unmanned aerial drones. We speak to the BBC’s Will Ross, who witnessed a drone launch on the Seychelle Islands, off the coast of East Africa.

[Above, our interview with Woody Harrelson, Ben Foster and director Oren Moverman]

"The Messenger" tells the story of the grief and pain that families go through when they find out they’ve lost a loved one to war, and the officers whose job it is to deliver that news. We talk to the film’s stars, Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster, about how the film changed their own outlooks on the reality of war.

As we discussed with researcher Phelim Kine earlier this morning, a just-released report from Human Rights Watch alleges that China is operating a distributed system of secret prisons that hold citizens petitioning for redress from their government.  We continue the conversation with Keith Bradsher, Hong Kong bureau chief for our partner, The New York Times.

We take a quick look at some of the numbers soon to affect consumers this holiday season. Wal-Mart posted positive third-quarter earnings, and the Labor Department reports that initial claims for jobless benefits fell by 12,000, totalling 502,000 in the week ending November 7th.  That's the lowest level for new claims since January. Is there an emerging sense of stability among shoppers that we didn't have last year?

We discuss these topics and President Obama's proposed "jobs summit" with The Wall Street Journal's Kelly Evans.