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YEARS OF ANGER
KILLEEN, Tex. — It was still darkon Thursday when Maj. Nidal MalikHasan left his apartment complex toattend 6 a.m. prayers at his mosquenear Fort Hood. Afterward, he saidgoodbye to friends and asked for-giveness from one man for any pastoffenses. “I’m going traveling,” hetold a fellow worshiper, giving him ahug. “I won’t be here tomorrow.”Six hours later, Hasan walkedinto a processing center at FortHood where soldiers get medical at-tention before being sent overseas.Witnesses say he bowed his head forseveral seconds, as if praying, stoodup and drew a high-powered pistol.“Allahu akbar,” he said — “God isgreat.” And he opened fire. Withinminutes he had killed 13 people.But acquaintances say Hasan’srage had been building for a longtime. In recent years he had grownmore vocal about his opposition tothe war and tortured over his role asa Muslim. At times he complained of harassment, once describing howsomeone had put a diaper in his car,saying, “That’s your headdress.”Hasan was born in Arlington, Va.,the son of Palestinian immigrants.When he was an adolescent, his par-ents moved the family to Roanoke.He graduated with honors from Vir-ginia Tech in biochemistry in 1995.Against his parents’ wishes, rela-tives said, he enlisted in the Army.He went to medical school at theUniformed Services University of Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md.After graduating in 2003, he did hisinternship and residency at WalterReed Army Medical Center.Relatives and classmates said heturned increasingly toward Islam.in part seeking solace for the deathsof his parents, in 1998 and 2001.A former classmate said Hasangave a presentation about a year agoin a health seminar, titled, “Why theWar on Terror Is a War on Islam.”The classmate said that some stu-dents had complained about Hasan,but that no action had been taken.“It didn’t cross my mind that he wasdangerous,” the classmate said. “Hewasn’t threatening.”
(NYT)
THAT EXPLODEDnto a rapage
WASHINGTON — The WhiteHouse, growing concerned thatthe Congressional timetable forpassing a health care overhaulcould slip into next year, is step-ping up pressure on the Senatefor quick action, with PresidentObama appearing Sunday in theRose Garden to call on senatorsto “take up the baton and bringthis effort to the finish line.”Obama’s remarks came just 14hours after the House narrowlyapproved a landmark plan thatwould cost $1.1 trillion over 10years and extend insurance to 36million uninsured Americans — astep the president called “a cou-rageous vote.” But the votes hadbarely been counted when theWhite House began turning its at-tention to an even bigger hurdle:getting a bill passed in the Senate.In the Senate, where propos-als differ substantially from theHouse measure, the bill is await-ing analysis by the nonpartisanCongressional Budget Office. Theslim margin in the House — thebill passed with just two votes tospare — suggests even greaterchallenges in the Senate, wherethe majority leader, Harry Reidof Nevada, is struggling to holdon to all 58 Democrats and twoindependents in his caucus.Obama has staked his domesticagenda on passing comprehen-sive health legislation — a goalthat has eluded presidents fordecades. While Democrats wereforced to make major conces-sions on insurance coverage forabortions to win House passageof the bill, they were nonethelessebullient on Sunday.“For years we’ve been told thatthis couldn’t be done,” Obamasaid. Of the American people, hesaid, “Moments like this are whythey sent us here.”But there was a sense insidethe White House and on CapitolHill that the hardest work is yetto come. The House debate high-lighted the pressures that willcome to bear on senators as theyweigh contentious issues like fed-eral financing for abortion, cover-age for illegal immigrants and the“public option,” a government-backed insurance plan to com-pete with the private sector.Unlike the House bill, whichpays to extend coverage by taxingindividuals who earn more than$500,000 a year and couples whoearn more than $1 million a year,the Senate bill imposes a 40 per-cent excise tax on so-called Cadil-lac plans costing more than $8,000a year or $21,000 for a family.And unlike the House bill,which includes a national publicplan, the Senate measure wouldallow states to opt out. But eventhat is too much government in-volvement for moderates likeSen. Joseph I. Lieberman of Con-necticut, a Democrat-turned-in-dependent who pledged Sundayto wage a filibuster to block anyplan with a public option in it.“If the public option plan is inthere, as a matter of conscience,I will not allow this bill to come toa final vote,” Lieberman said on“Fox News Sunday.”The Senate bill also faces pro-cedural hurdles; Reid cannotbring it to the floor until he getsthe C.B.O. analysis, expected thisweek. The delay could push Sen-ate consideration of the bill untilafter Thanksgiving, which couldmake it very difficult to meetObama’s goal of signing a healthbill by the end of this year.The timing is crucial. Adminis-tration officials say Obama wantsto wrap up work on health care sohe can turn his attention to otherlegislative priorities, includingpassing an energy bill and finan-cial regulatory reform. But WhiteHouse officials also know that thecloser the final vote comes to theNovember 2010 midterm Con-gressional elections, the more dif-ficult it will be to pass legislation. 
SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
Abdi Akgun joined the Marinesin 2000, eager to serve his coun-try. As a Muslim, he found his re-solve to fight terrorism steeled bythe attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.But two years later, when hewas deployed to Iraq, the thoughtof confronting Muslims in battlegave him pause. He was hauntedby the possibility that he mightend up killing innocent civilians.“It’s kind of like the Civil War,where brothers fought each oth-er across the Mason-Dixon line,”said Akgun, 28, of Lindenhurst,N.Y., who returned from Iraqwithout ever having pulled thetrigger. “I don’t want to stain myfaith, I don’t want to stain my fel-low Muslims and I also don’t wantto stain my country’s flag.”Thousands of Muslims haveserved in the U.S. military. Butsince Sept. 11, as the United Stateshas become mired in two warson Muslim lands, the service of Muslim-Americans has becomemore necessary and more com-plicated. In the aftermath of theshootings at Fort Hood by ArmyMaj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who isMuslim, many Muslim soldiersand their commanders say theyfear the relationship between themilitary and its Muslim memberswill only grow more difficult.Muslim leaders and servicemembers have taken pains to de-nounce the shooting and distancethemselves from Hasan. “I don’tunderstand why the MuslimAmerican community has to takeresponsibility for him,” said In-grid Mattson, president of the Is-lamic Society of North America.For Muslim soldiers, distanc-ing themselves from those theyfight has often proved difficult.Amjad Khan, who served in theArmy in Iraq, said he had triedto get used to the epithets othersoldiers used when speaking of Iraqis. “It gets to you sometimes,”said Khan, 32, who is of Pakistanidescent and from Queens. “Butthe more personally you takethings, the more you’re going tohave a hard time surviving.”For Khan, the most difficultpart of his service came before hewas deployed, when a senior of-ficer found his Islamic faith causefor suspicion. “He said, ‘I haveto watch my back because youmight go nuts,’ ” Khan recalled. 
 ANDREA ELLIOTT 
Complications Grow for Muslims in Military 
Obama Presses Senate on Health Care
 
Monday, noveMber 9, 2009 
Midnight in New York ©
2009 Th nw yk Tims 
FROM THE PAGES OF
 
PARIS — The historical legacyof 1989, when the Berlin Wall felland the cold war thawed, is aspolitical as the upheavals of thatdecisive year.The events of 1989 spurred astriking transformation of Europe,which is now whole and free, anda reunified Germany, milestonesthat are being observed with cele-brations all over the continent, in-cluding a French-German extrav-aganza here on Monday night.But 1989 also created new divi-sions and fierce nationalisms thathobble the European Union today,between East and West, Franceand Germany, Europe and Rus-sia. Some of the intensity of thosedivisions is evident in the tug of war over the achievements of 1989 — whether they owe more tothe resolute anti-Communism of Ronald Reagan or its inverse, thewhite-glove embrace of the Eastby many in Western Europe.And while many in the West sawthe wheel of history turning inevi-tably, promoting democracy andbanishing serious rivals to U.S.power, China forestalled its ownrevolution in 1989 and catapulteditself to prominence through anauthoritarian capitalism that Rus-sia’s leaders are now studying.It is a tribute to 1989, not un-like the French Revolution 200years before it, that its meaningis hotly contested. In general, saidJames M. Goldgeier, a historian atGeorge Washington University,“the big question out there for 20years is who gets the credit.”For many in America, he said,most of the credit goes to Reagan’saggressive military spending andantagonism toward Communism.That view has largely eclipsed an-other American perspective: thatglobalization and democratizationwere so powerful that a MikhailGorbachev was inevitable. “I thinkover time most Americans, if theythink back at all, say it was Reaganwho said, ‘Tear down this wall,’ anddown it came,” Goldgeier said.Robert Kagan, a historian withthe Carnegie Endowment in Wash-ington, noted that this was not thecase in Europe. “If 90 percent of Americans say it was the U.S. be-ing firm, 99 percent of Europeansthink it was they being soft, thatthe wall fell through Ostpolitik andWest German TV,” he said.For many Americans of both po-litical parties, 1989 seemed a won-derful example of the embrace of universal values that happenedto be theirs. Democrats arguethat President George W. Bushlearned the wrong lesson from1989, about the utility of force, andRepublicans argue that PresidentBill Clinton and President Obamalearned the wrong lesson — that“engagement” with totalitarianpower will weaken or destroy it.For all the disagreement, saidRonald D. Asmus, a deputy assis-tant secretary of state in the Clin-ton administration, what happenedwas simply amazing. “If someoneasked me in ’89 if we would haveall these countries in NATO andthe European Union, I would havebeen incredulous. We’ve lost sightof an incredible historical achieve-ment: the heart of Central andEastern Europe is at peace. Allproblems are not fully solved, butthey are tempered, controlled andcontained.”
STEVEN ERLANGER
The Legacy of 1989 Remains Open to Debate
BAGHDAD — After weeks of stalemate, the Iraqi Parliamentapproved a law on Sunday to ad-minister a critical national elec-tion in January, a significant mile-stone for its fragile democracyand a step that will allow the rapidwithdrawal of American combatforces early next year.The United States has said adelay of the election could setback the scheduled withdrawal of American combat troops. Presi-dent Obama hailed the vote onSunday as “a significant break-through” that would ease fearsabout an American withdrawal.The major sticking point hadbeen how to handle voting inKirkuk, which is rich in oil andis claimed by Kurds, Arabs andTurkmens. Thousands of Kurdshad been forced out of Kirkuk bySaddam Hussein, who replacedthem with Arabs to tighten his gripon the oil. Since the U.S.-led inva-sion that ousted Hussein in 2003,many Kurds have moved back. Ar-abs and Turkmens favored usingvoter lists from 2004 or 2005; Kurdswanted to use lists from 2009 thatreflected their higher numbers.The agreement reached Sun-day will use lists from 2009, but if lawmakers find the number of eli-gible voters in a particular area tobe suspiciously high, a U.N.-over-seen committee will determinewhether fraud has occurred.The election had been sched-uled for Jan. 16, but it appearedSunday that it would be delayedby a few days to give officials timeto print ballots and to make otherpreparations.
(NYT)
 Iraq Approves Key Election Law
Anti-Taian May Is Kie
A Pakistani mayor who publicly opposedthe Taliban was killed Sunday in a suicidebombing in a cattle market near Peshawar,officials said. A Taliban spokesman said bytelephone that the group claimed responsi-bility for the attack, which took place in thevillage of Mattani and killed 12 people, in-cluding the mayor, Abdul Malik, the Pesha-war police said.
(NYT)
Sauis Caim Gains in Fighting
Saudi Arabia said over the weekend thatit had regained control of a border areaseized by Yemeni rebels last week, and thatit had halted its military campaign there.But the rebels dismissed the Saudi claimson Sunday, saying Saudi troops had retreat-ed. The rebels’ statement came with a vid-eo of what was said to be fleeing Saudi sol-diers. The fighting began Tuesday.
(NYT)
Ian Nucea Cunteppsa
The Obama administration, trying to sal-vage a faltering nuclear deal with Iran,has told Iran’s leaders that it would let thecountry send its stockpile of enriched urani-um to any of several nations, including Tur-key, for temporary safekeeping, accordingto officials involved in the exchanges. ButIran has all but ignored the overtures, theysaid, instead reviving an old counterpro-posal: that arms inspectors take custody ofmuch of the fuel but keep it on Kish, a Per-sian Gulf island that is part of Iran. A seniorU.S. official said that proposal was rejectedbecause leaving the fuel on Iranian territo-ry would allow for the possibility that Irancould evict the inspectors.
(NYT)
Stm Kis 91 in E Sava
CANCÚN, Mexico — Hurricane Idaroared toward the Gulf of Mexico on Sundayafter killing 91 people and leaving at least60 missing in El Salvador. The storm sweptpast Cancún, doing little damage, and is ex-pected to weaken on Monday.
(Reuters)
In Brief 
 ANTHONY SUAU/THe New YOrk TimeS
 A o o dono-l slabs as ppad o topplng n Blnon monday to a th all o th Bln wall 20 yas ago.
INTErNATIoNAl
 
Monday, noveMber 9, 2009
2
 
WASHINGTON — The anti-abortion provision in the healthcare bill passed by the House lateSaturday was the biggest victoryfor abortion opponents in yearsand has emboldened them head-ing into what is sure to be a pitchedbattle in the Senate.The provision would block theuse of federal subsidies for insur-ance that covers elective abor-tions.The provision, inserted in thebill Saturday as an amendmentunder pressure from conserva-tive Democrats, was the result inpart of forceful lobbying by theU.S. Catholic Bishops. The healthlegislation is now moving to theSenate, which will have to decidewhether to include any abortionrestrictions in its version. Presi-dent Obama has so far remainedsilent on the issue, but as the de-bate continues he could be forcedto take sides.It would apply only to insurancepolicies purchased with the feder-al subsidies that the health legisla-tion would create to help low andmiddle-income people buy healthcoverage, and to policies sold by agovernment-run insurance plan.Abortion-rights advocatescharged Sunday that the provisionthreatened to deprive women of abortion coverage because insur-ers would drop the procedure fromtheir plans in order to sell them inthe new market of people receiv-ing subsidies. The subsidized mar-ket would be large because anyoneearning less than $88,000 for a fam-ily of four — four times the povertylevel — would be eligible for a sub-sidy under the House bill.Women who received subsidiesor public insurance could still payout of pocket for the procedure. Orthey could buy separate insurance“riders” to cover abortion, thoughsome evidence suggests fewwould, in part because few plan forunintended pregnancies.Not many women who undergoabortions file private insuranceclaims in any case. A 2003 studyby the Alan Guttmacher Institutefound that 13 percent of abortionswere billed directly to an insur-ance company. Only about half of those who receive insurance cov-erage from their employers havecoverage of abortion in any event,according to a study by the KaiserFamily Foundation.But the abortion battle has beenplaying out over incrementalchanges in the courts and in leg-islation, most of which in recentyears have gone against advo-cates of abortion rights.“This is going to make it thatmuch more challenging on theSenate side,” said Nancy Keenan,president of NARAL Pro-ChoiceAmerica. 
DAVID D. KIRKPATRICKand ROBERT PEAR
 In House Bill, Victory for Abortion Opponents
WASHINGTON — House Dem-ocrats were thrilled by the passageof their major health care legisla-tion on Saturday, but were particu-larly tickled by denying Republi-cans a solid wall of opposition withthe solitary vote of Rep. Anh Cao of Louisiana.Cao, a freshman Republicanfrom New Orleans and a Vietnam-ese-American representing a pre-dominantly black, heavily Demo-cratic district, was elected lastyear in an upset victory over Rep.William J. Jefferson, a Democratwho was under indictment at thetime and has since been convictedof federal corruption charges.“I have a constitutional dutyto make the right decision for mydistrict whether or not the decisionwas popular,” Cao said in an inter-view Sunday on CNN. “A lot of myconstituents are uninsured, a lot of them are poor.”In a statement posted on his Website shortly after the vote on Satur-day, he said he had secured a per-sonal commitment from PresidentObama on health issues importantto Louisiana, including disparitiesin federal reimbursement rates forMedicare.While many Democrats com-plained that tighter restrictions oninsurance coverage for abortionshad threatened their support forthe bill, Cao, a onetime Jesuit semi-narian, said those tougher restric-tions were essential for his vote.This was not the first time Caohas broken with his party. He wasone of 29 Republicans to join Dem-ocrats this year in voting to reau-thorize the Children’s Health In-surance Program, which typicallycovers children whose families donot qualify for Medicaid.Democrats, teasingly, claimed amantle of bipartisanship for theirhealth care legislation.“This was, as you observed, abipartisan vote,” the House major-ity leader, Steny H. Hoyer of Mary-land, said at a news conference tocelebrate the passage of the bill.
DAVID M. HERSZENHORN 
One Republican Breaks Ranks in Health Vote
BANGOR, Me. — For years,the location of this city’s needleexchange program, in a strip mallclose to highways and bus lines,was seen as a major asset.But now, AIDS activists say, thatlocation could undermine whathappens inside.A bill working in Congress wouldlift a ban of more than 20 years onusing federal money for needleexchange programs. But the billwould also ban federally financedexchanges from being within 1,000feet of a school, park, library, col-lege, video arcade or any placechildren might gather — a provi-sion affecting most of the country’sapproximately 200 exchanges.“This 1,000-foot rule is simplyinstituting the ban in a differentform,” said Rebecca Haag, execu-tive director of the AIDS ActionCouncil, an advocacy group.Under a separate bill, all ex-changes in Washington withinthe 1,000-foot perimeter would bebarred from receiving city moneyas well as federal money.“Let’s protect these kids,” saidRep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., whointroduced the Washington bill.“They don’t need to be playingkickball in the playground andseeing people lined up for needleexchange.”Both bills have passed the Houseand await Senate action.
KATIE ZEZIMA
 Bill to Help Needle Exchanges Would Hurt Most of Them
Prescriptions
Follow the progress, and thedebate, on the health bill.
nytimes.cm/pesciptins
Shting in Ca
A 63-year-old man suspectedof fatally shooting one personand wounding three others in aVail, Colo., bar has been arrest-ed in what authorities say wasan apparently random shooting.Richard Moreau of Vail is ac-cused of firing shots outside andin the Sandbar Sports Grill. Po-lice say he was arrested Satur-day at the scene on suspicion offirst-degree homicide.
(AP)
Tansit Stike
Commuters in Philadelphiahave been told to gear up fora second week of finding otherways to work after the collapseof a proposed deal to end a six-day-old strike by about 5,000 busdrivers, subway and trolley con-ductors and mechanics.The largest union represent-ing workers of the SoutheasternPennsylvania TransportationAuthority wants an indepen-dent audit of pension funds. Theunion is also rejecting languagethat could reopen the contractif SEPTA’s costs increase dueto national health care reform.
(AP)
Amy Chief f StaffWants Me Tps
Gen. George Casey, the Armychief of staff, on Sunday be-came the latest U.S. military of-ficial to advocate sending moretroops to Afghanistan as Presi-dent Obama nears a decision ona new strategy.
(Reuters)
Psecuts SeekStuents’ Gaes
A Northwestern Universityprofessor and journalism stu-dents who spent three years in-vestigating the case of a manconvicted in the 1978 killing ofa security guard believe theyhave evidence that shows pros-ecutors put the wrong man be-hind bars. But Cook Countyprosecutors issued subpoenasto David Protess, the professor,seeking his students’ grades,his syllabus and their privatee-mails. Prosecutors claim thestudents may have been underpressure to prove the case toget a good grade.
(AP)
In Brief 
NATIoNAl
 
Monday, noveMber 9, 2009
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