Andrews, Daniel Sieberg, Priya David, Thalia Assuras

xfdcb CBS-EVENING-NEWS,-SAT-01

<Show: CBS EVENING NEWS, SATURDAY EDITION>

<Date: June 20, 2009>

<Time: 18:30>

<Tran: 062001cb.403>

<Type: Show>

<Head: For June 20, 2009, CBS>

<Sect: News; International>

<Byline: Jeff Glor, Elizabeth Palmer, Bob Schieffer, Tony Guida, Wyatt Andrews, Daniel Sieberg, Priya David, Thalia Assuras >

<High: Iranian riot police attack demonstrators with tear gas, clubs, as U.S., other nations, can only watch and wait, hope for justice and a

peaceful resolution to the stalemated election. American journalist held

by the Taliban for seven months has escaped. Health insurers devise a plan

that could be a financial and medical fit for healthy young Americans, who

make large number of the uninsured. >

<Spec: Geopolitical; Middle East; Iran; Iranian Election; Protestors; Riot Police; Demonstrations; Taliban; Journalists; Kidnapping; Afghanistan;

Health Care Reform; Uninsured; Health Care Plans; Affordable Health Care>

JEFF GLOR, CBS ANCHOR, CBS EVENING NEWS: Tonight, Iranian police attack protesters there with tear gas and clubs and President Obama calls on Tehran to end all violent and unjust actions.I'm Jeff Glor.

Also tonight, a New York Times reporter escapes from the Taliban after seven months of captivity in Afghanistan.

Following months of speculation, a published report says the iconic founder of Apple, Steve Jobs, is recovering from a liver transplant.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think about it all the time. I think I --you know, what if something happened? You know, what if I really needed it?

GLOR: Meet the young invincibles. Health insurers find creative ways to sign up millions of young adults who think coverage is unaffordable or unnecessary.

ANNOUNCER: This is the CBS EVENING NEWS with Jeff Glor.

GLOR: Good evening.

We begin tonight with the turmoil inside Iran where thousands of protestors told to stay off the streets defy government orders. Here's what we know tonight. Police fire tear gas and water cannons on as many as 3,000 demonstrators in Tehran.

President Obama issued his strongest warning yet on the Iranian government crackdown. And a suicide bomber in a shrine to Ayatollah Khomeini reportedly killed at least two people.

Today's march took place near major squares named for revolution and freedom. Elizabeth Palmer is in Tehran with more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH PALMER, CBS CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Riot police flooded the streets near Tehran University, spoiling for a fight. Protesters gathered on one of the city's main avenues chanting death to the dictator. And then as police helicopters hovered overhead, the security forces waded, tear gas, stun grenades, water cannons and truncheons. The protestors retaliated with stones. One man described by phone what happened to him.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They use some machines that throw the water in people.and then they attack us with batons. I, myself, they make very, very heavy beat on my head. I was bleeding.

PALMER: It's estimated today's crowd was 2,000 to 3,000 strong, but many young people who wanted to join in were turned back by the police before they got anywhere close. Eventually, the threat of more violence forced the protesters to retreat and scatter, but it was a remarkable show of defiance. Give given that Iran's supreme leader laid down the law yesterday at a special Friday prayer service.

No more protest, he ordered, Election results come from the ballot box, not the street.

It was a reference to the mass demonstrations that went on all last week. In attendance at prayers was the core of Iran's Islamic establishment. Front and center, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose landslide election sparked the demonstrations. Opposition politicians, including the favorite reform candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi, accused the government of massive fraud.

In spite of today's violence and the warning from the ayatollah, Mousavi isn't backing down. In a letter to the government today, he is calling for last week's vote to be annulled.

The only solution, says Mousavi, is for the government to call a new election.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PALMER: And there was a fresh statement from Mr. Mousavi this evening through the semiofficial foreign (ph) news agency. He said to his supporters he'd always be by their side and then went on to warn the Islamic state it might face dangerous consequences if it didn't allow what he called legal rallies, Jeff.

GLOR: Elizabeth, we've also seen this statement tonight, now, from a general in Iran saying up until now he feels the government has been lenient, but as of tomorrow they're going to get serious with protestors. You have seen any indication of how people will react to that?

PALMER: Every day brings fresh surprises. Today, it was remarkable, although the riot police and the Basiji were violent, they weren't using, as far as we know live ammunition. So there's room for escalation here. There's no question.

GLOR: All right, Elizabeth Palmer in Tehran tonight. Elizabeth, thank you.

President Obama's call today for an end to the Tehran crackdown follows days of criticism that he hasn't been outspoken enough. So here to help us put the week in focus is chief Washington correspondent and Face The Nation anchor Bob Schieffer.

Bob, good evening to you. The president's words, or not words, have been parsed every which way, all week long-- is he saying too much? Is he not saying enough? What do you make of this latest statement?

BOB SCHIEFFER, CBS CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, there's no question he's raised the rhetoric to another level when he has told the Iranian leaders not to carry out these acts against their own people. But he's trying to strike a very measured tone here.

Because, after all, what can the United States do at the end of the day? If he urges these protestors to sort of storm the Bastille, as it were, and thousands of people are killed, then what does the United States do next? What happens after that? He is trying to let the protesters know that we support them in spirit. The last thing he wants to do is leave the impression that the United States is instigating all of this, or it's the Great Satan, as the Iranians call us, who are causing all this to happen.

GLOR: I think a lot of people are asking, Bob, if there is that sort of seminal moment, that Tianamen Square that takes place in Iran, what does the U.S. do then?

SCHIEFFER: I don't think there's any answer to that question at this point, Jeff. This is a very, very dangerous situation. You know, they're not much that the United States can do. Would we send in troops? I think that's highly unlikely. And so that is why the president is striking such a measured tone. He knows in the end, that his options are fairly limited here, I think.

GLOR: Meanwhile, Bob, I know we have a big morning coming up on

Face tomorrow a big guest. You can tell bus that?

SCHEIFFER: Yes, well, John McCain is coming by and some of the questions you asked me are the very questions I'm going to ask him tomorrow-- what do we do about the situation in Iran? He is not really satisfied with the tone that the president has struck thus far. We've also got things to talk about on North Korea, and also on health care.

GLOR: We will be watching. Bob Schieffer from Washington.

Bob, thank you.

SCHIEFFER: Thank you.

GLOR: There's been a dramatic escape in Afghanistan. A reporter for

The New York Times , captured by the Taliban seven months ago, is safe at a U.S. base tonight after scaling a wall, where his captors were holding him outside Kabul. Tony Guida, now, has more on David Rohde.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TONY GUIDA, CBS CORRESPONDENT: This isn't the first time David Rohde's reporting put him in harm's way. Fourteen years ago in Bosnia, he was arrested by Serbian troops. After Rohde broke the story of the massacre of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica he sneaked back into the country. The Serbs thought Rohde was a spy when they saw him taking pictures of other graves.

CLAYTON JONES, EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR, CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR : For five days we didn't know if he was alive or dead. When he came out later, we discovered that the Serbs had been driving all over Yugoslavia trying to find a place to develop the slides.

GUIDA: Rohde won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting of Srebrenica. He won a second Pulitzer a month ago, for his part in The New York Times coverage of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Rohde was researching a book on the U.S. involvement there when the Taliban offered him an interview. Instead, they kidnapped him and his translator. Rohde was abducted outside Kabul and held for seven months in the mountainous Pakistani region of Waziristan.

BILL KELLER, EXEC. EDITOR, THE NEW YORK TIMES: The kidnappers would let him call to sort of demonstrate that he was still alive. And from that, we know that they were mostly in the mountains, that they were moved frequently.

GUIDA: Yesterday, Rohde somehow managed to climb over a wall. He hailed a Pakistani scout, who took him to an army base. From there Rohde was air lifted to the U.S. airbase at Bagram, Afghanistan.

KELLER: That's at this moment, where he is, I hope catching up on some sleep, getting a physical, chatting with his wife on the phone.

GLOR: Rohde was lucky. Since 9/11 32 journalists have been killed in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

JOEL SIMON, DIR. CMTE. TO PROTECT JOURNALISTS: This is probably the most dangerous period in history for journalists. In Iraq alone, we've counted 139 journalists who have been killed.

GUIDA (On camera): David's family says they prayed for him every day and they are enormously relieved that he is safe, none more than his wife, Kristin.

We've been married nine months, she said And David's been in captivity for seven of them. Tony Guida, CBS, News, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GLOR: After weeks of discussion the pharmaceutical industry has agreed to $80 billion in prescription drug discounts over years, for millions of Medicare recipients. That deal could help defray the costs of health care reform.

As the can be debate over reform intensifies, a new CBS News/ New York Times poll shows one half of Americans think the government would do better than the private companies at providing medical coverage. That is up sharply from 2007. Republicans said today in their weekly address, that Democratic reform proposals in Congress would, quote, bury us in debt.

Wyatt Andrews reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WYATT ANDREWS, CBS CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Four different versions of health care reform emerged from Congress this week.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, (R) ARIZONA: We don't know what the government option is.

ANDREWS: But no debate raged louder than the showdown over what's called the government option, or the public plan. House Democrats have proposed a taxpayer-financed insurance plan that would compete with private insurance, the idea being to drive down prices.

REP. CHARLES RANGEL, (D) NEW YORK: Is this going to bring down the cost of health insurance? You bet your sweet life. I can't wait to talk to anybody that's fighting against this public health insurance program.

ANDREWS: The congressman is already getting that wish.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: An unwarranted government takeover.

ANDREWS: Republicans, who have seen this coming for months .

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Government takeover of health care.

ANDREWS: Call the public plan a government take over because the House proposal is based on Medicare. And, Medicare, thanks to taxpayer funding, is roughly 25 percent cheaper than private insurance and is open to everyone.

REP. DAVE CAMP, (R) MICHIGAN: The economics would force them into the government plan.

ANDREWS: Republicans like Dave Camp of Michigan say a public plan with Medicare's 25 percent advantage will, over time, wipe out the private insurance industry.

CAMP: If everyone is reimbursed at a government rate, you'll have a mass migration, 120 million people from the private plans to the public plan.

ANDREWS: That prediction of a massive buy-in to the public plan comes from the Lewin Group, a think tank owned by United Health, the nation's largest health insurer. The author of the report tells us Republicans are right, except for one major detail. The House version of the public plan won't fly, he says, because the Senate has moved away from basing a public plan on Medicare.

JOHN SHIELS, VICE PRESIDENT, THE LEWIN GROUP: I think we're past the point where people want to set up a public plan that is going to be available to everybody.

ANDREWS (On camera): In fact, one major reform proposal in the Senate Finance Committee doesn't have a public plan at all. And now this debate over the public plan isn't just between Democrats and Republicans. Democrats face a fight amongst themselves because of their different approaches in the House and Senate. Wyatt Andrews, CBS News, Capitol Hill.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GLOR: Coming up on tonight's CBS EVENING NEWS, reports of major surgery for Apple founder Steve Jobs.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GLOR: He is the man behind iPods, the iPhone, and Apple computer. Steve Jobs, perhaps the most discussed, and most mysterious, leader in the business world today. And today, The Wall Street Journal is reporting Jobs had a liver transplant. Science and technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEVE JOBS, FOUNDER, APPLE, INC.: We're going to make some history together today.

DANIEL SIEBERG, CBS SCIENCE TECH CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Rarely in history has one man's vision defined a company the way Steve Jobs has defined Apple.

TOM MERRITT, EXECUTIVE EDITOR, CNET: Obviously, Steve Jobs has a huge influence on Apple, because he is Apple. So his influence permeates everything, and while they are doing a good job in his absence, you know that they want him back.

SIEBERG: The Apple CEO is reportedly on the mend after receiving a liver transplant in Tennessee two months ago. In January, Jobs and said he was suffering from a hormone imbalance and appeared thinner in public when he announced he was stepping away from daily duties. He also battle the pancreatic cancer in 2004.

JOBS: Enjoy your media.

SIEBERG: Doctors who have not treated Jobs, but are familiar with his rare form of pancreatic cancer tell CBS News that the liver transplant could give Jobs many more years of life. A deeply private person, Jobs has not said much about his health problems, but in 2005, speaking before students at Stanford, Jobs was uncharacteristically reflective after recovering from cancer treatment.

JOBS: No one wants to die, even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet, death is the destination we all share, and that is as it should be. Because death is very likely the single best invention of life; it's life's change agent.

SIEBERG: The latest iPhone was released on Friday, and a return from Jobs would be especially welcome now since Apple is facing increased competition from PALM with its Pre and Research In Motion with its line of smart phones. Investors will be closely watching what Jobs does.

MERRITT: I think he wants to leave everything in the hands of the folks that are running it right now and we'll see him come back in his own time.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SIEBERG: When Jobs stepped away from Apple, back in January, he said he'd return to the office by the end of June. Following this reported liver transplant he now appears ready to do just that, Jeff.

GLOR: Daniel Sieberg, we know you'll be watching.

SIEBERG: Absolutely.

GLOR: Next up on tonight's CBS EVENING NEWS. What to do about America's 13 million uninsured young adults.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GLOR: For many young adults, health insurance just isn't on their radar. But a serious illness or accident can be a disaster. Now, there's an affordable option, as Priya David reports in our series Prescriptions For Change.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PRIYA DAVID, CBS CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Twenty-seven-year-old Jamie Doerr is a waitress who moved to New York City with dreams of becoming an actress, and very little cash. She rarely thought about health insurance.

JAMIE DOERR, WAITRESS: I just can't afford independent health insurance right now.

DAVID: Insurers call people like Jamie the young invincibles; 19 to 29-year-olds who don't get health insurance with their jobs and don't carry individual coverage, often because they consider it a major expense they can live without. Across America, there are 13.2 million young invincible, who make up 30 percent of all uninsured, a number that is expected to climb in this economy.

KARYN SCHWARTZ, KAISER FAMILY FOUNDATION: With more and more people losing their jobs, people are really having trouble maintaining their health insurance.

DAVID: But the average monthly premium for private insurance for this age group is $400 to $500 per month.

DOERR: I don't foresee in my future being able to pay for independent health insurance.

DAVID: Young adults have the highest rate of injury-related emergency room visits of all age groups, and 46 percent of young uninsured adults reported having medical debt as a result.

(On camera): To entice more young people to purchase health insurance one company is offering far cheaper plans, in six states, including California.

RICHARD WHITE, VP, WELLPOINT BLUE CROSS/BLUE SHIELD: They're literally one accident away from having their future impacted by a costly accident.

DAVID: Richard White, an executive at WellPoint Blue Cross/Blue Shield oversees a plan specifically designed to attract young invincibles. Called Tonik, the plan offers three low-cost options, ranging from $70 to $120 per month, which all include basic preventive care.

They allow four doctor and emergency room visits, annually, with low copayments and dental and vision coverage. For anything else, there's a high deductible of $5,000. Steep but catastrophic injury or disease care can run into the tens of thousands.

It was enough to lure Joe Sanroman, a framing contractor, from California who spent his early 20s without health insurance.

JOE SANROMAN, FRAMING CONTRACTOR: It's worth it to pay that little bit of money every month, and then be OK, be able to go to the doctor when you need to.

DAVID: So far, Tonik is only available in these six states but the company is working to expand into all states where Blue Cross/Blue Shield already operates, including New York.

DOERR: I'm not a doctor. I don't know if I'm really sick. You know? And I don't want it to get to the point where one day I finally go in and they're like, It's too late.

DAVID: A fear Jamie feels she can't escape because for her the price tag for health insurance remains out of reach. Priya David, CBS News, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GLOR: Still ahead on tonight's CBS EVENING NEWS, love and marriage in a time of recession.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GLOR: A couple from New York made history today by taking part in the first zero-gravity wedding aboard a specially modified Boeing 727 over Florida. That couple not withstanding, the gravity of the economic slowdown is causing many other couples to add something new to their vows-a promise to part with a lot less of their money. Thalia Assuras has a guide tonight, to weddings on a budget.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

THALIA ASSURAS, CBS CORRESPONDENT (voice over): From the gowns and tuxes ...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hello, come try a sample.

ASSURAS: ... to the cake, a couple's wedding is often a fantasy fulfilled-- not this wedding season.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Whew!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whew!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You want to start?

ASSURAS: For couples like Keeva Moye and Jeff Schrivner (ph), the recession is squeezing out the romance.

KEEVA MOYE, BRIDE-TO-BE: Here we are, all blissfully happy, wanting to get married and going-- I don't have as much as I thought I did.

ASSURAS: Tight savings and a short period of unemployment have forced them to stick to a $5,000 budget, honeymoon included. So no band, fewer guests.

MOYE: We wanted between 100 and 150. We've cut that back to 75.

ASSURAS: And plenty of bargain hunting.

MOYE: It retailed at $1,000. And I got it on line for $299. You can believe that?

ASSURAS: Keeva and Jeff are not alone.

(On camera): Are brides cutting back, and bridegrooms?

SHARON LEWIS, WEDDING PLANNER: They're definitely cutting back. They're cutting back in so many different ways.

ASSURAS (voice over): Wedding planner Sharon Lewis says attendance at her shows has shrunk. And research shows a quarter of brides-to-be plan to slash their budgets in half. The average wedding tab this year is $19,000, down from a peak of $28,732 in 2007. That is more than a 30 percent drop.

VERA WANG, DESIGNER: We've cut our price points from the year prior by about 30 percent.

ASSURAS: Even high-end designers like Vera Wang are feeling the pinch. She says her brides usually come to her right after get a ring, but not anymore. They're shopping around instead, and many are spending less.

WANG: One would think that maybe bridal would be the last sufferer, but it really has suffered, I think, for the whole industry.

ASSURAS: Still, Keeva Moye is looking past the wedding planning woes and finding blessings in a smaller bash.

MOYE: What's more important is, you know, spending that money into making sure that our marriage lasts.

Oh, thank you.

ASSURAS: A sure sign that love can be recession-proof. Thalia Assuras, CBS News, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GLOR: That is the CBS EVENING NEWS tonight. Russ Mitchell will be here tomorrow night. I'm Jeff Glor, CBS News in New York. Good night.

END

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