NPR 2009-12-23

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Senate leaders have worked out an agreement for a vote on final passage to the Democrat's health care bill. Senate majority Leader Harry¹ Reid says the vote will take place early on Christmas Eve at around 8 a.m. It had been tentatively scheduled for that evening. Senate Democrats² are sounding more confident about their efforts to get the bill passed. They cleared the latest hurdle³ this morning when they won another key test vote and then they were cheered as they entered the press conference on Capitol Hill.

Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus of Montana says Senate's passage to the bill is near.

"We're not the first to attempt such reforms but we will be the first to succeed."

Another test vote, this one to shut off debate is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon. If approved, it would then have to be reconciled with an already passed bill before, rather, with an already passed health bill before it can become law. Republicans are still attacking the deal-making that helped to give Democrats the 60 votes they needed to move the bill forward. GOP Leader Mitch McConnell says the process was a mess.

A freshman⁴ member of the House of Representative is switching parties. Congressman⁵ Parker Griffith of Alabama says he is switching from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party. Griffith spoke⁶ to reporters at his home in Northern Alabama today. He has a largely conservative voting record.

For a third day in a row stocks are higher, rather President Obama's plan to move Guantanamo Bay detainees to a rural prison in Illinois is being both praised and criticized in the public hearing on the issue today. The administration wants to buy an under utilized⁷ state prison in Thomson Illinois, about 150 miles west of Chicago to house the detainees. NPR's David Schaper reports.

The Obama administration would move fewer than 100 / Guantanamo detainees and as many as 1,600 other federal inmates⁸ to the nearly vacant Thompson Correctional Center. Supporters claim it would create 3,000 new jobs.

"It's absolutely huge."

Russ Simpson of the Tri-county Economic Development Alliance calls it the opportunity of a lifetime.

"It's the something northwest of Illinois has never seen, in terms of economic development possibilities and possibly may never come again."

But Beverly Pearls opposes moving suspected terrorists to Illinois.  

"They hate us, they wanna cut our heads off and to bring them near my children and grandchildren, I resent it."

Pearls and other critics are protesting in what maybe the only public hearing on the plan to move Guantanamo detainees to Thomson, Illinois. David Schaper, NPR News.

Stocks are higher today following news that sales of existing homes last month jumped far more than analysts⁹ had expected on Wall Street at the close. The Dow was up 50 points at 10,464. The NASDAQ Composite Index is up 15 points at 2,253, and the S&P 500 was up four points at 1,118.

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Falling prices and a popular tax credit to being hailed for, helping¹⁰ push sales of previously¹¹ owned homes to their largest yearly gain on the record. The National Association of Realtor says sales jumped last month by a record 44% compared to ...

...is a deadline for agreeing to ship most of its low enrich uranium out of the country in exchange for fuel for Tehran research reactor¹². Washington has threatened harsher sanctions against the country. Iran, the world's fifth largest oil exporters, has claimed its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. The West contends Iran is working toward building nuclear weapons.

Europe's Eurostar train linking London with Paris and Brussels resumed service today after being suspended for three days. Thousands of holiday travelers were stranded¹³. Eleanor Beardsley reports from Paris.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy summoned the head of France‘s rail operator and ordered him to get the Eurostar moving again. Sarkozy called the situation “unacceptable for travelers”. Problems started Friday after five trains failed inside the channel tunnel, trapping more than 2,000 passengers for hours. Exhausted¹⁴ passengers appeared on British and French TV broadcast, complaining that they had been left underground from more than 15 hours without food, water or any clear idea of what was going on. Facing stiff criticism, Eurostar   is pledging to do its best to get everyone home by Christmas.  The jointly¹⁵ owned French, British and Belgium Company says the unusually dry snow got past the train's snow-screens and shorted out the locomotive’s electrical systems in the warmer air of the tunnel. For NPR News, I'm Eleanor Beardsley in Paris.

Crude oil futures¹⁶ prices ended the session higher today. Crude oil was up 68 cents a barrel to close at $74.40 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

I'm Jack¹⁷ Speer, NPR News in Washington.