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The strategically important nation has been ruled by one man for the past 30 years, but President Suharto, is now 75, and recent rumors of his ill health are affecting the country's financial strength.

NPR's Joanne Silberner reports on two federal HMO programs for the elderly. People who join get not just medical care - they also receive social supports like home nursing aides -- but members are limited to the health care providers in the HMOs. The goal is to keep people as healthy as possible as long as possible while holding down costs. So far, at least, there are few complaints about the programs.

While the Democrats have charged repeatedly that Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole is in the back pocket of tobacco interests, both parties have benefitted from camapign contributions from the tobacco industry. Democrats are getting less money than they used to, but they still get a lot. And the Clinton Administration, while it has tried to limit smoking domestically, has not done so when it comes to tobacco exports. NPR's Peter Overby reports.

NPR's Brooke Gladstone reports on MSNBC -- the new 24-hour cable news channel that offers CNN its first-ever direct competition. Despite 16-years of bad press, low ratings and slow profits, CNN is thriving in its niche market -- upscale, middle-aged, news junkies. MSNBC hopes to lure chunks of that audience away with round-the-clock timeliness and 24-hour linkage to an expansive internet website. The other networks will be watching closely to see how much slicing the 24-hour news market can bear.

Linda Wertheimer talks with Jerry Horton, the superintendent for the North Pontotoc [PAWN-uh-tawk] School District in Ecru, Mississippi. He pledges to keep some religion in the area's public schools, despite a federal court ruling against the district's practice of broadcasting prayers and Bible classes over the intercom system.

NPR senior news analyst Daniel Schorr says that there exist three potential hot spots in the world that, if they erupted, could hamper President Clinton's re-election bid--Israel, Russia and Bosnia.

NPR's Sunni Khalid reports that the Arab world is beginning to assess the potential damage to the peace process in the wake of last week's Israeli elections. At the meeting in Aqaba (AH-kuh-bah), Jordan, leaders of Egypt, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority called for Israel to continue the peace process.

The Supreme Court heard arguments today on part of the new anti-terrorism law. A Georgia death row inmate is challenging the law's new limits on appeals based on alleged violations of prisoners' constitutional rights, so-called "habeas corpus" petitions. Supporters of the law say prisoners have been abusing the system to delay executions. Critics of the law say reducing the opportunity for appeal increases the risk of executing innocent people. NPR's Nina Totenberg reports on today's arguments before the justices.

a former director at the National Transportation Safety Board, about how the agency is handling the inquiry...

NPR's Lynn Neary remembers some of the 230 passengers and crew on TWA flight 800, which crashed Wednesday night off Long Island. They included a Houston woman who fought for victim's rights, an English professor from upstate New York who had just won an award for excellence in teaching and a televion producer who was heading to France for his last assignment before leaving ABC televisiion. He was traveling with his wife and daughter.