Additional support is provided by from the tisch wnet studios in new york, ari sreenivasan. The house of representatives voted 407 to nothing to grarnt back pay to 800,000 federal employees now furloughed. The senate also is expected to approve the legislation. In a separate development, chuck hagel said the pentagon is ordering most of its furloughed civilian employees back to work, he did not say exactly how many. Meanwhile, there are new signs the Government Shutdown is damaging the economy, thousands of home buyers may not be able to qualify for mortgages because of the furloughing of irs workers. The irs often verifies the income of home buyers trying to get a lone. For weeks now, washington watchers have been saying resolution of the conflict will hinge on the actions of two men, president obama and House Speaker john boehner. Well have two conversations with the reporters who cover each of them. For more, were joined by janet hook of the wall street journal, i have to ask, does this mornings unanimous agreement to give federal workers who were furloughed back pay, if thats approved by the senate and the white house does, that buy john boehner more time or increase the pressure on minimum . I have to say, that unanimous vote is really an illusion. Its the one thing people can agree on, is that they dont want to take this out on the federal workers who are missing days and days of paychecks. I think actually, it kind of lifts the pressure on congress to come to any kind of agreement, because there isnt pressure coming from federal workers who are wanting to get their paycheck, they know theyll be made whole in the end. Whats the likelihood if Speaker Boehner combines this negotiation into the debt ceiling conversation thats looming. President obama last week was giving speeches where he was calling out Speaker Boehner and basically saying he was almost single hand edly responsible for the shutdown. Speaker bainer has been har much in return questioning president obamas leadership. A couple weeks ago, i their they played golf together and they were trying to get some negotiations together. Right now its difficult to think of them out on the links together. Julie pace is a White House Correspondent for the associated press, she had an exclusive interview with the president yesterday. We just heard janet hook say the relationship between Speaker Boehner and the president is almost nonexistent. You sat down with the president yesterday, that seemed narl accurate . Yes, its definitely accurate. These are two men who tried to build a relationship back in 2011, they really found that they either couldnt trust each other or didnt have a lot of overlapping positions. And the relationship has gotten worse over time. They say they dont speak very often, they dont necessarily not like each other, they just dont have anything in common. And i think thats playing out in this debelate. You dont see a lot of invitations for john boehner to come over to the white house. You dont see a lot of phone calls being traded by the two men. Youve covered the president since before he was president. Now, in this particular crisis, how does he seem to you . One of the things i was struck by in the interview we had with him, is how ofd he seems. The white house feels like, in terms of the Government Shutdown, theyre really winning the politics of this, and the president seems to really skewed this confidence. He was holding firm on his positions, making clear that he was not going to negotiate away to the Government Shutdown. What i think is particularly striking, is that just a few weeks ago, this was a president who was really in crisis 37 i dont think thats overstating it, you had his decision on syria, you had the nsa revelations, going back earlier in the summer. You had controversies in the irs that were bubbling up. That has been overshadowed by the debacle in capitol hill over the Government Shutdown, and its really renewed his confidence going into the end of this year. Does he think this will get tied into the conversation about the debt celling . So i asked him about this, he said that that shouldnt happen, that the house should be able to resolve this before we get to the debt ceiling deadline, which is about october 17th, i think realistically, theres a good chance that will happen. You hear from some republicans on capitol hill, that it may be in Speaker Boehners favor to let these two deadlines merge. I think if you caught some white house officials in some private moments, they may acknowledge the fact that that is where this is headed. I want to ask you about iran. Israel has gone on the record and said that iran is very close to a nuclear bomb. Whats the president s assessment . The president admits that the u. S. Is a bit more conservative than iran in their intelligence assessme assessment. When i asked him what the Current Assessment is, he said that the u. S. Believes iran is a year or more away from being able to build a nuclear weapon, this is something hes be telling Benjamin Netanyahu for quite some time, the israelis are a bit more forward leaning on their time frame. What the president is trying to do when he lays out this longer time frame is making the case for diplomacy, saying we have a year or more to try to launch this diplomatic effort with the new iranian president. Julie pace, thanks so much. Thanks for having me. In other news, the government will temporarily take down the newly launched wib site where americans can apply for medical insurance. Healthcare. Gov, it will go down for a few hours late tonight and late tomorrow night. There have been nearly 9 million individual visits to the site during the past four days. Many users reported experiencing long waits or receiving error messages. There were renewed calls across the United States today for immigration reform. Demonstrators marched in dozens of cities. Last june the Senate Passed anible grags bill that would have put many undocumented immigrants on the pageant to citizenship. The bill has gone nowhere in the house. Overseas today, irans Supreme Leader has criticized that nations new president a week after Hassan Rowhani spoke with president obama. We support the governments diplomatic movements, and place importance on diplomatic efforts. And support what was in this last trip. Of course, in our opinion, some of what occurred in the new york trip was not profitable. The eayatollah also expresse skepticism about thethness of washington to negotiate with them. Calling the u. S. Not trustworthy. U. S. Navy s. E. A. L. S al shabaab claimed responsibility for a terror attack on an upscale mall that killed dozens of shoppers last month. And now to our signature segment, where we take a look at important but often underreported issues. Tonight we focus on a little known portion of the Affordable Care act. How a once obscure task force decides which preventative screenings your Insurance Company has to coverer in full. Our report is by dr. Emily sinae. Barbara hillary is shopping for a coat that will keep her warm in subzero temperatures. When im on expedition, its all about survival and reaching my goals. The 82yearold retired nurse is planning a trip to the arctic, and it wont be her first. I was the first africanamerican woman to reach the north pole, setting a world record. The first africanamerican woman to reach the north and south pole. Setting another worlds record. Shes been an adventurer all her life, and a smoker too. She had her first cigarette when she was 19 years old and over the years she smoked close to two packs a day. Then one day, hillary read about a Lung Cancer Screening Program using ct scans at a Medical College in new york city. Always willing to try something new, hillary decided to sign up. It occurred to me that this is an avenue that i had not explore explored, i was a smoker, it was available. So why not take advantage of it. And did you have any symptoms . Were you sick at the time . No, i wane the. No cough something. No. As it turned out, her first screening showed a cancerous mass in her lung and she would need surgery. Had you not been proactive, what would have happened . I might be dead by now. Now under a little publicized part of the Affordable Care act, long time smokers like hillary might be entitled to a 300 preventative lung Cancer Screening with no co pay. Thats because of an obscure group known as the United StatesPreventative Services task force. Its composed of 60 volunteer and independent physicians and academics. The Group Considers what screenings have worked and which ones dont. Anyone in the medical field can submit a nomination for a seat on the task force, even selfnominations are accepted. Members are embedded in selected agencies within the department of human health and services. The group was little known for 30 years. Using letter grades to make recommendations to primary care physicians on which services they should offer their patients and helping Insurance Companies decide to cover. Before the Affordable Care act was passed in 2010, a grade a or b was only a recommendation. But under the new law, a grade a or b now requires that medicare and private insurers pick up 100 of the cost. Dr. Virginia moyer is the chair of the task force. The Affordable Care act includes a provision that says that any recommendation that receives an a or b grade is paid for first dollar, so no co pay for those recommendations. Since the passage of the agordable care act, the task force has recommended more than a dozen Preventative Services. Screenings for hiv, Cervical Cancer and osteoporosis as well as counciling for obesity and tobacco use. People who need Preventative Services can now get them within their Insurance Networks fully covered. The Preventative Service is something that is intended to keep something bad from happening. What we do as a task force is, we carefully evaluate the science. The science that tells us whether a Preventative Service is going to benefit people. The idea is that providing Preventative Services from the outset will save lives and Health Care Dollars on the back end. On the surface, patients are going to get all of the services that the Task Force Recommends, either a or b covered in full, with no co pays. That sounds good, i think the problem is, thats very expense everyone. Dr. Scott gottlieb is with a think tank, in the medical world, nothing ever comes for free. For the average person who hears that it is now the law that their Insurance Company has to pay for Preventative Services. Season the that something people are going to want as part of their Health Benefits . Im concerned about the things that wont be covered. Youre going to see more things covered in pull that the Task Force Recommends and more things not covered that the task force doesnt recommend. If the Task Force SaysInsurance Companies have to pay for something, and it costs a lot of money, arent they just going to take money from other things . The Affordable Care act, what it says is, that Insurance Companies have to pay for a and b recommendation. It says no, sir at all about what doesnt get paid for. That then remains the decision of Insurance Companies, and, of course, for many people, its the decision of medicare. And the decision of the Insurance Companies like aetna has been to stick with what the Task Force Says. Dr. Lonnie reese man is its chief medical officer. Weve covered all the mandates already. Theyre based into our premiums and were not expecting a significant increase in costs. But the real financial challenge will be to manage costs, and at the same time, satisfy customers as more services are mandatesed in coming years. Any increases in costs will be covered in our premiums, but we will explain the basis for increasing premiums as a result of increasing medical costs. That could mean no out of pocket expenses for Preventative Services at the doctors office. But higher insurance bills for consumers. And theres still another aspect of this story. Whether theres the same oversight of the volunteer task force as there is of other government agencies. I have a problem with a Government Entity functioning as a regulatory agency, not being subject to any of the rules that govern good regulation writing or rule making. Theyre going to determine coverage not just for obama care, not just for medicare, but for everyone. Controversy about the task force has been especially heated when its decisions have been reversed oregon against the grain of the wider medical community. For instance, in 2009, the task force recommended against routine mammograms for women before the age of 50. Changing an earlier recommendation saying women should be screened at 40, despite being more visible these days, the chair of the Task Force Says theyll continue doing their job, reviewing Scientific Evidence so they can keep americans healthy. We want to be independent and we want our recommendations to be based on science, not politics. If you look at our website, it ends in dot org not dot gov. Were an independent panel. Were epidemiologists and primary care physicians, not policy makers. Even as the debate of the role of the task force continues, explorer Barbara Hillary says shes just grateful she got her early screening. To me, its just so obvious that i was able to live. As a result as a result of the screening program. Living is not inhaling and exhaling. Living is, you know you feel it. If you dont feel it, baby, you aint living. Visit news hour. Pbs. Org to find out what Preventative Services will be covered by your insurance procedure under the Affordable Care act. Watch an interview with a pioneer of lung Cancer Screenings. The october issue of National Geographic features the power of photography, and peer fortunate to be joined by one of the photographers of National Geographic. Your work accompanies a piece called the price of precious. Youre talking about conflict minerals in the congo. Were not just talking about blood diamonds any more. Thats something people were familiar is with maybe a decade ago. What kind of minerals . Its minerals we use in electronic products. Things that make our factories function more efficiently. Things that make our cell phones work silently. Things that keep these electronic products together. To help draw that connection, how does my purchase of an electronic product end up making its way to someone in these mines . In the mine, they extract tin, that product then is exported in from congo to its neighboring countries and from there it makes its way to the east african coastline shipped to asia to go to production companies, which will take the raw material and turn it into a different form. How is it by reading this piece, i learned that the congo is one of the most mineral rich countries on the planet. Yet at the same time, its one of the poorest places on the planet. They have these resources, whats been keeping them from exercising that sort of economic independence. The problem is, theres no control. 23i6r9 of all, within an environment like that, the government there is not really in control of the regions where the minerals are sourced. If they are in control, its a very military led control. Some of the military leaders are not as scrupulous as they should be, and theyre extracting those minerals for their own personal profit. On top of that you have a huge collection of militia rebel groups that are working and fighting in the regions. They use the Natural Resources to fund the military campaign. They try to take over the mines to extract the minerals. One of the things that is striking about your photos is how many of these mines are staffed by children. Is there any improvement . I have seen some small improvement. Ive been working in congo since the late 1990s, and when i was in these mines in 2003, 2004, there were certainly a lot more children in them than i saw recently. Thats not to say that its not a problem any more. It is a problem. Theres still lots of children working in the mines, being forced to work in the environments by the military. And also, sometimes when the fighting starts again, they leave the mines and theyre forced to fight for the militia, that they are working for in the mines. This may seem like a naive question, but is there anything that can be done about it . How can an American Consumer affect whats happening so a child in a mine in the congo . Its a really good question. Because thats where the solution lies. It lies with the consumer. The dodd frank bill was passed in 2010, that made any Company Responsible for reporting if they received any minerals from the congo. Some of them are working better than others. Intel, motorola. Other Electronics Products companies are not doing so well. And so they need a push. And that push had to come from us, the consumer. They can send messages to the organizations that are manufacturing these products to tell them, were watching and seeing what youre doing, youre not behaving in a way you should be behaving or responding as quickly as you should be responding to the doddfrank act. Thanks for your time. Thank you. Finally tonight, an excerpt from a front line documentary airing this coming tuesday, its about head injuries in the National Football league, in this case, a concussion suffered by former Dallas Cowboys quarterback, troy aikman during his teams victory over the San Francisco 49ers in the nfc championship game. I went to visit troy who was sitting in a darkened hospital room all alone. The room is dark because aikman cant even stand looking into the light. You know, its a surreal scene where the city is celebrating and the quarter back who won the game is in the hospital with his agent. He looked at me and said, lee, where am i . I said, well, youre in the hospital. He said, well, why am i here . I said, because you suffered a concussion today . He said, well, who did we play. I said, the 49ers. And he said, did we win . Yes, you won. Did i play well . Yes, you played well. Did what does that and so, what does that mean . It means youre going to the super bowl. Five minutes later theyre sitting there, theyre continuing to hang out, and aikman turns so steinberg and says, what am i doing here . And the next thing you know, they are relieving this conversation they had five minutes earlier. For a minute i thought he was joking. I went through the same consequence of answers again. And his face brightened and we celebrated again. Maybe ten minutes passed and he looked at me with the same puzzled expression. And asked the same sequence of questions. Join us tomorrow on air and online. Foregoing a Traditional College education to take a chance on becoming the next great tech entrepreneur. I remember my freshman year sitting in my astronomy class with some other young aspiring tech entrepreneur was using that 90 minutes to further his career about. The house votes unanimously for back pay for furloughed federal workers. That does it for this edition. Thanks for watching. Pbs news hour weekend is made possible by lewis b. And louise coleman. Judy and josh westin, joyce v. Hale. The walick family. The cheryl and phillip mill steen family. Bernard and eileen schwartz. Corporate funding is provided by mutual of america. Thats why were your retirement company. Additional support is provided by rock music plays male narrator has a dog ever touched your heart, or changed your life . What if a dog could literally open new doors for you . Across america, people coping with profound challenges are getting a new lease on life. Assistance dogs. Loving canine companions are working small miracles every day. Not just because theyre trained, not just because theyre smart. man yes but because dogs see the world differently than any other animal, because dogs are born to care about us. woman this program is made possible by