July 8, 1998 All Things Considered (entire program) Requires the RealAudio Player

An index of the day's stories:

NIH Priorities -- Each year, the National Institutes of Health spends about 14 billion dollars on research that is ultimately intended to find cures for diseases. The NIH has a process for prioritizing how it spends its money, but as NPR's Joe Palca reports, a new study from the Institute of Medicine says the agency doesn't do a very good job of explaining to the public what that process is, and how it works. (4:00)

IRS Overhaul -- NPR's Peter Kenyon reports from Capitol Hill on today's Senate debate on a bill to restructure the Internal Revenue Service. Senators claimed the bill would make federal tax collection more sensitive to taxpayers and less intrusive in the lives of Americans. The measure has passed the House. (3:30)

South African Army -- NPR's Charlayne Hunter-Gault looks at some of the problems facing the transformation of the South African military as it integrates former liberation army fighters. Military advisors are having a difficult time bringing former guerrilla fighters into the current conventional force and training them to use conventional tactics. Tensions between these former guerrillas and officers from the apartheid era are running high. Another concern lies in the makeup of the leadership of the South African Army: only 22 percent of the force's officers are black, while more than 70 percent of the enlisted men are black. This has led to the perception that all of the military decision makers are white. All of this difficulty is manifesting itself even as the army is undergoing severe cutbacks, in which the defense force is expected to be trimmed in half over the next three years. (8:00)

Israel and the West Bank -- NPR's Linda Gradstein reports from Jerusalem that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met again with his inner cabinet to discuss deadlocked negotiations concerning a further Israeli withdrawal from occupied West Bank territory. Once again, no decision was reached. This deadlock continues despite signs that patience on the issue is reaching an end, both in Israel and among Palestinians. Earlier this week, Israeli opposition politicians said the Prime Minister has been lying about the state of the negotiations, and even some powerful members in Netanyahu's inner cabinet said the time had come to quit stalling and to redeploy troops. (3:00)

More Israel News -- All Things Considered host Robert Siegel talks with Hirsh Goodman, the editorial director of the Jerusalem Post publications. They discuss the reaction in Israel to the United Nations General Assembly decision to give the Palestinians an upgraded status, and the Israeli inner cabinet's inability to decide on a timetable for a long-overdue withdrawal from the West Bank. (6:00)

Volkswagen Restitution -- NPR's Edward Lifson reports from Berlin that Volkswagen has decided to pay slave laborers who worked for the firm under the Nazis. Until now the automaker insisted that the German government compensate these slave laborers, since it was the Nazi regime that pressed them into service. The move by VW will force other German firms to consider such claims for back wages. (3:00)

Tunnel Reopened -- Carrie Kahn of member station KPBS in San Diego reports that illegal immigrants may be using a tunnel to make their way into the U.S. from Mexico. Authorities on both sides of the border believed the tunnel, which was excavated by drug traffickers, had been sealed. They are now investigating how the tunnel may have been opened, and who should make sure it's closed. (3:15)

Borrowed Fashion -- Commentator Guillermo Gomez-Pena says that young white people in the USA have discovered that the taste of Latinos and other minority groups is sexy. He says TV has become stranger than any performance art he could do. He says real psychopaths are providing more entertainment than artists. Artists have been forced to re-define their radical image against the rising tide of every day bizarre actions. (4:45)

Nigeria Unrest -- Linda talks with Hugh Delios, a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. They discuss the riots that erupted after the death of opposition Moshood Abiola yesterday. Deaths that occurred as a result of the violence prompted the military ruler, Abdulsalam Abubakar, to dissolve his cabinet. (4:00)

U.S. Policy -- NPR's Tom Gjelten reports on the continuing drama that surrounds the sudden death yesterday of Moshood Abiola, Nigeria's leading opposition politician and most prominent political prisoner. The U.S. State Department says it has seen no evidence contradicting the government's claim that Abiola died of a heart attack while meeting with visiting U.S. officials. But a team of independent medical examiners is on its way to Nigeria to conduct an autopsy on Abiola's body. Abiola's unexpected death has greatly complicated plans for a transition to civilian democratic rule in Nigeria. (4:00)

Nigerian Opposition -- NPR's Jennifer Ludden reports that the death of Moshood Abiola has left a void in Nigeria's very scattered political opposition, Abiola was the only politician in recent times to have support in every region of the country. Now that he is no longer a part of the political landscape, members of the opposition are scrambling to regroup and take political advantage of the situation. (4:00)

Sudan Famine -- Linda talks with Karen Easterday, a nurse with World Vision, a nonprofit organization that is providing emergency relief in southern Sudan. A famine in that region is becoming dramatically worse. Relief officials estimate that as much as 60 percent of the population is malnourished. Easterday has set up a feeding camp, which began its work this past June. (7:30)

Chicago Blood Shortage -- NPR's Cheryl Corley reports on the blood shortage in Chicago. The city's main blood bank says the situation remains critical. While hundreds of donors have answered the appeals and rolled up their sleeves to donate, blood is still in such short supply that officials are asking area hospitals to delay elective surgeries. (3:30)

African American Organ Donation -- NPR's Cheryl Devall reports on Charles Tuck, an African-American who has had multiple organ transplants, pancreas, kidney and two corneas to replace organs damaged by diabetes. The Department of Health and Human Services report that African-Americans wait longer for kidney transplants than whites and are also less likely to donate organs than whites. A number of churches and fraternal organizations are working to increase donor awareness in the African-American community and Charles Tuck has made the issue a personal crusade. (6:00)

World Cup Update -- Robert talks with Stephan Fatsis, who covers sports and sports business for the Wall Street Journal. They talk about today's World Cup semifinal match between the French and Croatian soccer teams, which France won by a score of 2 to 1. France will now meet the defending World Cup champion Brazil in the final match of the championship on Sunday. (3:15)

NBC 'Dateline' Lawsuit -- A jury in Bangor, Maine has ruled that NBC's "Dateline NBC" newsmagazine is guilty of defamation in a story about safety violations in the trucking industry. The jurors ordered the network to pay more than a half million dollars in damages to the plaintiffs -- the trucker who was featured in the story and the company that employed him. They claimed NBC misled them by promising a "positive" story and ended up defaming them instead. Andrea DeLeon reports. (3:00)

Tina Brown Quits 'The New Yorker' -- Tina Brown resigned today as editor of The New Yorker magazine. Under her tenure, the magazine underwent several controversial changes -- shorter articles, more photographs and a greater emphasis on popular culture. The magazine had been losing money for some time before Brown's arrival in 1992 and continued to do so under her tenure. NPR's Brooke Gladstone reports. (4:00)