Preview -- World News Tonight 08/17/01
Aug. 17 -- — Peter Jennings is on the road. Charles Gibson anchors the broadcast tonight and World News Tonight writer Alex Travelli has our preview.
Good afternoon.
Wildfires rage on in the West. Eight states burn today, as two battalions of the U.S. military are called into the fray. It will take them a week to become fully operational, and in the meantime the region expects hot, dry and windy weather — the very worst kind for a firefighter. The day saw evacuations of homeowners and the rescue of several endangered hikers. Bill Redeker reports from Washington state, scene of the worst of the blazes.
Another hurdle for President Bush's program of faith-based initiatives emerged today, as John DiIulio, the director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, quit the job. DiIulio accepted the position only six months ago. Among his reasons for leaving, he has cited frustrations with Washington politics — and a killer commute from his home in Philadelphia. It's a critical time for the administration's plan to find new and expanded roles for religious organizations in the public life of the country. An important bill for the initiative just passed the House and faces a more difficult time in the Senate. John Cochran is in Texas with the president.
Multimillionaire adventurer Steve Fossett made a spectacular and safe landing in southern Brazil today, but he made it about half a world too soon. Fossett was on his sixth major attempt to circle the globe by hot-air balloon — it was the fifth such flight that he flew solo. He left Australia 13 days ago, and flew almost 13,000 miles. He earned new world records with which to console himself: the farthest distance ever crossed and the longest time spent aloft on a solo balloon flight. It's a remarkable hobby he's chosen for himself. Bill Blakemore has his story.
Then to southern Florida, where police have uncovered an unnerving scam, executed on an unprecedented scale: children used by strangers to defraud the Medicaid system. The youngsters, perhaps thousands of them, were herded up in poor communities and brought to dentists' offices. There some of them underwent unnecessary treatments, for which the dentists and the round-up agents billed the government, through Medicaid. It was a dangerous abuse of the children, and of public funds. Jeffrey Kofman reports from Miami.
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