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Report: Obama sets Afghan strategy

WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 (UPI) -- President Barack Obama has decided to send a large number of troops to Afghanistan and keep a large force there for the long term, CBS News reported Monday.

Citing informed sources, CBS said Obama intends to agree to most, if not all, of a request by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, for 40,000 new troops. A source described as a senior officer told the network Obama has decided to send four combat brigades and thousands of support troops.

The first new contingent of troops would arrive in Afghanistan early in 2010 and the deployment would not be completed until the end of 2010, CBS reported, saying Obama would not likely announce his decision before returning to the United States from China this month.

The report said all of Obama's military advisers have called for more troops in Afghanistan but have also cautioned the war cannot be won if Afghan President Hamid Karzai does not rid his government of corruption.

In an interview with ABC News Monday, Obama said he plans to meet again with top advisers to discuss strategy in Afghanistan.

"I've been asking not only General McChrystal, but all of our commanders who are familiar with the situation, as well as our civilian folks on the ground, a lot of questions that, until they're answered, may -- may create a situation in which we resource something based on faulty premises," he said.

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FBI tracked Hasan in December 2008

FORT HOOD, Texas, Nov. 9 (UPI) -- The FBI said Monday the man accused of the Fort Hood, Texas, massacre came to its attention in December 2008 but was not suspected of "terrorist activities."

In a statement, the FBI said it took notice of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan as part of an unrelated investigation being carried out by a Joint Terrorism Task Force -- an FBI-led team made up of FBI agents and investigators from other federal, state and local law enforement agencies.

"Investigators on the JTTF reviewed certain communications between Major Hasan and the subject of that investigation and assessed that the content of those communications was consistent with research being conducted by Major Hasan in his position as a psychiatrist at the Walter Reed Medical Center," the statement said. "Because the content of the communications was explainable by his research and nothing else derogatory was found, the JTTF concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning."

Intelligence agencies intercepted communications between Hasan and cleric Anwar al-Aulaqi, who was an imam at a mosque in suburban Virginia where Hasan worshiped but now lives in Yemen, officials said Monday. It was not clear what the exchanges were or whether they provided a clue about Hasan's views or emotional state, The New York Times reported.

Aulaqi reportedly crossed paths with al-Qaida figures, including two of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers, The Washington Post reported.

Since Aulaqi left Falls Church, Va., mosque in 2002 for Yemen, his lectures promoting strategies of an al-Qaida military leader were found in computer files of suspects in terrorism cases in the United States, Canada and Britain, officials said. It is not clear whether Hasan knew the imam well then, or only later through his Internet-based lectures.

The exchanges provide the first indication the Army psychiatrist communicated with the cleric, who Monday praised the major on his Web site, saying he "did the right thing," the Times reported.

"He is a man of conscience who could not bear living the contradiction of being a Muslim and serving in an army that is fighting against his own people," Aulaqi posted on his Web site.

U.S. officials said the communications did not change the most likely scenario that Hasan acted alone, the Times said.

In an interview with ABC News Monday, President Barack Obama declined to say directly whether he was concerned that the federal government may have had an internal communication failure. He said he would not comment further until the matter is investigated

"We are going to complete this investigation and we're going to take whatever steps are necessary to make sure that something like this doesn't happen again," he said.

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Obama: Healthcare bill not 'abortion bill'

WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama said Congress should change language in a healthcare reform bill passed by the House that restricts abortion coverage.

"I laid out a very simple principle, which is this is a healthcare bill, not an abortion bill," Obama told ABC News in an interview. "And we're not looking to change what is the principle that has been in place for a very long time, which is federal dollars are not used to subsidize abortions."

Obama acknowledged "there are strong feelings on both sides" about an amendment adopted by the House Saturday that abortion rights advocates say would jeopardize women's access to legal abortions. He said "there needs to be some more work before we get to the point where we're not changing the status quo."

The measure approved by the House would bar the use of federal funding for insurance that covers elective abortions. The provision would apply to insurance policies purchased with federal subsidies the health legislation would create to help low- and middle-income people, and to policies sold by a government-run insurance plan.

Conservative Democrats sought language on abortion funding in exchange for their support of the reform legislation. Both sides credited the provision's success to vigorous lobbying by Roman Catholic bishops, The New York Times reported Monday.

Anti-abortion groups, buoyed by the House vote say they will pressure the Senate to adopt similar language when it takes up healthcare reform.

"We think that providing healthcare is itself a pro-life thing, and we think that, by and large, providing better health coverage to women could reduce abortions," Richard M. Doerflinger, spokesman for the anti-abortion division of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, told the Times.

Abortion rights advocates said the provision threatened women's access to abortion because insurers could drop coverage for the procedure to sell policies in an expanded market of people receiving subsidies. The subsidized market would loom large because anyone earning less than $88,000 for a family of four would be eligible for a subsidy under the House bill, the Times said.

Women who received subsidies or public insurance could still pay out of pocket or buy insurance riders to cover abortion.

"This is going to make it that much more challenging on the Senate side," Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, said.

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Ida headed for overnight landfall

MIAMI, Nov. 9 (UPI) -- Tropical Storm Ida was closing in on the U.S. Gulf Coast Monday night and forecasters said the storm would probably make landfall during the night.

Hurricane warnings and watches along the coast were canceled Monday as Ida was downgraded from a hurricane to a tropical storm. A tropical storm warning was in effect from Grand Isle, La., to the Aucilla River in Florida, including New Orleans and Lake Pontchartrain, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency Sunday, saying Ida "threatens the safety and security of those citizens" along the state's southeastern coastline, CNN reported. Residents in Florida were asked to have disaster plans in place by Florida's Division of Emergency Management.

At 7 p.m. EST Monday, Ida's center was about 40 miles east-southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River and about 125 miles south of Mobile, Ala. Top sustained winds were 70 mph with higher gusts and the storm was likely to weaken Monday night.

Ida was on a northerly track, moving at about 17 mph, but was expected to lose forward speed overnight. On its forecast track, the storm should reach the northern Gulf Coast Monday night and then turn eastward Tuesday, NHC forecasters said.

Ida-generated rains could dump up 3-6 inches of precipitation through Wednesday from the central and eastern Gulf Coast into the eastern portions of the Tennessee Valley, southern Appalachians and other points in the southeastern United States, the hurricane center said.

The center also warned that a storm tide could raise water 3 to 5 feet above ground level near and to the east of where Ida's center will make landfall.

The U.S. Census Bureau said Monday 2.8 million people might feel the storm's effects. In a statement, the bureau noted 16 counties in four states were under a tropical storm warning posted by the National Hurricane Center.

The statement said the largest population centers likely to feel the effects of the storm are Gulfport-Biloxi, Miss.; Mobile, Ala.; New Orleans; and Pensacola, Fla.