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Reid looks to bring health bill to floor

WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 (UPI) -- U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was set Saturday to seek a key procedural vote bringing the healthcare reform bill to the Senate floor, observers said.

Political analysts say Reid needs at least 60 votes to open debate on the bill, the first step in what is expected to be a long and rocky road for approval of the Democratic Party-backed reforms to the nation's healthcare infrastructure, CNN reported.

The majority leader has said he hopes for a final vote on the bill by the end of the year, well past President Barack Obama's original deadline of August, the U.S. broadcaster said.

While the House version of the healthcare reform bill passed by a 220-215 vote margin -- with 39 Democrats opposing it -- it will be easier for Republican critics to stifle the will of Democratic majority in the Senate, analysts said.

Should the reform bill pass the Senate and go to a House-Senate conference committee, a broad range of agreements have already been reached, such as subsidizing insurance for a family of four making up to roughly $88,000 annually, or 400 percent of the federal poverty level, CNN said.

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FBI monitored alleged shooter's e-mail

WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 (UPI) -- The suspect in the Fort Hood, Texas, shootings allegedly traded coded e-mails regarding money transfers with a radical Muslim cleric, authorities said.

The alleged e-mails between Army Maj. Nidal Hasan and Anwar al-Awlaki intensified in the months before the Nov. 5 attack that killed 13 people, two sources close to the investigation told The Washington Post in a story published Saturday.

The two men discussed in "cryptic and coded exchanges" how to transfer money overseas in ways that would not attract law enforcement attention, an unidentified source told The Post, adding Hasan "clearly became more radicalized toward the end."

The FBI monitored the e-mails but did not forward them to the military, government and congressional sources told The Post. Al-Awlaki, a Yemeni cleric who once lived in the United States, is considered by U.S. officials to be an al-Qaida supporter.

The commander of the U.S. Army in Europe is to investigate Hasan's years at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the Pentagon said Friday. Gen. Carter Ham will investigate reports Hasan's colleagues at Walter Reed were concerned about his performance and apparent embrace of radical Islam.

Hasan is recovering from gunshot wounds that have left him paralyzed.

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China mine blast death kills 42

HARBIN, China, Nov. 21 (UPI) -- A gas explosion at a mine in northeast China's Heilongjiang province killed at least 42 workers and left 66 missing Saturday, officials said.

Vice Premier Zhang Dejiang rushed to the scene as 156 rescue workers gathered at the Xinxing Coal Mine in Hegang City, about 250 miles east of the provincial capital of Harbin, where they worked working on repairing the mine's damaged ventilation system, the state-run Chinese news service Xinhua reported.

Hegang Mining Bureau Hospital deputy director Pan Xiaowen told Xinhua the hospital had received 29 injured miners from the accident. The injured are reportedly suffering from burns, fractures and carbon monoxide poisoning.

The destroyed ventilation system, as well as a damaged communication infrastructure, were hampering efforts to reach the miners, who are trapped 1,650 feet underground, China News Agency reported.

Xinhua said the mining company confirmed that 528 workers were in the mine when the explosion occurred at 2:30 a.m., with 415 escaping the accident.

Officials said Heilongjiang Longmei Mining Holding Group is the owner of the Xinxing Coal Mine.

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Hadron collider sends proton beam

GENEVA, Switzerland, Nov. 21 (UPI) -- A proton beam has been sent through the Large Hadron Collider, a key step in restarting the world's largest atom smasher, physicists in Switzerland said.

The physicists Friday succeeded in sending the beam clockwise around the 17-mile underground tunnel near Geneva, the European Organization for Nuclear Research said.

The effort marked a critical step in restarting the $9 billion collider, which was shut down after it's inaugural start up in September 2008 because of problems with electromagnets.

The past year's work has been a "Herculean effort," Steve Myers, the collider's director for accelerators, said in a release.

Physicists aim to use the collider to investigate what the universe was like when it was less than a trillionth of a second old. To do that, protons of seven trillion volts each are to be smashed together to create tiny fireballs that replicate the conditions of the beginning of the universe, the physicists said.