Here is a comparison of the three health care bills before Congress, including one by House Democrats and an alternative by House Republicans.

President Barack Obama made a last-minute personal appeal to Democrats to pass landmark health care legislation Saturday as the House voted to advance debate on a bill to expand coverage to millions of the uninsured.

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s landmark health care overhaul moved toward a vote in the House today after anti-abortion lawmakers won a chance to knock out language that would let federally subsidized health care plans cover abortions.

MIAMI — A tropical storm warning has been issued for Grand Cayman Island as Ida gains strength over Caribbean waters.

In Britain, there are no long lines of people seeking swine flu vaccine. Doctor’s offices aren’t swamped with desperate calls. And there are no cries of injustice that the vaccine is going to wealthy corporations or healthy people who don’t really need it.

Pfc. Marquest Smith, on his way to Afghanistan in January, was completing routine paperwork about a bee-sting allergy when the sounds erupted. A loud, popping noise. Moans. The sudden, urgent shout of “Gun!”

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is traveling to Capitol Hill on Saturday to try to close the sale on his signature health care overhaul, facing a make-or-break vote in the House certain to be seen as a test of his presidency.

As if going off to war, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan cleaned out his apartment, gave leftover frozen broccoli to one neighbor and called another to thank him for his friendship — common courtesies and routines of the departing soldier. Instead, authorities say, he went on the killing spree that left 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas, dead.

Just when it was beginning to look a little better, the economy relapsed Friday with a return to double-digit unemployment for only the second time since World War II and warnings that next year will be even worse than previously thought.

Amid intense lobbying by the Obama administration, House Democratic leaders struggled Friday for the final votes needed to pass sweeping health care legislation, offering fresh concessions to abortion opponents and working to ease concerns among Hispanic holdouts.