WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Six hip-hop artists from five countries speaking four languages are on stage, warming up for their show at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. International hip-hop artists warm up for their show at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Tuesday. "Warming up" doesn't really capture it; the dancers explode across the stage, each one with a different hip-hop style. Michelle Salazar is chic-grungy in black jeans and white T-shirt, her long black hair swirling around her head. Hassan El Haf, from Lebanon, tall and thin, does a kind of electric hip-hop mixed with salsa. Argentines Mauricio Trech and Silvia Fernandez move in a dramatic break dance. Both hail from Argentina, home of the tango. Hien Ngoc Pham from Vietnam, with a buzz cut and dressed in white jeans and a white T-shirt, has Broadway bravado in his every move. The dancing stops and Samer Samahneh begins rapping -- in Arabic. No translation needed; it comes from his soul. Three weeks ago, the dancers had never met, but now they're a team, participating in the State Department's Cultural Visitors Program. The program consists of three weeks of meeting American hip-hop artists and dancers and visiting New York City, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. "It's like a dream come true for me," Salazar said Tuesday, the day of the team's show, "because I only read their names in the Internet and now, like, I met Afrika Bambaataa, the founder of hip-hop. I was right next to him. It's a real immersion into the culture. I don't want to wake up!" Salazar isn't just star-struck. She's learning a lot and she plans to bring it back to her fellow dancers in the Philippines. "Dancers in the Philippines don't have much of a foundation [in hip-hop]," she says. "They don't understand why dancers do this" -- she moves her arm -- "or why they do this" -- she strikes a pose. "Because if they knew why they would feel it. I can feel it by watching these [American] hip-hop dancers." Samahneh agrees: "You've got to feel it." His rapping, he says, comes from inside-out. "Even if you don't know the language, you can get involved with what I'm saying." Samahneh says that when he raps in his hometown of Nablus in the West Bank, he is "asking God to bring peace to our land." Colombia Barrosse, the vibrant head of the State Department's Cultural Programs Division of the Bureau of Cultural Affairs, says the cultural cross-fertilization is the goal of the program. "There is nothing that can substitute for being in the United States and meeting Americans in their place, to look at the richness and diversity of the United States. That's irreplaceable," she says. The Cultural Visitors Program is part of the State Department's cultural programming around the world. The $8.5 million budget is supplemented by institutions like the Kennedy Center, which is co-sponsoring this performance. Most of the visiting artists in the program found their way to professional dance through hip-hop. Pham, a member of the Vietnam Dance Association, is currently working to open a hip-hop training center in Ho Chi Minh City to reach out to young people. With a broad smile, he says, "Hip-hop is such energy. It's so young. It's also an opportunity for our countries to get closer, and I have a lot of friends all over the world." Hip-hop may have started in the United States, but it belongs to everyone. Here's how Hassan El Haf puts it: When he got to New York, he felt as if he had landed on his "real planet." "Yeah, I see them, all the

How long is the State Department Cultural Visitors Program?

How long is the team's visit to New York?

What is part of State Department's Cultural Visitors Program?

Where will hip-hop artists from five countries visit?

Answer: three weeks

Answer: New York City, Philadelphia

Answer: International hip-hop artists

Answer: three weeks

Answer: meeting American hip-hop artists and dancers

Answer: Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Answer: the State Department's cultural programming around the world.

Summary:
Hip-hop artists from five countries visit the U.S. to meet U.S. artists, perform .
Visit is part of State Department's Cultural Visitors Program .
Team visits New York City, Washington, Philadelphia over three weeks .
"It's a real immersion into the culture," Philippine performer says .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Slave labor in developing countries such as Brazil, China and India is fueling part of their huge economic growth, according to a State Department report released Wednesday. Amnesty International activists protest human trafficking during an event in Greece in March. The department's annual "Trafficking in Persons Report" found increased allegations of forced labor made in connection with a variety of agricultural products and manufactured goods in developing countries. In Brazil, the report found a "trafficking phenomenon." It said thousands of trafficked and forced laborers had been found on plantations growing sugar cane for Brazil's booming production and export of the biofuel ethanol. The report cites shrimp processed in Thailand and Bangladesh; clothing from Bangladesh, India, Jordan and Malaysia; and bricks made in India, China and Pakistan as being among the products of booming industries in which workers are subjected to forced labor, debt bondage and hazardous working conditions. Laws are not adequate to punish those responsible, it adds. China was found to have a "significant" problem with forced labor, including forced child labor. Children as young as 12 are reportedly subject to forced labor under the guise of "work and study programs" and subject to excessively long hours, dangerous conditions, low pay and physical abuse. The report found China's growing brick industry is fraught with cover-ups of the problem. For the fourth year in a row, China was put on a "watch list" of countries that could face sanctions if they don't improve their efforts to combat trafficking. India was also placed on the watch list for not doing enough to solve its trafficking problem, according to the report. While commercial sexual exploitation remained a problem in India, the State Department found internal forced labor "may constitute India's largest trafficking problem." It said men, women and children are forced to work in brick kilns, rice mills, agricultural businesses and embroidery factories. Once again, the report found U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf to have dismal records on trafficking. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait and Oman were listed as destination countries with widespread trafficking abuses. The report cites forced laborers trafficked from Asia and Africa who are subject to restrictions on movement, withholding of passports, threats, and physical and sexual abuse. The report found those countries made weak efforts to rescue the workers and prosecute the traffickers. The other countries on the blacklist are Algeria, Myanmar, Cuba, Fiji, Iran, Moldova, North Korea, Papua New Guinea, Sudan and Syria.

What was the State Department investigating?

What is the subject of the State Department documents?

What types of human rights violations are reported in the documents?

What is significant about the Persian Gulf in this story?

According to the report, where is slavery rampant?

Answer: "Trafficking in Persons

Answer: "Trafficking in Persons Report"

Answer: trafficked and forced laborers

Answer: dismal records on trafficking.

Answer: U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf

Answer: in developing countries such as Brazil, China and India

Answer: Brazil, China

Answer: Brazil, China and India

Summary:
State Department report documents human trafficking .
Slavery rampant in industries in Brazil, China, India, report says .
U.S. allies in Persian Gulf have dismal record, according to report .
Withholding of passports, threats, physical and sexual abuse reported .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sniper Lee Boyd Malvo said in a letter to CNN that he is still "grappling with shame, guilt, remorse and my own healing if that will ever be possible." And a social worker who has worked extensively with him said he draws self-portraits that often show him with a tear running down his cheek.

A self-portrait drawn by sniper Lee Boyd Malvo. Many of his drawings show him with a tear running down his cheek.

Malvo, 22, spends 23 hours a day inside his cell at Virginia's toughest prison, a maximum-security compound called Red Onion, not far from the Kentucky border. He's serving a life sentence.

According to social worker Carmeta Albarus-Lindo, Malvo is a changed person since he and John Allen Muhammad terrorized the Washington area five years ago this month in attacks that left 10 dead over a 23-day period.

"The most I can do is to continue to be there, because that is his greatest fear -- that, you know, another parental figure would abandon him because that was what he'd been exposed to all his life," said Albarus-Lindo, who has spent hundreds of hours with Malvo since his arrest and conviction.  Read the letter »

She said one of those "parental" figures was Muhammad, who met Malvo in the Caribbean nearly two years before the deadly shooting spree began in 2002.

Muhammad became the teenager's surrogate father, convincing him that violence was the only way to correct perceived injustices to African-Americans, Albarus-Lindo said.

He ordered Malvo to go to bed each night and to memorize passages from "The Art of War," an ancient Chinese text on battlefield strategy.

According to Albarus-Lindo, Malvo was "brainwashed" into aiding Muhammad in the murders.

However, prosecutors have said Malvo, even at 17, knew what he was doing.

"I thought he was coldblooded," said Paul Ebert, commonwealth attorney for Prince William County, Virginia, of the first time he met Malvo. "He was a person who had chosen a life of crime."

And when a Virginia jury spared Malvo's life, some investigators said they were horrified.

"That was the hardest day of my career," said April Carroll of the Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms and Tobacco. "I felt that day we had failed when Malvo was not sentenced to death."

Some of the victims' families said they are content that Malvo did not receive the death penalty. Vicki Buchanan Snyder, whose brother James "Sonny" Buchanan was shot in the back while mowing a patch of lawn at a Maryland auto dealership, said she was "satisfied" with the jury's verdict.

As for Malvo, Albarus-Lindo said he will "never forgive himself for what has happened." When she first began seeing him, he still called Muhammad "Dad." It took months, she said, before he stopped. In the interim, Albarus-Lindo said, he took college correspondence courses and began to draw.

Muhammad is at a Virginia prison called Sussex One. In a DVD made last year inside prison and obtained exclusively by CNN, he said he is "still fighting" on death row. He wants to "correct," he said, some "inaccurate statements" made by the news media about his relationship with Malvo. He wasn't specific about what he meant.  Watch Muhammad on death row »

Muhammad's ex-wife, Mildred, said she believed that she was the real target of the snipers from the beginning. She and her children live in suburban Washington, and she runs a Web site called Afterthetrauma.org, devoted to the victims of domestic abuse.

Mildred Muhammad said she feels her ex-husband wanted to kill her as revenge because she was able to gain custody of their three children. As for his relationship with Malvo, she said she too is convinced that John Allen Muhammad brainwashed the younger man.

"That boy was a victim before he even knew it," she

What is the name of the person who wrote a letter to CNN?

In what city were ten people killed in a 2002 sniper attack?

What did the social worker say about the sniper?

What number of people died in the sniper attacks?

What did the sniper write in his letter to CNN?

When were the Washing area sniper attacks

What year was the Washington-area sniper attacks?

Answer: CNN

Answer: Sniper Lee Boyd Malvo

Answer: Washington area

Answer: he draws self-portraits that often show him with a tear running down his cheek.

Answer: Lee Boyd Malvo

Answer: 10 dead

Answer: "grappling with shame,

Answer: "grappling with shame,

Answer: 10 dead

Answer: 2002.

Answer: terrorized the Washington area five years ago this month in attacks that left 10 dead over a 23-day period.

Answer: Carmeta Albarus-Lindo,

Answer: social worker Carmeta Albarus-Lindo,

Answer: 2002.

Summary:
Social worker says sniper Lee Boyd Malvo is a changed person.
Ten people were killed in Washington-area sniper attacks in 2002 .
In a letter to CNN, Malvo writes he's still "grappling with shame, guilt, remorse"


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Some "Occupy" demonstrators who've clashed with police in New York City have migrated south as the new year begins, joining their colleagues in the nation's capital where authorities continue to allow protest camps at two locations.

"We're here because we got pushed out of New York, but we're also here because this is the heart of where all politics happen," said a protester who would not give his name. "Police know me," he explained, as he tried to repair a tarp torn free by high winds early Monday.

He said he has been joined by a handful of other Occupy Wall Street demonstrators pushed out by New York police.

On New Year's Eve, New York City police arrested 68 Occupy Wall Street demonstrators at their longtime camp in Zuccotti Park.

The young man, who said he left the Wall Street location weeks ago after authorities began to pressure protesters to leave, reflected on a strategy for the new year as he spoke Monday at the larger of two encampments in Washington -- at a small downtown park known as McPherson Square, near the White House .

"I think (the movement's) most important stage right now is to inform the American people, before we can give any kind of particular answer or one message," he said.

"This is still, relatively, in my opinion, a young movement, and I don't think it's so much that it's anybody having the same answers but everybody asking the same questions right now," he told CNN, speaking on camera with most of his face concealed by a heavy winter scarf.

Among the questions being asked include those from a ranking U.S. congressman, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-California, demanding to know why protesters have been allowed to make camp in the first place. Issa, in a letter two weeks ago to the U.S. Department of Interior, said he believes the camping is illegal.

But the National Park Service, which is in charge of McPherson Square, has applied the most liberal interpretation of rules against overnight camping, and officials instead consider the makeshift tent city a "24-hour vigil.

A handwritten bulletin board maintained by the protesters Monday noted it is "Day 93" of the demonstration there.

At a second location in Washington, known as Freedom Plaza, the National Park Service in recent days extended a required permit through the end of February, acting just before it was to expire on New Year's Day.

The extension may further provoke Issa, who chairs a House panel on government reform. His December 13 letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar expressed concern that the tent city in McPherson Square has ruined some of a $400,000 restoration project at the park, paid for with economic stimulus money.

Issa said the National Park Service has allowed "the Occupy DC movement to ecologically damage the park significantly over the past two months, by camping and killing the newly planted grass" at the location.

Protest organizers and supporters have distributed straw around the tents to deal with mud that followed heavy rains last month. Other areas where grass remains now show signs of damage from the tents and tarps blocking sunlight.

National Park Service spokeswoman Carol Johnson told CNN the protesters in McPherson Square do not require a permit because their group contains fewer than 500 people and is considered a 24-hour vigil. Police in the area have said their enforcement so far has been to keep city streets clear of protesters, and to respond to petty crime that may take place around the camps.

CNN's Greg Seaby contributed to this report.

Where have authorities expanded permits?

Answer: Some "Occupy" demonstrators

Answer: south

Answer: south

Answer: U.S. congressman, Rep. Darrell Issa,

Answer: Some "Occupy" demonstrators who've clashed with police in New York City

Answer: McPherson Square

Answer: "Occupy"

Summary:
Occupy Wall Street demonstrators migrate south .
Authorities extend permit in Washington, D.C.
Congressman questions continued forbearance .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Some Democrats appear to be wavering on a highly contentious House resolution labeling Turkey's treatment of Armenians in World War I as genocide.

A KC-135 tanker lands at Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey in 2003.

Turkey, a longtime U.S. ally and NATO partner, was incensed by the resolution calling the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks genocide and threatened to block access to Incirlik Air Base after the resolution passed a House committee vote.

The base, in southern Turkey near Syria, is a major resupply center for U.S. operations in Iraq and elsewhere in the Mideast and Asia.

The Pentagon is preparing to set up new supply routes for troops in Iraq if Turkey cuts off U.S. access to the strategically important Incirlik, military officials said Tuesday.

Ankara acknowledges the killings of Armenians during World War I but vehemently objects to the "genocide" label.

The House Foreign Affairs Committee last week adopted the nonbinding resolution. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would bring the measure to a vote of the full House sometime next month. But the Bush administration urged Congress to drop the issue, and some leading Democrats urged Pelosi not to bring it to the floor.

Majority Leader Steny Hoyer signaled Tuesday that the vote might be put off.

"I said I thought we would bring this up prior to us leaving here," said Hoyer of Maryland. "I have not changed on that, although I would be less than candid to say that there are a number of people who are revisiting their own positions. We will have to determine where everybody is."

Democratic Rep. Ike Skelton, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, announced his opposition to the resolution last week.

And Democratic Reps. Alcee Hastings of Florida and John Tanner of Tennessee, both members of the U.S. House delegation to NATO, urged Pelosi to reconsider in a letter released Tuesday.

"More than half of the cargo flown into Iraq and Afghanistan comes through Incirlik Air Base, and this base would be a key component of any plans for redeployment of our troops in the future," they wrote.

Lt. Gen. Carter Ham, the director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Pentagon planners are looking at "a broad range of options" to keep food, fuel and ammunition flowing to U.S. troops in Iraq if Turkey blocks Incirlik.

"We're confident that we'll find ways to do that," Ham told reporters at the Pentagon. "There's likely to be some increased cost and some other implications for that, and obviously we'd prefer to maintain the access that we have."

Defense Secretary Robert Gates echoed lawmakers' concerns last week.

"About 70 percent of all air cargo going into Iraq goes through Turkey. ... About a third of the fuel that they consume goes through Turkey or comes from Turkey," Gates said.

He also said that 95 percent of the Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protective vehicles, or MRAPs, being deployed in Iraq are flown through Turkey. The vehicles are built to withstand roadside bombs.  See Incirlik's key location »

The U.S. military issued a "warning order" a few days ago to ensure that alternative air crews, planes, fuel and routes are lined up if Turkey stops or restricts U.S. access to Incirlik, a source said.

Jordan and Kuwait are among the alternatives the United States is considering.

Some fear pursuit of the resolution would also embolden the Turks to attack Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq which could further complicate Iraqi stability, U.S. officials said.

Incirlik offers 10,000- and 9,000-foot runways and 57 hardened aircraft shelters, according Globalsecurity.org, a source of background information about military issues.

Globalsecurity said Incirlik has become a hub for cargo shipments to Iraq, taking over for Rhein-Main Air Base in Germany because it is closer to Iraq, reducing the strain on troops and aircraft. E-mail to a friend

CNN's Barbara Starr and Deirdre Walsh contributed to this report.

What Congress resolution is Turkey upset about?

what does the house resolution call killing of armenians?

What is the house resolution caling the killing of Armenians?

What Air Base is the U.S. military using during the Iraq mission?

What have they called the killing of armenians

Who did the Majority Leader say is revisiting their own positions

What does the House refer to the killing of Armenians as?

Who made a resolution which upset Turkey?

What event was Congress making a resolution about?

What did the Majority Leader say about the Dems?

What happened to Turkey during World War I?

What air base is a key point for U.S. military supply of Iraq mission?

What does House resolution call killing of Armenians?

What air base is key for US military supply?

Which country is upset about World War 1 "genocide" resolution?

what does the house resolution call genocide?

Who is upset about World War I "genocide" resolution in Congress?

What air base is a key point of US military supply?

Are Dems "revisiting their own positions?"

Which air base is Key for U.S. military's supply of Iraq mission?

What did the House resolution call the killing of Armenians?

Where is the key supply for the military?

Answer: that the vote might be put off.

Answer: the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks

Answer: treatment of Armenians in World War

Answer: Incirlik Air

Answer: genocide

Answer: genocide.

Answer: Incirlik

Answer: genocide.

Answer: a number of people

Answer: genocide.

Answer: southern Turkey

Answer: genocide.

Answer: 10,000- and 9,000-foot runways and 57 hardened aircraft shelters,

Answer: House

Answer: the resolution calling the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks genocide

Answer: killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks

Answer: was incensed by the resolution calling the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks genocide

Answer: there are a number of people who are revisiting their own positions. We will have to determine where everybody is."

Answer: killings of Armenians

Answer: Incirlik

Answer: Democrats appear to be wavering on a highly contentious House resolution

Answer: genocide.

Answer: Armenians

Answer: Incirlik

Answer: treatment of Armenians in World War

Answer: Turkey's

Answer: killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks

Answer: Democratic Rep. Ike Skelton, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee,

Answer: is a major resupply center for U.S. operations in Iraq and elsewhere in the Mideast and Asia.

Answer: The Pentagon

Answer: Incirlik

Answer: there are a number of people who are revisiting

Answer: Incirlik

Answer: genocide.

Answer: killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks genocide

Answer: Turkey,

Answer: Incirlik Air Base

Answer: a number of people

Answer: that there are a number of people who are revisiting their own positions. We will have to determine where everybody is."

Summary:
NEW: Majority Leader says a number of Dems are "revisiting their own positions"
Turkey is upset about World War I "genocide" resolution in Congress .
House resolution calls killing of Armenians "genocide"
Incirlik Air Base is key point for U.S. military supply of Iraq mission .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Some experts are skeptical that anything could have stopped Robert Hawkins from going on a murderous rampage at an Omaha, Nebraska, shopping mall on Wednesday. A police car sits outside the Westroads Mall in Omaha, Nebraska, on Thursday. "This is not something that anybody can reasonably anticipate," said Don Greene, a former FBI agent who has written a book on mall security. "If the people closest to him didn't see any indicators or signs that he was going to go off so drastically ... how is some public safety officer supposed to recognize this person?" Greene asked. In fact, security at Omaha's Westroads Mall did find Hawkins' behavior suspicious before the shooting, Omaha Police Chief Thomas Warren said Thursday. Mall surveillance initially flagged Hawkins "based on his actions" when he entered the mall through the Von Maur store's main entrance on the second floor, Warren said. He said Hawkins exited quickly after entering, then re-entered within six minutes and appeared to be concealing something in a balled-up sweatshirt. He then went up the elevator to the third floor, and when he got there, he immediately began firing, Warren said.  "It doesn't appear as though there was an opportunity for intervention," he said. Shopping malls around the country were expected to review their emergency plans and consider additional security measures in light of Wednesday's shooting, which killed eight.  Watch what experts say about keeping malls safe » "There is always a fear of copycats when something like this happens," said Malachy Kavanaugh, spokesman for the International Council of Shopping Centers. He said malls would be considering whether to close some entrances, bring in additional officers, and make security more visible. There are 1,200 enclosed malls in the United States and about 50,000 shopping centers. Although some include police substations, most are patrolled by unarmed private mall and store security guards. Should these private security guards be armed? "Absolutely not," said Greene. Greene said if a security officer were to pull a gun on an armed individual in a mall, it could result in "the gunfight at the 'OK corral,' and then we might have 23 people killed instead of eight." "These random events are very challenging to prevent and difficult to deal with when they occur. Law enforcement and security prevention measures, no matter how good, cannot forestall a tragedy such as this from happening," said a statement issued Wednesday night by the Simon Property Group, which operates regional and outlet malls across the United States. "We do not disclose or discuss our enhanced security measures and/or procedures that we have in place or may institute at any given time, some of which are visible to the public, with others intentionally less noticeable," the statement said. "Disclosure of such information could potentially compromise our efforts to provide a safe and secure environment." Security expert Lou Palumbo told CNN one useful strategy was having trained law enforcement personnel watching people as they enter the mall. "You start to observe the people coming into the mall area," he said. "To let them in your door and then try to figure out what they're doing, you know, it's not as effective as catching them as they're coming in the door." The International Council of Shopping Centers has conducted focus groups with shoppers to test how they would react to even tighter "airport style" security measures, including bag checks and magnetometers. According to Kavanaugh, the results have shown that shoppers would accept the measures only if the national threat advisory system was raised to its highest level, red. Such extreme measures are "in the mall industry playbook ... but it is something no one wants to do," said Kavanaugh. While some mall owners have increased training of security personnel and have upgraded their emergency systems, many security experts believe more should and can be done. Those experts suggest it's a matter of money. They say until shoppers start staying away, mall owners will not make significant changes

What do security experts say abut such incidents?

What are malls expected to do in wake of Wednesday shooting?

What did a gunman and Omaha Nebraska mall do?

Answer: eight.

Answer: their emergency plans

Answer: eight.

Answer: Wednesday.

Answer: eight."

Answer: it's a matter of money.

Answer: murderous rampage

Answer: Westroads Mall in Omaha, Nebraska,

Answer: review their emergency plans and consider additional security measures

Answer: murderous rampage

Summary:
Malls expected to assess security arrangements in wake of Wednesday shooting .
Gunman at Omaha, Nebraska, mall killed 8 people and himself .
Some security experts say such incidents are impossible to anticipate .
Study by Police Foundation says training drills for mall guards are inadequate .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Some of the security officials at this weekend's Super Bowl will be scrutinizing the body language and demeanor of fans as part of the effort to spot suspicious and possibly dangerous people in the crowd.

Fans take in the sights Thursday at the NFL Experience at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida.

The Transportation Security Administration says it will have several teams of behavior-detection officers working with local police in Tampa, Florida, as an added security measure for the high-profile game.

TSA spokesman Christopher White said that the officers are being sent at the request of the local police and the FBI, and that it's the first time such officers are assisting with a major sports event.

"Unlike technology, the human detection officers can be anywhere," White said. "They can be completely unobtrusive."

The TSA officers will be wearing their uniforms and working in teams with police along the stadium's security perimeter but won't work inside the stadium as fans watch the game. They'll also be around key hotels associated with the Super Bowl, the airport and other transportation centers in Tampa.  Watch what goes on at Super Bowl media day »

According to White, if a TSA officer observes someone displaying unusual behavior, a local police officer will follow up by questioning the person.

This month, the TSA also held a four-hour training session on behavior detection for about 100 Tampa-area police. The TSA officers themselves undergo an initial seven days of training before being paired with experienced officers and having follow-up training.

Barry Steinhardt of the American Civil Liberties Union said such behavior screening is a bad idea.

"There is no scientific evidence behavior profiling works to pick out terrorists or criminals," Steinhardt said.

The TSA uses behavior screening daily at airports. White said officers also have helped out at such high-profile events as last week's presidential inauguration and the Republican and Democratic national conventions.

What did the ACLU say about the screening?

Which police force will work with the TSA?

Answer: security officials

Answer: behavior screening is a bad idea.

Answer: behavior screening

Answer: is a bad idea.

Answer: Tampa-area

Summary:
TSA will scan body language and demeanor of fans attending big game .
TSA says behavior-detection officers will work in tandem with Tampa police .
ACLU says there's no hard proof that such screening works .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Some private security guards hired to protect the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan say their contractor has allowed widespread mistreatment, sexual activity and intimidation within their ranks, according to the watchdog group Project On Government Oversight (POGO).

A spokeswoman for watchdog group POGO said hazing at a camp for security guards went "well beyond partying."

The group sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday, and briefed reporters on its findings, which it said are based on e-mails and interviews with more than a dozen guards who have worked at the U.S. compound in Kabul.

The company -- ArmorGroup, North America -- has a security contract with the State Department to provide services through July 2010, and has been cited several times for shortcomings in the security required by the contract.

A U.S. Senate panel two months ago was critical of the State Department for not closely supervising ArmorGroup, after a series of warning letters from the State Department in the year leading up to the panel's inquiry.

When CNN contacted Wackenhut, the corporate parent of ArmorGroup, a spokesperson there said the company would have a response Wednesday.

The U.S. Embassy said Wednesday it was taking the allegations very seriously.

"Nothing is more important to us than the safety and security of all Embassy personnel -- Americans and Afghan -- and respect for the cultural and religious values of all Afghans," it said in a statement.

"We have taken immediate steps to review all local guard force policies and procedures and have taken all possible measures to ensure our security is sound." Should initiation rituals such as hazing be allowed? Sound off below

POGO says two weeks ago it began receiving whistleblower-style e-mails, some with graphic images and videos, that are said to document problems taking place at a non-military camp for the guards near the U.S. diplomatic compound in Kabul.

"This is well beyond partying," said Danielle Brian, POGO's executive director, after showing a video of a man with a bare backside, and another man apparently drinking a liquid that had been poured down the man's lower back.

She told CNN that ranking supervisors were "facilitating this kind of deviant hazing and humiliation, and requiring people to do things that made them feel really disgusted." Watch claims that alleged hazing at the U.S. Embassy pose a threat to security »

"This is not Abu Ghraib," she said, referring to images and videos of abuse by U.S. military troops against prisoners held at a facility in Iraq. "We're not talking about torture," she continued, "we are talking about humiliation," by supervisors causing a breakdown of morale, and a "total breakdown in the chain-of-command."

In the letter POGO sent to Clinton, Brian wrote that the problems are "posing a significant threat to the security of the Embassy and its personnel."

Among the recommendations from the group: immediate military supervision of the private security guards, a review of whether the contract should be revoked, and consideration as to whether government forces should replace private security in a combat zone.

What did providing security guards allow

Answer: July 2010,

Answer: a man with a bare backside, and another man apparently drinking a liquid that had been poured down the man's lower back.

Answer: widespread mistreatment,

Answer: a man with a bare backside, and another man apparently drinking a liquid that had been poured down the man's lower back.

Answer: widespread mistreatment, sexual activity and intimidation within their ranks,

Answer: through July 2010,

Summary:
Watchdog: Contractor providing security guards allowed "deviant hazing, humiliation"
Video showed naked man, another man apparently drinking liquid poured down back .
Watchdog warns Sec. of State Clinton of security threat posed by behavior .
ArmorGroup, North America has contract until July 2010 .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sonia Sotomayor strongly asserted her adherence to the law while dodging questions about her personal beliefs on the third day of her Supreme Court confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Sonia Sotomayor answers questions from senators on Wednesday, the third day of her confirmation hearings. Asked repeatedly Wednesday by Republicans about her controversial statement that a "wise Latina" could reach a better decision than a white man, Sotomayor called it a poorly expressed but valid point about the value of differing perspectives in applying the law. Senators from both parties pressed her on her personal views on issues such as abortion, gun control and executive powers. But Sotomayor consistently answered she needed to know the specifics of a particular case, such as applicable state statutes and other facts. Sensing frustration over her responses, the federal appellate judge offered an explanation about how judges approach the law. "What we do is different than the conversations citizens have about what they want the law to do," Sotomayor said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, who sought her views on the legality of some kinds of abortions and whether there was a fundamental right to possess firearms and self-defense. Judges look at the facts of a case and apply the law based on those facts, she said. "It's not that we make a broad policy choice and say this is what we want," Sotomayor continued.  Watch Face Off: Should Sotomayor be confirmed? » Her performance rankled Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, the former Republican committee chairman who changed parties last April. Specter repeatedly cut off Sotomayor's responses Wednesday, saying she was not answering his questions. Later, in praising Sotomayor's record as a judge, Specter said: "I'm not commenting about your answers, but your record is exemplary." "You'll be judged on your record more than your answers," he said. If approved by the committee and confirmed by the full Senate, the 55-year-old Sotomayor would be the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, the third female justice and the 111th person to sit on the nation's highest court.  Watch Sotomayor being questioned » Her dispassionate answers on a range of issues displayed a command of legal concepts that impressed even her harshest interrogators. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, appeared to rule out a filibuster attempt against the nomination by his minority party, telling Sotomayor that "you will get that up-or-down vote on the Senate floor."  Watch Cornyn quiz Sotomayor on abortion » Democrats predicted she would be confirmed with support from members of both parties. Cornyn and other Republicans raised the "wise Latina" statement for a second straight day, asking whether it meant she had a gender, ethnic or racial bias. Sotomayor said the remark she made in several speeches was never intended to mean that one gender, ethnic or racial group was better than another. "It is clear from the attention that my words have gotten and the manner in which it has been understood by some people that my words failed," Sotomayor said. "They didn't work." iReport.com: Share your thoughts on the Sotomayor hearings However, she defended the point she was trying to make, and said other Supreme Court justices including Sandra Day O'Connor and Samuel Alito had expressed similar thoughts. "The message that the entire speech attempted to deliver, however, remains the message that I think Justice O'Connor meant, the message that higher nominees, including Justice Alito, meant when he said that he considers his Italian ancestry when deciding discrimination cases," said Sotomayor.  See how Sotomayor compares with justices on the court » O'Connor, the first woman Supreme Court justice, had said she believed a wise female judge and a wise male judge could reach the same conclusion. "I don't think Justice O'Connor meant that personal experiences compel results in any way," Sotomayor said. "I think life experiences generally, whether it's that I'm a Latina or was a state prosecutor or have been a commercial litigator or been a trial judge and an appellate judge

Who dodges questions about personal views?

Whose answers were muddled and confusing?

When was Sottomayor questioned by Senators?

Answer: Sonia Sotomayor

Answer: Sonia Sotomayor

Answer: Sonia Sotomayor

Answer: Sonia Sotomayor

Answer: Wednesday,

Answer: Sonia Sotomayor

Summary:
NEW: Sotomayor asserts adherence to law, dodges questions about personal views .
GOP senator calls Sonia Sotomayor's answers "muddled, confusing"
Supreme Court nominee says "wise Latina" remark didn't mean one group is better .
Sotomayor questioned by senators on third day of confirmation hearings .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Southwest Airlines will pay $7.5 million to settle complaints that it flew unsafe aircraft, and the fine will double unless the airline completes additional safety measures within a year, federal regulators announced Monday.

The FAA found Southwest operated jets on nearly 60,000 flights without performing certain mandatory inspections.

The Federal Aviation Administration originally recommended more than $10 million in civil penalties in 2008 after finding Southwest operated 46 of its Boeing 737 jets on nearly 60,000 flights without performing mandatory inspections for fatigue cracks in their fuselages.

FAA documents obtained by CNN found that in some cases, Southwest aircraft flew for 30 months after government inspection deadlines had passed.

A congressional panel concluded the planes were "not airworthy," and two FAA whistle-blowers said agency managers let the airline conduct the safety checks on a slower schedule to avoid disrupting flights.

The Dallas, Texas-based airline said it was happy to have settled "all outstanding issues with the FAA."

"This settlement with the FAA will allow us to focus on safety going forward, rather than on issues that are now behind us and that have already been addressed," Southwest Airlines said in a written statement.

CNN's Mike M. Ahlers contributed to this report.

What flew for 30 months after inspection deadlines passed?

How much will the fine increase if the airline doesn't complete additional safety measures?

Amount of planes FAA found that Southwest flew without checking?

What airline flew nearly 50 planes without inspecting for cracks?

Who flew 46 jets without checking for fatigue?

Which agency fined Southwest for flying jets without checking for cracks?

How long did Southwest fly affected aircraft after the inspection deadlines?

Answer: Southwest Airlines

Answer: Southwest Airlines

Answer: double

Answer: $7.5 million

Answer: 46

Answer: Southwest

Answer: Southwest Airlines

Answer: FAA

Answer: 30 months

Summary:
Fine will double unless airline completes additional safety measures within a year .
FAA found Southwest flew 46 jets without checking for fatigue cracks in fuselages .
FAA documents: Aircraft flew for 30 months after inspection deadlines passed .
Southwest happy to have settled "all outstanding issues with the FAA"


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday that House committees will begin action on President-elect Barack Obama's proposed economic recovery package in the next couple of weeks, with a vote in the full House slated for the week after Obama's inauguration. Speaker Nancy Pelosi says the House will not go on a break until an economic recovery package is passed. Obama will take office January 20. If that schedule slips, Pelosi, D-California, pledged to cancel the House's planned weeklong break in mid-February for Presidents Day. "We are not going home without an economic recovery package," Pelosi said. Pelosi said Obama's plan has broad public support "almost sight unseen," citing a poll from Politico that says 79 percent of Americans support the president-elect's plan. A senior Pelosi aide said discussions about the details are ongoing between the Obama transition team and key leaders. The Ways and Means Committee will focus on the tax piece, approximately $300 billion in tax cuts. Obama transition aides met with Democrats on that committee Wednesday morning to discuss various proposals, according to another Democratic aide. The Appropriations Committee is tasked with drafting details on spending hundreds of billions of dollars on infrastructure projects, food stamps and other aid to states. Sidestepping a question on possible roadblocks for the bill, Pelosi instead touted the new muscle of the expanded Democratic majority. "We have been so used to an uphill fight, but now we have arrived. We have a big, strong, something like an 80-vote majority in the Congress, in the House, with a Democratic president in the White House," she said. In a speech Thursday, Obama said it was imperative that Congress move quickly to pass the stimulus package once he takes office, warning that a failure to do so would have devastating long-term consequences to the nation's economy. "We start 2009 in the midst of a crisis unlike any we have seen in our lifetime, a crisis that has only deepened over the last few weeks," Obama said at George Mason University in Virginia.  Watch Obama call for "dramatic action" on the economy » "I don't believe it's too late to change course, but it will be if we don't take dramatic action as soon as possible," Obama continued. "If nothing is done, this recession could linger for years." Key members of Obama's own party, however, said they opposed central tax measures of the president-elect's proposals after emerging from a closed-door meeting of the Senate Finance Committee.  Watch Obama explain his tax proposals » In particular, they do not think that giving employers a $3,000 tax credit for each worker they hired would work. "I'm not that excited about that," said Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts. "Having a tax credit for hiring is not going to change that dynamic; creating a direct job will. So I'd rather spend the money on the infrastructure, on direct investment, on energy conversion and other kinds of things, much more directly and much more rapidly and much more certainly create a real job." Sen. Kent Conrad agreed. "I think it's unlikely to be effective," the North Dakota senator said. "If you think about it, businesspeople are not going to hire people to produce products that are not selling. Who is going to hire in the auto industry if you give them a $3,000 credit to make cars that people are not buying?" A second Obama tax proposal that several Democrats were down on is payroll tax credits, amounting to about $20 per paycheck and totaling $500 per person and $1,000 for couples earning less than $200,000 a year. Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon said he doubted that proposal would do much to stimulate the economy. "We have an example from the first stimulus that indicates just giving people $500 to $600, while certainly welcome when there's this much economic hurt, may not be the best use of stimulus,

How much would employers get for each worker hired?

Who balks at proposal to give employers $3,000 for each worker hired?

How much money will be given to employers?

Answer: $3,000 tax credit

Answer: Key members of Obama's own party,

Answer: touted the new muscle of the expanded Democratic majority.

Answer: $3,000 tax credit for each worker they hired

Answer: House committees

Answer: Barack Obama's proposed economic recovery package in the next couple of weeks, with a vote in the full

Answer: Barack Obama's

Summary:
Speaker Nancy Pelosi sets full House vote on stimulus for week of January 25 .
House committees will work on Obama's plan over the next couple of weeks .
Senate Democrats balk at proposal to give employers $3,000 for each worker hired .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Staff Sgt. Cody Reeves has survived harrowing conditions and stared down enemies on the battlefield during two tours in the military hotspots of Iraq. Staff. Sgt. Cody Reeves works out with his fellow Old Guard soldiers. Now he is stationed near Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, trained to carry the remains of fellow soldiers who perished in that same conflict. Before,"it was all about catching the bad guy," Reeves said. "When you come here, it's all about honoring your brothers who are fallen for catching the bad guys, for their service." Reeves serves in the Army's Old Guard, a tight-knit group of soldiers of similar height and size who physically bear the weight of the Army's fallen veterans. The Old Guard conducts a 15-minute ceremony called a dignified transfer. A recent decision by Defense Secretary Robert Gates gives families the choice to allow media to film the solemn event. It's the first time in 20 years the ceremony has been open to the press.  Watch members of the Old Guard in action » Every detail of the transfer is precise. When an American soldier dies overseas, the Old Guard is called into action. They travel from their base to Dover, where they meet the aircraft carrying the soldier's body. The six men receive the flag-draped casket, which can weigh 500 pounds, and carry the soldier's body to a waiting vehicle. Women serve as officers in charge on the Army transfer teams, but do not carry the caskets. For Air Force transfers, which use eight people, women help carry the coffin. Despite the cold or the heat, the late hour when the planes often arrive and the physical and emotional strain of their job, the soldiers keep their faces blank. "There's definitely times where your mind goes off, even in the ceremony," said Spc. Wilbert Steinborn, another member of the Old Guard. "You say, 'This guy might have a wife or kids or mother or father who's never going to see him again.' "You can't let it show. Inside you might feel it, and definitely a human's going to feel that -- they're going to feel that emotion. But you can't show that on the outside," Steinborn said. The men stifle sneezes, learn to yawn through their noses and betray no sign of the burden they carry. And -- what they say makes keeping their composure even more important -- the team performs its duties in front of the soldiers' families. "We're soldiers too. We're infantrymen. We could easily be in their place," Steinborn said. "It's hard because you honestly think you see your wife or your girlfriend sitting where the next-of-kin is. You can imagine yourself being there.... So I think that's why we try to be as precise and exact, and look as good, and make them look as good as possible." Some of the Old Guard choose to learn about the lives of the soldiers they've carried. Reeves asks for information about the fallen after having participated in the ceremonies, but never before he greets the soldier's body. "It's 'take care of business' and then afterwards I like to know a little bit about the soldier," he said. "That way you can keep emotions at bay and you're just focused on doing the soldier part." Strikingly, the men, who head to their barracks' gym for intense weight training twice a day and take five-mile runs as a team, seem to be able to communicate without speaking. After drilling for countless hours on the base's grounds, they can feel if another man is even minutely out of step in the ceremony. Sometimes they'll whisper corrections so discreetly no onlooker would ever notice. The nature of their job means the men also share a tighter, unspoken bond. "When I was walking through the aircraft and saw the transfer case with the American flag draped over it, it was

Who says "it's all about honoring your brothers who are fallen"?

Answer: Staff. Sgt. Cody Reeves

Answer: Staff Sgt. Cody Reeves

Answer: Staff. Sgt. Cody Reeves

Summary:
"It's all about honoring your brothers who are fallen," Reeves says .
Army's Old Guard transfers remains of soldiers who died in conflict .
The team performs duties in front of the soldiers' families .
The nature of their job means the men share a tight, unspoken bond .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Stars and Stripes, the newspaper that receives U.S. military funding to help it cover and get distributed free to American forces in war zones, complained Tuesday of censorship by military authorities in Iraq. A soldier with the U.S. Army's 1st Cavalry Division patrols the streets of eastern Mosul, Iraq, on June 16. In a story on its Web site, the newspaper known as Stripes said the military violated a congressional mandate of editorial independence by rejecting a request to embed reporter Heath Druzin with the U.S. Army's 1st Cavalry Division, which is attempting to secure the city of Mosul. The military cited various problems in Druzin's reporting on previous embed assignments with units of the division, according to the story. One example noted by the military was a March 8 story that said many Mosul residents would like the American soldiers to leave and hand over security tasks to Iraqi forces, the Stripes Web site said. "Despite the opportunity to visit areas of the city where Iraqi Army leaders, soldiers, national police and Iraqi police displayed commitment to partnership, Mr. Druzin refused to highlight any of this news," Maj. Ramona Bellard, a public affairs officer, wrote in denying Druzin's embed request, according to the Stripes story. A military official in Iraq defended the move to turn down the reporter's request. "U.S. Army units in Iraq remain committed to the media embed program and appreciate objective media reporting," said Lt. Col. David H. Patterson Jr., a spokesman for Multi-National Corps-Iraq. "The relationship that Druzin established with the command during a previous embed did not facilitate being invited back." Patterson added that Druzin was welcome to embed in another unit and that the 1st Cavalry Division was open to having a reporter other than Druzin. "Accusations of censorship are without merit," Patterson said. Other allegations against Druzin by the military included that he used quotes out of context, behaved unprofessionally and persisted in asking Army officials for permission to use a computer to file a story during a communications blackout period, the Stripes story said. Terry Leonard, editorial director at Stars and Stripes, denied the Army's allegations, calling Druzin's previous reporting on the division accurate and fair. "To simply say 'you can't send him because we didn't like what he wrote' is unacceptable," Leonard said. He noted that Congress set up Stripes as an independent newspaper so that "no commander can decide what news troops in the field receive." Army officials have offered to allow a different Stripes reporter to embed with the division or to allow Druzin to embed with a different Army unit in Kirkuk, Leonard said. Stripes rejected those offers because the military has no right to deflect coverage from Mosul or decide which Stripes reporter covers its operations, Leonard said. "To deny Mr. Druzin an embed under the reasons stated by Maj. Bellard is a direct challenge to the editorial independence of this newspaper," Leonard wrote in his appeal to the decision, according to the Stripes story. "That independence is mandated by Congress. The denial of the embed constitutes an attempt at censorship and it is also an illegal prior restraint under federal law. ... The military cannot tell us what stories to write or not write." Stripes receives close to $10 million a year from the Department of Defense to help defray the costs of covering "contingency" operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, including the publishing and distribution of roughly 85,000 free newspapers a day, Leonard said. The newspaper receives additional government subsidies, with the total amounting to less than half of its budget, he said. Other revenue comes from ad sales and circulation at permanent U.S. military bases and elsewhere, Leonard said. CNN has been denied embed requests on occasion but never because of the past conduct of individual journalists. The reasons have almost always involved logistical details involving security and force coverage.

What does the newspaper claim about the situation?

Answer: Stars and Stripes,

Answer: the military violated a congressional mandate of editorial independence by rejecting a request to embed reporter Heath Druzin with the U.S. Army's 1st Cavalry Division,

Answer: other than Druzin.

Answer: Heath Druzin

Answer: Mosul, Iraq,

Answer: units in Iraq remain committed to the media embed program and appreciate objective media reporting,"

Summary:
Newspaper says military's rejection of embed request is censorship .
Paper wanted reporter Heath Druzin to be embedded with Army division in Iraq .
Army rejects request, cites Druzin's previous interactions with division .
Army denies accusations, says different reporter may embed with division .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- State Department officials should serve where they are needed -- even in war-torn Iraq, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says that "people need to serve where they are needed."

Rice was responding to foreign service officers' objections to the possibility of "directed assignments" in Iraq. The issue has caused an uproar in the State Department, resulting in a contentious town hall-style meeting Wednesday.

The new directives would be needed if enough qualified foreign service officers don't step forward to fill open positions at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

If the State Department enforces directed assignments, it will be the first time since the Vietnam War era.

One official called the order to serve in Iraq "a potential death sentence" during the town meeting.

The State Department already has begun notifying about 200 people considered prime candidates. Those chosen will be given 10 days to respond, according to last week's announcement. Unless they have a valid medical reason to refuse, those who decline could face dismissal, it said.

Wednesday's heated meeting was replayed on an internal State Department television channel in Washington several times and talked about widely.

Some at the hourlong meeting questioned why they were not told of the policy change directly, learning about it instead from news organizations last week.  Watch the diplomats exchange angry words »

"I just have no respect for the whole process because you've demonstrated a lack of respect for your own colleagues," said foreign service officer Jack Croddy.

"Thank you for that comment. It's full of inaccuracies, but that's OK," Harry Thomas Jr., director general of the foreign service, shot back.

Others pointed out the risks of such assignments, considering the dangers of a war zone, lack of security and regular rocket attacks on U.S. personnel.

Rice, who did not attend the meeting, tried to calm things down Friday by underscoring the State Department's attempts to do "everything that we can to try and protect our diplomats."

However, she said, "This is one of the highest priority tasks of the United States, and we're going to meet our obligations."

Speaking to reporters en route to Turkey and the Mideast, she said, "I don't know if we will have direct assignments or not, but we are one foreign service, and people need to serve where they are needed."

The secretary sent out a cable to State Department employees worldwide encouraging them to serve in Iraq.

"This year [U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker] has identified the need for additional positions to more effectively accomplish our mission in Iraq," Rice said in the cable.

Rice said she has decided to go forward with the identification of  officers to serve, "should it prove necessary to direct assignments."

"Should others step forward, as some already have, we will fill these new jobs as we have before -- with volunteers. However, regardless of how the jobs may be filled, they must be filled," she said.

Rice earlier said reports that the State Department was finding it hard to coax foreign service employees into Iraq "couldn't be further from the truth."

The assignments are new positions. Fifteen people have stepped forward to volunteer for Iraq service since the new policy was announced October 26, department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

McCormack rejected comments by Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-California, that State Department employees are "nervous Nellies" and that wounded U.S. military veterans should be asked to fill the Iraq vacancies.

McCormack said until now the State Department has been successful in filling jobs in Iraq with volunteers. Since 2003, more than 1,500 personnel have volunteered to go to Iraq, he said. But with the expansion of the staff in Iraq this year, 58 spots were left open.

"They are serving in dangerous and challenging places," he said. "We have a lot of brave people who are stepping up to the plate in Anbar and Basra and Baghdad

objections officials to Condolezza answered?

What did the official call the order to serve in Iraq?

what is the rice department doing to protect diplomats?

What does one official think of orders to serve in Iraq?

Who responds to foreign officers' objections on Iraq duty?

who responds to objections on Iraq duty ?

who was the official who said:a potential death sentence?

What is the department doing, according to Rice?

What will happen to those who don't volunteer?

Answer: "people need to serve where they are needed."

Answer: "directed assignments"

Answer: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice

Answer: "a potential death sentence"

Answer: "everything that we can

Answer: "a potential death sentence"

Answer: "people need to serve where they are needed."

Answer: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice

Answer: Condoleezza

Answer: directed assignments,

Answer: responding to foreign service officers' objections to the possibility of "directed assignments" in Iraq.

Answer: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice

Answer: the order to serve in Iraq

Answer: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice

Answer: foreign service officers'

Answer: One

Answer: foreign service officers'

Answer: notifying about 200 people considered prime candidates.

Answer: face dismissal,

Answer: foreign service officers' objections

Summary:
Condoleezza Rice responds to foreign service officers' objections on Iraq duty .
"Directed assignments" will be enforced if enough officers don't volunteer in Iraq .
Rice: Department doing "everything that we can to try and protect our diplomats"
One official calls order to serve in Iraq "a potential death sentence"


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Suspected terrorists and foreign fighters held by the U.S. military at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have the right to challenge their detention in federal court, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

A prefabricated court complex has been erected at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to try terrorism suspects.

The decision marks another legal blow to the Bush administration's war on terrorism policies.

The 5-4 vote reflects the divide over how much legal autonomy the U.S. military should have to prosecute about 270 prisoners, some of whom have been held for more than six years without charges. Fourteen of them are alleged to be top al Qaeda figures.

Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy said, "the laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times. Liberty and security can be reconciled; and in our system reconciled within the framework of the law."

Kennedy, the court's swing vote, was supported by Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer, generally considered the liberal contingent.

At issue was the rights of detainees to contest their imprisonment and challenge the rules set up to try them.  Watch how the 5-4 ruling is a major blow for the Bush administration »

A congressional law passed in 2006 would limit court jurisdiction to hear so-called habeas corpus challenges to detention. It is a legal question the justices have tackled three times since 2004, including Thursday's ruling.

Each time, the justices have ruled against the government's claim that it has the authority to hold people it considers "enemy combatants."

Preliminary hearings have begun in Guantanamo for some of the accused. A military panel this month arraigned five suspected senior al Qaeda detainees, including the alleged mastermind of the September 11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was transferred to the prison camp in 2006.

The Bush administration has urged the high court not to get involved in the broader appeals, saying the federal judiciary has no authority to hear such matters.

Four justices agreed. In a sharp dissent, read in part from the bench, Justice Antonin Scalia said the majority "warps our Constitution."

The "nation will live to regret what the court has done today," Scalia said.

He was supported by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.

President Bush, who is traveling in Europe, said he disagreed with the Guantanamo ruling but promised to abide by it.

"Congress and the administration worked very carefully on a piece of legislation that set the appropriate procedures in place as to how to deal with the detainees," he said. "We'll study this opinion, and we'll do so with this in mind to determine whether or not additional legislation might be appropriate so that we can safely say, truly say to the American people, 'we are doing everything we can to protect you.' "

The Pentagon declined to comment, and the Justice Department said it was reviewing the decision and was expected to comment later Thursday.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, welcomed the ruling, saying the Supreme Court upheld the Constitution.

"I have long been an advocate of closing Guantanamo, so I would hope this is in furtherance of taking that action," Pelosi said.

The appeals involve noncitizens. Sixteen lawsuits filed on behalf of about 200 prisoners were put on hold pending a ruling last year by a federal appeals court upholding the government's right to detain and prosecute suspected terrorists and war criminals.

An attorney for one of the detainees, Salim Ahmed Hamdan -- Osama bin Laden's alleged driver and bodyguard -- said he would file an appeal asking that charges be dropped against the Yemeni native.

"The clearest immediate impact of this ruling is to remove the remaining barriers for closing Guantanamo Bay. It means, in legal terms, Guantanamo Bay is no different than Kansas," attorney Charles Swift said.

Now the ruling has been issued, a flood of similar appeals can be expected.

The lead plaintiffs are Lakhdar Boumediene, a Bosnian, and

What ruling does President Bush disagree with?

Answer: Guantanamo

Answer: federal judiciary

Answer: Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,

Answer: "the laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times. Liberty and security can be reconciled; and in our system reconciled within the framework of the law."

Answer: the Guantanamo ruling

Answer: the Guantanamo ruling

Summary:
NEW: President Bush says he disagrees with ruling but he'll abide by it .
NEW: Court says separately it won't rule on case of U.S. citizens convicted in Iraq .
Justice Scalia: U.S. "will live to regret what the court has done today"
Justice Kennedy: Constitution should "remain in force, in extraordinary times"


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Suzanne Richard was born to be an actress. Suzanne Richard says that navigating the maze of government aid regulations is a challenge. She was also, however, born with osteogenesis imperfecta, a bone-crippling disorder that can mean a lifetime of health problems and physical disability. But rather than letting her condition hinder her acting ambitions, Richard has embraced it, and now works to encourage other actors with disabilities to do the same. As the artistic director of Open Circle Theatre, a theater founded to "showcase professional artists with disabilities in an integrated setting," Richard offers her actors respite from the challenges they face, and access to an industry that can often discriminate against people like her. "I decided a long time ago that if people were going to stare at me, they were going to pay me for it," she quipped backstage at a rehearsal for her latest production, "Is there ANYBODY OUT THERE?" And at a height of just under 4 feet, with legs encased in metal braces, the 38-year-old Richard said she indeed often attracts curious stares from the public. Richard's condition, also known as Brittle Bones Disease, is a genetic disorder "characterized by fragile bones that break easily," according to the Osteogenesis Imperfecta Foundation. The condition is considered rare, thought to affect only about 40,000 Americans, said Tracy Hart, CEO of the OI Foundation. There is no cure, Hart said. While the severity of the disorder varies greatly, common health issues related to OI are a short stature, weak tissues, fragile skin, muscle weakness, loose joints, hearing loss, breathing problems and curvature of the spine, according to the OI Foundation. In Richard's case, OI has meant frequent bone fractures, painful surgeries, leg braces, wheelchairs, and a multitude of symptoms caused by the pressure her weak frame puts on her body. As a child, Richard had to have rods surgically placed in her legs "as infrastructure" -- a painful routine that she repeated as often as she grew. But for Richard, the physical constraints of her condition are only half the battle. When Richard was forced to retire from her job as an accessibility specialist at the National Endowment for the Arts because she was too sick to work, she lost her work-provided private health insurance coverage. She now gets Medicare through her Social Security Income retirement benefits. Social Security Income is a government program that "makes monthly payments to people who have low income and few resources," and are either at least 65 years of age or disabled. Social Security recipients are subject to income restrictions depending on what state they live in, and are only allowed to have resources worth $2,000, with certain exceptions, according to the Social Security Web site (www.socialsecurity.gov). These strict financial eligibility limitations, Richard said, can be nerve-wracking, and can make navigating the system extremely difficult. "If you lose your Social Security benefits because you make too much money, you lose everything. You lose your Medicare, too," Richard said. "So if you're on disability you have to be really careful not to make too much money, which is self-defeating." It is "self-defeating" especially when one considers the massive medical bills Richard accumulates due to her OI. Though Medicare covers 80 percent of her medical costs, Richard said she often comes up short some months. "You can't get blood from a stone. ... I'm on a fixed income. That's why I'm on Medicare," she said. So, Richard constantly finds herself in the precarious situation of having to rely on her loved ones and the government for her financial stability. "I'm hanging on by my fingernails. ...You can never get ahead," she said. It's a frustrating circumstance familiar to Richard's fellow actors at Open Circle, as well as to the millions of disabled Americans in need of expensive medical treatment. It's a system, said Richard, that must

What does she encourage disabled actors to do?

What type of disorder did the director have?

Answer: osteogenesis imperfecta,

Answer: "I decided a long time ago that if people were going to stare at me, they were going to pay me for it,"

Answer: artistic director of Open Circle Theatre,

Answer: embraced it,

Answer: osteogenesis imperfecta,

Answer: These strict financial eligibility limitations,

Summary:
Theater's artistic director was born with bone-crippling disorder .
Suzanne Richard encourages other disabled actors to embrace their art .
Navigating maze of government aid is extremely difficult .
"You can never get ahead" when system punishes earning, Richard says .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The "vast right-wing conspiracy" that attacked him during his presidency has been weakened, but continues to operate against President Obama, former President Clinton said Sunday. Former President Clinton said Republicans won't see a 1994-like surge at the polls in 2010. On NBC's "Meet the Press," Clinton was asked about the term his wife Hillary Clinton, now secretary of state, famously coined. "Is it still there?" host David Gregory asked. "Oh, you bet. Sure it is. It's not as strong as it was, because America's changed demographically, but it's as virulent as it was," the former president replied. "I mean, they're saying things about him [Obama] -- you know, it's like when they accused me of murder and all that stuff they did," Clinton said, in an apparent reference to conspiracy theories surrounding the suicide of White House deputy counsel Vince Foster. "It's not really good for the Republicans and the country, what's going on now," Clinton said. "I mean, they may be hurting President Obama. They can take his numbers down, they can run his opposition up. But fundamentally, he and his team have a positive agenda for America." The nation needs "a credible debate about what's the right balance between continuing to expand the economy through stimulus and beginning to move back to fiscal balance," Clinton said. "We need a credible debate about what's the best way to get to universal [health care] coverage." Clinton was asked whether he is concerned that the 2010 midterm elections could resemble those of 1994, when Republicans took control of the House and Senate two years into his first term. "There's no way" that could happen, Clinton said, adding that "the country is more diverse and more interested in positive action." Also, he said, Republicans had control of Congress for several years under President George W. Bush, "and they know the results were bad." And, he said, "the Democrats haven't taken on the gun lobby like I did." "Whatever happens, it'll be manageable for our president," Clinton said.

Who said consspiracy not as strong as it once was

Answer: President Clinton

Answer: former President Clinton

Answer: The "vast right-wing conspiracy"

Answer: Republicans won't see a 1994-like surge at the polls in 2010.

Summary:
Clinton: Right-wing "conspiracy" not as strong as it once was, but is as virulent .
Obama's popularity may take hit, but attacks not good for country, Clinton says .
Clinton: "No way" that Republicans will enjoy 1994-level success in 2010 elections .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The 2009 presidential inauguration is looking to be historic and, frankly, headache-inducing for the throngs of people descending on the nation's capital to watch Barack Obama sworn in as the 44th president. Workers are putting the finishing touches on the innaugural stage on the steps of U.S. Capitol. CNN has compiled a list of frequently asked questions and answers. Q: How crowded will Washington be, and how will I get around? A: Think Times Square on New Year's Eve. Throw in tight security, then multiply that by 12. At least, that's how it will most likely feel. Nearly 2 million people are expected to hit the streets of the nation's capital January 20. Police will be shutting bridges across the Potomac River into Washington, along with a huge chunk of the downtown area. Two of the major routes coming into the city -- Interstates 395 and 66 -- will be closed to inbound traffic, at least for private vehicles. And for those coming from Virginia, all of the bridges between the state and Washington are going to be shut. In order to get in: walk or take public transport, such as the metro area's subway system. Amtrak says that it has increased the number -- and length -- of trains running to Washington on Inauguration Day and that tickets are still available but are going fast. iReport.com: Are you going to the inauguration? Security officials also say charter buses, taxis and car services will be another option for those attending. Q: What can't I bring? A: There are several obvious items that are prohibited, according to the U.S. Secret Service, including: "Firearms, ammunition, explosives, weapons of any kind, aerosols, supports for signs and placards, packages, coolers, thermal or glass containers, backpacks, bags exceeding size restrictions, laser pointers, animals other than helper/guide dogs, structures, bicycles and any other items determined to be a potential safety hazard." Items surrendered to security officials will not be returned. Other items that are being banned include baby strollers and umbrellas. Read more about Secret Service traffic, security plans (PDF) Q: When do the festivities start? A: Saturday, January 17. Obama and Vice President-elect Joe Biden will begin their whistlestop-like train tour, stopping in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Wilmington, Delaware; and then making a stop for an event in Baltimore, Maryland, before pulling into Washington. That evening, Michelle Obama, Jill Biden and their families will hold a free "Kids' Inaugural" concert to honor military families. Sunday, January 18 Obama will kick off the schedule of official inaugural activities in Washington, D.C., with a welcome event on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The event will be free and open to the public. HBO will exclusively broadcast the event from 7 to 9 p.m. ET. The event will be televised by HBO on an open signal accessible to all U.S. viewers with access to cable, telcos or satellite television. It will also be a star-studded affair, with Beyoncé, Mary J. Blige, Bono, Garth Brooks, Sheryl Crow, Renee Fleming, Josh Groban, Herbie Hancock, Heather Headley, John Legend, Jennifer Nettles, John Mellencamp, Usher Raymond IV, Shakira, Bruce Springsteen, James Taylor, will.i.am and Stevie Wonder -- among many others. The Rev. Gene Robinson, an openly gay Episcopal bishop, will deliver the invocation. Monday, January 19 (Martin Luther King Jr. Day) Obama and Biden will honor King's legacy by urging supporters to participate in activities dedicated to serving others in communities across Washington, according to the Obama transition Web site, Change.gov. On Monday night, Jazz at Lincoln Center and The Rockefeller Foundation will present "A Celebration of America" at the Kennedy Center in Washington. The event -- marking King's legacy and the 56th inauguration -- will be broadcast live on CNN. Special guest stars will be announced shortly. Tuesday, January 20: Inauguration Day

Where are several million expected to descend?

when will Obama be sworn in as President?

Answer: the nation's capital

Answer: Barack Obama

Answer: Barack Obama

Answer: January 20.

Answer: Saturday, January 17.

Summary:
Barack Obama to be sworn in as president January 20 .
Several million are expected to descend on Washington .
CNN has your guide to all things Inauguration 2009 .
Activities begin January 18 with an Obama-Biden whistlestop-like tour .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Air Force is returning F-15E Strike Eagle jets to service over Iraq and Afghanistan after grounding other F-15s, the Air Force said Wednesday.

The Air Force grounded models of its F-15 fleet after the crash of an older model F-15C this month.

The F-15s were grounded after a crash earlier this month in Missouri of an older model that disintegrated in flight.

Each F-15E must pass an inspection of critical parts on the airframe before returning to flying missions, Air Force officials said.

All U.S. Air Force 224 E-model aircraft will undergo a one-time inspection of hydraulic system lines, the Air Force statement said.

The longerons -- molded, metal strips of the aircraft fuselage that run from front to rear -- will also be inspected, according to the Air Force.

The straps and skin panels in and around the environmental control system bay will also be examined, officials said.

The Air Force would not say whether the parts being inspected were part of the problem on the aircraft that crashed.

The investigation into why that plane fell apart in flight is still ongoing and Air Force officials will not say what happened until the investigation is complete, an Air Force spokesperson said.

Air Force officials said the rest of the almost 500 F-15s -- older airframes than the F-15Es -- will remain grounded until the investigation offers a solution to what happened.

The E-model aircraft, the youngest and most sophisticated in the F-15 inventory, is heavily used by Central Command for ground support in the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It is also used for the homeland security mission over the United States known as Operation Noble Eagle.

On November 3, the Air Force grounded all of its F-15s in response to a November 1 crash of a Missouri Air National Guard F-15C in Boss, Missouri.

The grounding forced Central Command to use other Air Force, Navy and French fighters to fill the gaps, though Strike Eagles did fly to support troops in battle in Afghanistan as an emergency measure while they were still under grounding orders, according to Central Command reports.

The plane that crashed, built in 1980, was one of the older F-15s in the fleet.

The F-15E Strike Eagle is an air-to-ground and air-to-air fighter, making it more versatile than other F-15 models, which are used for only air-to-air missions.

The Strike Eagle is used in Afghanistan and Iraq in its air-to-ground role, using its advanced sensors to drop bombs on targets. E-mail to a friend

What will undergo a one-time inspection?

what is used for ground support in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Where are F-15s used for ground support?

Which aircraft will undergo a one-time inspection?

Where is the F-15 being used for ground support?

which is the model aircraft undego a one-time inspection?

What wars did the F-15 provide ground support in?

what grounded after a November 1 crash in Missouri?

Answer: F-15E

Answer: ground support in the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Answer: Missouri

Answer: Each F-15E

Answer: All U.S. Air Force 224 E-model aircraft

Answer: F-15E Strike Eagle

Answer: November 1

Answer: in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Answer: U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Answer: All U.S. Air Force 224 E-model

Answer: of hydraulic system lines,

Answer: Missouri

Answer: Missouri

Answer: F-15E Strike Eagle jets

Answer: Afghanistan

Answer: U.S. Air Force 224 E-model

Answer: Iraq and Afghanistan.

Answer: models of its F-15

Answer: Boss, Missouri.

Answer: models of its F-15 fleet

Answer: November 3,

Summary:
F-15s grounded after a November 1 crash in Missouri .
F-15 is used for ground support in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan .
All U.S. Air Force 224 E-model aircraft will undergo a one-time inspection .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Bush Pentagon tried to find loopholes in the Geneva Conventions for its "ghost detainee" program in Iraq and to delay the release of Guantanamo Bay prisoners to avoid bad press, three human rights groups contend.

The Pentagon considered delaying the release of detainees from Guantanamo Bay because of criticism.

Pentagon documents discuss CIA and Pentagon detention activities earlier this decade and indicate coordination between agencies in hiding internees from the Red Cross.

Amnesty International USA, New York University's Center for Human Rights and Global Justice, and the Center for Constitutional Rights obtained the material through a Freedom of Information Act request and released it Thursday.

"It's obvious that Defense officials engaged in legal gymnastics to find ways to keep detainees off the books," said Meg Satterthwaite, faculty director of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice.

"A full accounting of all agencies' responsibilities must now take place to ensure that these abuses don't continue under a different guise."

President Obama has signed an order closing the Guantanamo detention facility in Cuba and prohibiting CIA prisons. However, the order allows the CIA to detain people temporarily.

It is not known whether the Pentagon or the CIA still holds "ghost detainees," Satterthwaite said, referring to people housed at secret facilities.

The Pentagon issued an information paper May 28, 2004, on the "applicability of the Geneva Conventions to 'Ghost Detainees' in Iraq." Its purpose was to clarify the law about such detainees.

The Geneva Conventions spell out international humanitarian law and authorize the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit prisoners during armed conflicts.

The Pentagon's information paper said that if "absolute military security" requires it, the conventions permit the holding of persons "who participated in activities hostile to the security of the occupying power."

Specific examples would be "spies and saboteurs," the paper said.

Although the Red Cross must be notified of such detentions, "persons who have committed such acts are considered to have forfeited the rights of communication," the paper said.

"Normally the ICRC has the right to go to all places where protected people are detained," the paper said. But, it added, such visits can be denied temporarily "for reasons of imperative military necessity."

A February 17, 2006, e-mail showed that a State Department foreign policy adviser urged the Pentagon to consider delaying by a month and a half the release of Guantanamo prisoners who were scheduled to be sent home in order to avoid bad press.

This came amid worldwide furor over the Guantanamo detention facility, photos of prisoners being mistreated at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and sharp criticism on the streets and in blogs toward U.S. detention policies.

"We may need to definitely think about checking with SouthCom to see if we can hold off on return flights for 45 days or so until things die down," the adviser wrote to Gen. Norton Schwartz, then head of the U.S. Transportation Command. "Otherwise we are likely to have hero's welcomes awaiting the detainees when they arrive, and we will have problems getting overflight and landing clearance for the flights anyway. It would probably be preferable if we could deliver these detainees in something smaller and more discreet than a T tail" -- apparently referring to a large transport plane like the giant C-5 Galaxy.

SouthCom is the U.S. Southern Command, the American military command covering Latin American and the Caribbean. Schwartz is now the Air Force chief of staff.

The letter appeared to be an e-mail reply to a State Department "hot issues" memo that said the United States was getting "creamed on human rights" and "taking a big hit on the issues of human rights and respect for the rule of law." It pointed to news stories about a U.N. Guantanamo report and coverage highlighting calls from officials to close Guantanamo.

It cited criticism of the United States in blogs and discussion boards.

"America has lost its prestige," a blogger from Yemen wrote. "Every year the world waits for the annual U.S. State Department report on human

What are the detention practices being justified?

What did the groups present to the Pentagon?

Answer: people housed at secret facilities.

Answer: Bush Pentagon

Answer: documents

Answer: the release of Guantanamo Bay prisoners

Answer: CIA and Pentagon

Answer: Amnesty International USA, New York University's Center for

Summary:
Military tried to justify detention practices, human rights groups say .
Groups present Pentagon documents to support accusations .
Groups: Pentagon also sought to delay Guantanamo releases to avoid bad press .
Communications came amid criticism over Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Bush administration has launched a "significant escalation" of covert operations in Iran, sending U.S. commandos to spy on the country's nuclear facilities and undermine the Islamic republic's government, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday. An Iranian flag flies outside the building containing the reactor of Bushehr nuclear power plant, south of Tehran. White House, CIA and State Department officials declined comment on Hersh's report, which appears in this week's issue of The New Yorker. Hersh told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer" that Congress has authorized up to $400 million to fund the secret campaign, which involves U.S. special operations troops and Iranian dissidents. President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have rejected findings from U.S. intelligence agencies that Iran has halted a clandestine effort to build a nuclear bomb and "do not want to leave Iran in place with a nuclear program," Hersh said. "They believe that their mission is to make sure that before they get out of office next year, either Iran is attacked or it stops its weapons program," Hersh said. The new article, "Preparing the Battlefield," is the latest in a series of articles accusing the Bush administration of preparing for war with Iran. He based the report on accounts from current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources.  Watch Hersh discuss what he says are the administration's plans for Iran » "As usual with his quarterly pieces, we'll decline to comment," White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe told CNN. "The CIA, as a rule, does not comment on allegations regarding covert operations," CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano said. Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad, denied U.S. raids were being launched from Iraq, where American commanders believe Iran is stoking sectarian warfare and fomenting attacks on U.S. troops. "I can tell you flatly that U.S. forces are not operating across the Iraqi border into Iran, in the south or anywhere else," Crocker said. Hersh said U.S. efforts were staged from Afghanistan, which also shares a border with Iran. He said the program resulted in "a dramatic increase in kinetic events and chaos" inside Iran, including attacks by Kurdish separatists in the country's north and a May attack on a mosque in Shiraz that killed 13 people. The United States has said it is trying to isolate Iran diplomatically in order to get it to come clean about its nuclear ambitions. But Bush has said "all options" are open in dealing with the issue. Iran insists its nuclear program is aimed at providing civilian electric power, and refuses to comply with U.N. Security Council demands that it halt uranium enrichment work. U.N. nuclear inspectors say Tehran held back critical information that could determine whether it is trying to make nuclear weapons. Israel, which is believed to have its own nuclear arsenal, conducted a military exercise in the eastern Mediterranean in early June involving dozens of warplanes and aerial tankers. The distance involved in the exercise was roughly the same as would be involved in a possible strike on the Iranian nuclear fuel plant at Natanz, Iran, a U.S. military official said. In 1981, Israeli warplanes destroyed an Iraqi nuclear reactor. Iran's parliament speaker, Ali Larijani, warned other countries against moves that would "cost them heavily." In comments that appeared in the semi-official Mehr news agency Sunday, an Iranian general said his troops were digging more than 320,000 graves to bury troops from any invading force with "the respect they deserve." "Under the law of war and armed conflict, necessary preparations must be made for the burial of soldiers of aggressor nations," said Maj. Gen. Mirfaisal Baqerzadeh, an Iranian officer in charge of identifying soldiers missing in action. Journalist Shirzad Bozorghmehr in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.

Where is the programs being staged from?

What did the U.S. officials decline to comment on?

What did Congress authorize up to $400 million for?

What amount of money was authorized for covert ops?

Answer: "Preparing the Battlefield,"

Answer: Afghanistan,

Answer: up to $400 million to fund the secret campaign,

Answer: in Iran, sending U.S. commandos to spy on the country's nuclear facilities and undermine the Islamic republic's

Answer: Hersh's report,

Answer: White House, CIA and State Department officials

Answer: Iran,

Answer: the secret campaign,

Answer: $400 million

Summary:
New Yorker article says Congress authorized up to $400 million for covert ops in Iran .
Journalist Seymour Hersh says program is being staged from Afghanistan .
U.S. officials decline comment, deny the U.S. is launching raids from Iraq .
Iranian general says troops are building graves for invaders in the event of war .


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Central Intelligence Agency hired the private security firm Blackwater USA in 2004 to work on a covert program aimed at targeting and potentially killing top al Qaeda leaders, according to a source familiar with the program. CIA Director Leon Panetta canceled the covert program this year when he learned of its full scope. The existence of the program, which began in 2001, came to light earlier this year when CIA Director Leon Panetta canceled the effort, but it is only now that Blackwater's involvement has become known. That development was first reported Thursday in The New York Times. The program was part of a broader effort inside the CIA to develop the capacity to conduct training, surveillance and possible covert operations overseas, according to the source. The program was outsourced to contractors to "put some distance" between the effort and the U.S. government. By mid-2006, Blackwater's involvement in the program had ended, according to a U.S. official. Other contractors were brought in for other parts of the program, another source said. The total program cost "millions," a U.S. official said. It is not known how much Blackwater was paid. The company -- now known as Xe -- did not return CNN's calls seeking comment. "The program ebbed and flowed. There were different phases to it. There may have been different folks involved," the source said. U.S. officials have previously acknowledged that Panetta canceled the entire program this year when he learned of its full scope. At the time of the cancellation, officials said, renewal of the program was being considered. At that point, it had been brought to the new CIA director's attention. Panetta canceled the effort in part because Congress had not been notified about it, officials said. Also, some in the intelligence community were worried there could be a diplomatic disaster if contractors were caught performing such work in foreign countries. Former CIA Director Michael Hayden, who ran the agency from 2006 to 2009, downplayed the program during a speaking engagement in Washington. "This was not a very prominent thing during my time as director," Hayden said. "What you had were three separate efforts under three different directors to deal with an issue that everyone understood was a problem in a capacity that everyone agreed we should have." A spokesman for the CIA would not comment on the details of the still-classified program. "Director Panetta thought this effort should be briefed to Congress, and he did so," spokesman George Little said. "He also knew it hadn't been successful, so he ended it. Neither decision was difficult. This was clear and straightforward. "Director Panetta did not tell the committees that the agency had misled the Congress or had broken the law. He decided that the time had come to brief Congress on a counterterrorism effort." Blackwater's extensive involvement in U.S. operations overseas, particularly in Iraq, has been controversial. The Iraqi government says that in a shooting in September 2007, Blackwater security guards killed 17 Iraqi civilians. Blackwater says its employees were returning fire after they were attacked by armed insurgents, but an Iraqi investigation concluded that the guards randomly fired at civilians without provocation. The incident led to the Iraqi government's refusal to renew the firm's operating license in the country when it expired in May. Although it lost the Iraq contract, the company, which changed its name to Xe earlier this year, continued to get multimillion-dollar contracts from the U.S. government for work in Afghanistan.

Who was trying to develop possible covert operations overseas?

When did Blackwater's involvement in the program end?

Who said "This was not a very prominent thing during my time as director"?

Who said "Blackwater's involvement in program had ended by mid-2006"?

Who worked to develop possible covert operations overseas?

Answer: targeting and potentially killing top al Qaeda leaders,

Answer: 2001,

Answer: Blackwater USA

Answer: mid-2006,

Answer: Hayden

Answer: U.S. official.

Answer: Blackwater USA

Answer: The total program cost "millions," a U.S.

Summary:
Program, begun in 2001, came to light this year, when it was canceled .
It was part of CIA effort to develop possible covert operations overseas .
U.S. official says Blackwater's involvement in program had ended by mid-2006 .
Ex-CIA director: "This was not a very prominent thing during my time as director"