QUES: You just got done with a long run. You are gasping for air. Why does your body react this way? What is the purpose of breathing? All the cells of your body need oxygen to work properly. Your bodys circulatory system works with the respiratory system to deliver the oxygen. Your blood carries red blood cells. The main job of red blood cells is to carry oxygen throughout your body. The red blood cells get oxygen in the lungs. The lungs are the main organs of the respiratory system. The respiratory system is the body system that takes in oxygen. It then releases carbon dioxide back to the atmosphere. The carbon dioxide is the waste material from the cells.
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION: Do your blood carry red blood cells

QUES: (CNN) -- Horror-meister, Stephen King calls George Pelecanos "perhaps the greatest living American crime writer." His stories are set in Pelecanos' hometown of Washington, D.C., but this is not the side of the U.S. capitol that you see portrayed on TV with white marble monuments, lawyers and lobbyists. Pelecanos is more interested in working families struggling to get by, the racial tensions in its ethnic neighborhoods and the low-lifes on the edges. His crime-writing peers call Pelecanos the "undisputed poet" of Washington's gritty side. The best-selling and award-winning author is out this week with his 17th and latest novel, "The Cut." It's the first in a new series featuring Iraq war veteran and private investigator Spero Lucas. When he's not working for a Washington defense attorney, Lucas recovers stolen property for a 40% cut. Now, a high-profile crime boss hires Lucas to find out who's been stealing from him, and it could turn out to be Lucas' biggest payday or an untimely end. While Pelecanos made his bones in the noir tradition, there's a definite "Western" feel to "The Cut." The new novel takes place in a morally gray and often violent world. It's peppered with pitch-perfect dialogue and captures the sights, sounds and taste of Washington in rich detail. In short, Pelecanos reads like the real deal. Pelecanos knows a thing or two about capturing the authenticity of urban America with an ethnically and socially diverse cast. In addition to his success as a novelist, Pelecanos is a producer and writer for HBO's New Orleans-set, "Treme." He was previously a producer and Emmy-nominated writer on the hit series "The Wire" and the miniseries "The Pacific." Read an excerpt from "The Cut" CNN recently spoke to Pelecanos about his new novel. The following is an edited transcript. CNN: Tell me more about your new character, Spero Lucas.
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION: Which television shows has George Pelecanos worked on?

QUES: After the disruption of the plot in Amman, it had not escaped notice in Washington that Hijazi had lived in California and driven a cab in Boston and that Deek was a naturalized U.S. citizen who, as Berger reminded President Clinton, had been in touch with extremists in the United States as well as abroad. Before Ressam's arrest, Berger saw no need to raise a public alarm at home- although the FBI put all field offices on alert. Now, following Ressam's arrest, the FBI asked for an unprecedented number of special wiretaps. Both Berger andTenet told us that their impression was that more Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) wiretap requests were processed during the millennium alert than ever before. The next day, writing about Ressam's arrest and links to a cell in Montreal, Berger informed the President that the FBI would advise police in the United States to step up activities but would still try to avoid undue public alarm by stressing that the government had no specific information about planned attacks. At a December 22 meeting of the Small Group of principals, FBI Director Louis Freeh briefed officials from the NSC staff, CIA, and Justice on wiretaps and investigations inside the United States, including a Brooklyn entity tied to the Ressam arrest, a seemingly unreliable foreign report of possible attacks on seven U.S. cities, two Algerians detained on the Canadian border, and searches in Montreal related to a jihadist cell. The Justice Department released a statement on the alert the same day. Clarke's staff warned, "Foreign terrorist sleeper cells are present in the US and attacks in the US are likely." Clarke asked Berger to try to make sure that the domestic agencies remained alert." Is there a threat to civilian aircraft?"he wrote. Clarke also asked the principals in late December to discuss a foreign security service report about a Bin Laden plan to put bombs on transatlantic flights. The CSG met daily. Berger said that the principals met constantly. Later, when asked what made her decide to ask Ressam to step out of his vehicle, Diana Dean, a Customs inspector who referred Ressam to secondary inspection, testified that it was her "training and experience." It appears that the heightened sense of alert at the national level played no role in Ressam's detention. There was a mounting sense of public alarm. The earlier Jordanian arrests had been covered in the press, and Ressam's arrest was featured on network evening news broadcasts throughout the Christmas season. The FBI was more communicative during the millennium crisis than it had ever been.
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION: On what date did the warning "Foreign terrorist sleeper cells are present in the US and attacks in the US are likely." take place?

QUES: The second major point on which the principals had agreed on March 10 was the need to crack down on terrorist organizations and curtail their fund-raising. The embassy bombings of 1998 had focused attention on al Qaeda's finances. One result had been the creation of an NSC-led interagency committee on terrorist financing. On its recommendation, the President had designated Bin Laden and al Qaeda as subject to sanctions under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. This gave theTreasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) the ability to search for and freeze any Bin Laden or al Qaeda assets that reached the U.S. financial system. But since OFAC had little information to go on, few funds were frozen. In July 1999, the President applied the same designation to the Taliban for harboring Bin Laden. Here, OFAC had more success. It blocked more than $34 million in Taliban assets held in U.S. banks. Another $215 million in gold and $2 million in demand deposits, all belonging to the Afghan central bank and held by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, were also frozen. After October 1999, when the State Department formally designated al Qaeda a "foreign terrorist organization," it became the duty of U.S. banks to block its transactions and seize its funds. Neither this designation nor UN sanctions had much additional practical effect; the sanctions were easily circumvented, and there were no multilateral mechanisms to ensure that other countries' financial systems were not used as conduits for terrorist funding. Attacking the funds of an institution, even the Taliban, was easier than finding and seizing the funds of a clandestine worldwide organization like al Qaeda. Although the CIA's Bin Laden unit had originally been inspired by the idea of studying terrorist financial links, few personnel assigned to it had any experience in financial investigations. Any terrorist-financing intelligence appeared to have been collected collaterally, as a consequence of gathering other intelligence. This attitude may have stemmed in large part from the chief of this unit, who did not believe that simply following the money from point A to point B revealed much about the terrorists' plans and intentions. As a result, the CIA placed little emphasis on terrorist financing. Nevertheless, the CIA obtained a general understanding of how al Qaeda raised money.
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION:
Why was it easier to attack the funds of an institution, even the Taliban, than to find and seize the funds of a clandestine worldwide organization like al Qaeda?