APNewsBreak: Navy explores longer sub deployments

APNewsBreak: Navy explores longer sub deployments

In a Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011 photo, the commander of the U.S. Navy's submarine force, Vice Adm. John Richardson, is interviewed by The Associated Press at Naval Submarine Base New London in Groton, Conn. The Navy is considering extending the length of deployments on attack submarines, but won't say for how long, as it faces rising demands with a fleet that has been shrinking since the end of the Cold War, the commander of American submarine forces says.

GROTON, Conn. (AP) -- The Navy is considering lengthening the standard deployment of attack submarines beyond six months as it faces rising demands with a fleet that has been shrinking since the end of the Cold War, the commander of American submarine forces told The Associated Press in an interview.

Already, attack submarines are at times asked to stay out longer than six months - extensions that can be trying for sailors who serve in tightly confined spaces with limited outside communication as members of the "silent service."

Vice Adm. John Richardson told the AP this week that keeping subs out longer is one of several options the Navy is considering as the number of attack subs is projected to continue dropping in the next decade and beyond.

"I think we're looking at all the options," he said. "As you try and maintain the same presence with fewer hulls, there are all sorts of variables in that equation. One would be extending deployment lengths. So that's certainly on the table."

Submariners are not alone in seeing deployments extended periodically, as two wars and evolving threats strain the entire U.S. military. A spokeswoman for the admiral, Navy Cmdr. Monica Rousselow, said it is impossible to say how long sub deployments might become because so many factors are involved.

Extending deployments permanently would save resources because the Navy could complete more missions with the nuclear-powered submarines that it has available. The fast-attack subs travel to far-flung corners of the globe for missions including intelligence gathering and firing missiles, but they can maintain a presence only for so long before making the time-consuming journey back to U.S. bases.

Navy contractors began stepping up submarine production this year, but pressure on the defense budget has raised uncertainty about future procurement. While some critics describe the multibillion-dollar vessels as costly relics of a different era, Richardson says submarines remain integral to America's nuclear deterrence strategy and the security of a nation that conducts the vast majority of its trade by maritime channels.

Enlisted crew members on the attack subs sleep six to a room, stacked in bunk areas barely larger than a closet, and navigate corridors so narrow only one person can pass at a time. The deployments are typically broken up by port calls, but they can remain at sea for weeks or months at a time. The bigger, roomier ballistic missile subs generally stay closer to their home ports and have shorter deployments.

Sailors in the elite, all-volunteer submarine force go through psychological screening to make sure they can cope with the tight quarters and extended time beneath the ocean's surface. Nobody with claustrophobic tendencies is allowed on board.

But retired submariners say the time at sea does take a physical and emotional toll, particularly when a mission is suddenly extended.

"You establish a battle rhythm in your mind where `Six months is how long I'll be' and then, if it becomes seven months, you have to shift your mind a bit," said retired Rear Adm. John Padgett III, who remembers a particularly grueling 7 1/2-month submarine deployment during the Vietnam War. "You get a little tired of it."

Deployments longer than six months are unlikely to cause problems for specially trained sailors, but they would probably entail challenges for their families, said Army Col. Tom Kolditz, a psychologist at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

"You can probably find business decisions in the community based on that six-month cycle. You can find various kinds of financial planning done on that six-month cycle. If you take something like that that people are used to and change it, it can create problems," said Kolditz, director of the military academy's Department of Behavioral Sciences and Leadership.

One submariner's wife, Marie Hobson, said in an e-mail to the AP that longer deployments would make it harder on families, who are discouraged from writing or talking with sailors about anything stressful, to avoid affecting morale.

"As a wife, I don't know my breaking point. I can't tell you the magic number that a deployment would have to pass for me to throw my hands up and say, `I'm done.' The stress comes from the limited contact," said Hobson, who writes a blog about her experiences as a military wife.

At Naval Submarine Base New London in Groton, support services are available to help sailors' families deal with prolonged deployments, said Beth Darius, a services facilitator for the base's Fleet and Family Support Center.

"We honestly try to tell them, `Yes, you have a fixed date, but remember that date can always change,'" she said. "We try to help them not cement that date, but I personally know how easy it is to get that date and count down, and then have it change on you."

Richardson said in the interview Wednesday that constraints on communication are part of the nature of submarining, but that the Navy is working to improve bandwidth on the vessels. He said sailors will be able to communicate with family members more than ever, although e-mail will remain available only when it can be sent without the risk of giving up the sub's location.

Beyond the strain on sailors and their families, U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney said, the longer deployments reflect an increasingly acute security problem. Although Navy contractors received approval this year to double production of Virginia-class attack subs to two a year, he said that will only slow the decline in the size of the fleet and will not fully replace older ships as they are taken out of commission.

The number of nuclear-powered attack submarines in the U.S. force has fallen from a peak of 98 in the late 1980s to 53 at the end of fiscal year 2010, a decline that roughly matches a drop in the overall size of the Navy since the end of the Cold War. Each Virginia-class attack submarine costs about $2.6 billion and carries a crew of roughly 135 officers and sailors.

Courtney, who is pushing for an increase in attack sub procurement, said they are unmatched in their ability to deliver firepower and do surveillance without being detected.

"Look at Libya. When President Obama said `unique capabilities,' what he was really referring to was the USS Scranton, the Providence and the Florida, which in a matter of an hour obliterated Gadhafi's air defenses," said Courtney, a Democrat whose eastern Connecticut district includes the sub base and the Groton headquarters of the Navy's primary submarine contractor, General Dynamics' Electric Boat.

Currently, the submarine force can accommodate only about half the support requests from combatant commanders, according to Richardson, who said sub deployments are currently extended a month or more to meet demands on a case-by-case basis. He noted that surface ships also face extended deployments, as all branches of the military contend with increased demands.

As the Navy deals with rising security demands and budget pressures, he said, the force is also looking into repositioning submarines around the globe to reduce transit times and pressing builders to reduce maintenance periods and wring more deployments from aging vessels.

US strike kills American al-Qaida cleric in Yemen

US strike kills American al-Qaida cleric in Yemen

FILE - In this Nov. 8, 2010 file image taken from video and released by SITE Intelligence Group on Monday, Anwar al-Awlaki speaks in a video message posted on radical websites. A senior U.S. counterterrorism official says U.S. intelligence indicates that U.S.-born al-Qaida cleric Anwar al-Awlaki has been killed in Yemen.

SANAA, Yemen (AP) -- The killing of U.S.-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki and another American militant propagandist in a U.S. airstrike Friday wipes out the decisive factor that made al-Qaida's branch in Yemen the most dangerous threat to the United States: its reach into the West.

Issuing English-language sermons on jihad on the Internet from his hideouts in Yemen's mountains, al-Awlaki drew Muslim recruits like the young Nigerian who tried to bring down a U.S. jet on Christmas and the Pakistani-American behind the botched car bombing in New York City's Times Square.

Friday's drone attack was believed to be the first instance in which a U.S. citizen was tracked and killed based on secret intelligence and the president's say-so. Al-Awkaki was placed on the CIA "kill or capture" list by the Obama administration in April 2010 - the first American to be so targeted.

The other American killed in the strike, Samir Khan, published a slick English-language Web magazine, "Inspire," that spouted al-Qaida's ideology of attacks on Westerners and even gave how-to manuals on how to carry one out - like an article titled, "Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom."

Their voices elevated the several hundred al-Qaida fighters hiding out in Yemen into a greater threat than similar affiliates of the terror network in North Africa, Somalia or east Asia.

President Barack Obama heralded the strike as a "major blow to al-Qaida's most active operational affiliate," saying the 40-year-old al-Awlaki was the group's "leader of external operations."

"In that role, he took the lead in planning and directing efforts to murder innocent Americans," Obama told reporters in Washington, saying al-Awlaki plotted the Christmas 2009 airplane bombing attempt and a foiled attempt in 2010 to mail explosives to the United States.

Al-Awlaki's death was the biggest success in the Obama administration's intensified campaign to take out al-Qaida's leadership since the May killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. The pursuit of al-Awlaki and Friday's strike were directed by the same U.S. special unit that directed the Navy SEALs raid on bin Laden's hideout.

After three weeks of tracking the targets, U.S. armed drones and fighter jets shadowed al-Awlaki's convoy, before drones launched the lethal strike early Friday, U.S. officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss matters of intelligence.

Al-Awlaki and his comrades were moving through a desert region east of Yemen's capital near the village of Khasaf between mountain strongholds in the provinces of Jawf and Marib when the drone struck, U.S. and Yemeni officials said.

A tribal chief in the area told The Associated Press that the brother of one of those killed witnessed the strike. The brother, who had sheltered the group in his home nearby, said the group had stopped for breakfast in the desert and were sitting on the ground eating when they saw the drone approaching. They rushed to their truck to drive off when the missiles hit, incinerating the vehicle, according to the tribal chief, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not want to be associated with the incident.

U.S. officials said two other militants were killed in the strike. But the tribal chief, who helped bury the bodies in a Jawf cemetery, said seven people were killed, including al-Awlaki, Khan, two midlevel Yemeni al-Qaida members, two Saudis and another Yemeni. The differing numbers could not immediately be reconciled.

Al-Awlaki, who was born in New Mexico to Yemeni parents, had been in the U.S. cross-hairs since his killing was approved by Obama last year. At least twice, airstrikes were called in on locations in Yemen where al-Awlaki was suspected of being, but he wasn't harmed.

In July, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said al-Awlaki was a priority target alongside Ayman al-Zawahri, bin Laden's successor as the terror network's leader.

Bruce Riedel, a Brookings senior fellow and former CIA officer, cautioned that while al-Awlaki was the "foremost propagandist," for al-Qaida's Yemen branch, his death "doesn't really significantly change its fortunes."

Al-Qaida's branch "is intact and arguably growing faster than ever before because of the chaos in Yemen," he said.

Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, as the terror branch in Yemen is called, has been operating in Yemen for years, led by a Yemeni militant and former bin Laden aide named Nasser al-Wahishi. Its main goal has been the toppling of Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh and targeting the monarchy in neighboring Saudi Arabia, and its several hundreds militants have found refuge among tribes in Yemen's mountainous regions, where the Sanaa government has little control.

Amid the past seven months of political turmoil in Yemen, al-Qaida and other Islamic militants have gained even more of a foothold, seizing control of at least three towns and cities in the south and battling with the army.

Al-Wahishi placed major importance on propaganda efforts.

In the latest issue of Inspire, put out earlier this month, Khan - a U.S. citizen of Pakistani heritage - recounted meeting the Yemeni al-Qaida leader. "'Remember,' he said, as other mujahedeen were busy working on their computers in the background. 'The media work is half of the jihad'," Khan wrote.

Al-Awlaki gave the group its international voice.

He was young, fluent in English, well-acquainted with Western culture and with the discontent of young Muslims there. His numerous video sermons, circulated on YouTube and other sites, offered a measured political argument - interspersed with religious lessons - that the United States must be fought for waging wars against Muslims.

Downloads of his sermons were found in the laptops and computers of several groups arrested for plotting attacks in the United States and Britain.

Al-Awlaki exchanged up to 20 emails with U.S. Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, accused of opening fire at the U.S. military base at Fort Hood, Texas, killing 13 people, in a 2009 rampage. Hasan initiated the contacts, drawn by al-Awlaki's Internet sermons.

Al-Awlaki has said he didn't tell Hasan to carry out the shootings, but he later praised Hasan as a "hero" on his website.

In New York, the Pakistani-American who pleaded guilty to the May 2010 Times Square car bombing attempt told interrogators he was "inspired" by al-Awlaki after making contact over the Internet.

But U.S. officials say al-Awlaki moved beyond being just a mouthpiece into a direct operational role in organizing such attacks as he hid alongside al-Qaida militants in the rugged mountains of Yemen.

Most notably, they believe he was involved in recruiting and preparing Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian who tried to blow up a U.S. airliner heading to Detroit on Christmas 2009, failing only because he botched the detonation of explosives sewn into his underpants.

Yemeni officials say they believe al-Awlaki and other al-Qaida leaders met with Abdulmutallab in a Yemen hideout in the weeks before the failed bombing. Al-Awlaki has said Abdulmutallab was his "student" but said he never told him to carry out the airline attack.

Al-Awlaki began as a mosque preacher as he conducted his university studies in the United States, and he was not seen by his congregations as radical. While preaching in San Diego, he came to know two of the men who would eventually become suicide-hijackers in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The FBI questioned al-Awlaki at the time but found no cause to detain him.

In 2004, al-Awlaki returned to Yemen, and in the years that followed, his English-language Internet sermons increasingly turned to denunciations of the United States and calls for jihad, or holy war. Since the Fort Hood attack, he has been on the run alongside al-Qaida militants.

U.S. terrorism expert Evan Kohlman said al-Awlaki's death doesn't affect al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula's military capabilities. "The one area it makes a difference is, it limits the ability of AQAP to put out more English-language propaganda," at least in the short term.

"Al-Awlaki's greatest importance really is a recruiter for homegrown terrorism," he said. "There is no doubt he has provided assistance to recruiting people on behalf of AQAP."

But Kohlman noted that al-Awlaki's sermons and calls for jihad remain on the Web and "in some ways you could say they may be even more effective now because he has been martyred for his cause. ... That is a powerful lesson."

AP Exclusive: US fugitive lived openly in Africa

AP Exclusive: US fugitive lived openly in Africa

In this photo released by Noticias de Colares on Thursday Sept. 29, 2011, U.S. fugitive George Wright is seen in a post office in Praia das Macas, Portugal in 2000. Wright was arrested Sept. 26, 2011 by Portuguese authorities at the request of the U.S. government after more than 40 years as a fugitive, authorities said. The FBI says Wright, who escaped the Bayside State Prison in Leesburg, N.J., in 1970, became affiliated with the Black Liberation Army and in 1972 he and his associates hijacked a Delta flight from Detroit to Miami. After releasing the passengers in exchange for a $1 million ransom, the hijackers forced the plane to fly to Boston, then on to Algeria. Wright is being held in Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, pending extradition hearings. He has asked to be released while the extradition process goes forward, and the court handling the case is considering his request, according to U.S. officials.

LISBON, Portugal (AP) -- A convicted American killer who disappeared after a 1972 hijacking lived openly in West Africa under his real name for years and even socialized with U.S. embassy officials there, a former U.S. ambassador said Thursday.

The comments by John Blacken, a retired U.S. ambassador to Guinea-Bissau, raised new questions about a decades-long FBI manhunt for George Wright, who managed to elude authorities for 41 years until being arrested Monday in Portugal.

Blacken told The Associated Press he was stunned to hear about Wright's arrest because he knew him and his wife - who might have even worked on translation projects for the U.S. embassy. But Blacken had no idea that Wright was a fugitive.

In Washington, the U.S. State Department had no immediate comment.

Wright's years on the lam took him across the globe - from New Jersey to Detroit to Algeria to France to Guinea-Bissau and then Portugal, at the very least.

When Blacken served as ambassador from 1986 to 1989 in the former Portuguese colony of Guinea-Bissau, Wright had already escaped from jail in New Jersey while serving time for murder and was wanted in the 1972 hijacking by the Black Liberation Army of a U.S. plane to Algeria.

"All this was a big surprise, my goodness, murder and everything else," Blacken said in an telephone interview from Bissau, the capital of Guinea-Bissau. "No one imagined him being a murderer. Of course we didn't know him that well. He seemed like an ordinary person and not radical at all."

A fingerprint on Wright's Portuguese ID card was the break that led a U.S. fugitive task force to him, according to U.S. authorities. But for decades his file was in the unsolved "cold cases" section for U.S. law enforcement.

Blacken said he was never alerted by U.S. law enforcement officials about Wright's background.

"If we had received such a cable, we would have responded," Blacken added. "He was known as George Wright here, and it's strange that (U.S. officials) never tracked him down here."

It was not clear what action, if any, Blacken could have taken in a nation that at the time was very sympathetic to those it perceived as freedom fighters.

Michael Ward, head of the FBI in Newark, N.J., said it wasn't unusual that Wright could have lived undetected overseas for so long.

"Obviously communication abilities were much less back in the 70's and the 80's than they are today," Ward said. "You're dealing with someone with a common name who is living a low-key lifestyle and those factors would have contributed to him going unnoticed at the time."

Ward said New Jersey's Fugitive Task Force was able to track him down and break open the case with today's better investigative techniques and improved technology.

"It was a combination of persistence in the investigation, but also law enforcement techniques across the board have improved in the last 40 years. These days, everyone is just better at what they do," Ward said.

Ann Patterson, whose father Walter was killed by Wright in a 1962 gas station robbery in New Jersey, was surprised to learn that Wright lived in plain sight and managed to remain undetected in Guinea-Bissau using his real name.

"He just got away with everything. He was very adept at what he did. This is unreal," she said Thursday.

Blacken could not recall what sort of work Wright did in Guinea-Bissau, a tiny nation on the Atlantic Ocean. He knew Wright's Portuguese wife, Maria do Rosario Valente, better because she had worked as a freelance Portuguese-English translator, possibly even for the embassy.

Wright and his wife were already married when Blacken knew them, and Wright has lived for at least the last two decades in Portugal. A photocopy of his Portuguese residency card listed his home country as Guinea-Bissau.

A woman at the Guinea-Bissau embassy in Lisbon said no one was available to comment on whether Wright obtained citizenship from the African nation, but doing so in the 1980s was relatively easy for foreigners.

Wright's arrest has generated intense media interest in Portugal. International camera crews were staked out Thursday around his pretty house on a cobbled street not far from a stunning Atlantic Ocean beach in Almocageme, 28 miles (45 kilometers) west of Lisbon.

He is being held in Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, pending extradition hearings and will likely remain in detention for at least several weeks while his lawyer and lawyers for the United States present their legal arguments, said the president of the Lisbon court.

Wright has asked to be released during the process and can appeal the extradition decision to the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Court, a process likely to last months, the judge, Luis Maria Vaz das Neves, told The AP.

Vaz das Neves declined to provide details of the arguments because that information is not available to the public in Portugal, but said authorities are trying to determine whether Wright's Portuguese identity documents are valid.

"The citizen is American, though he said he also has Portuguese nationality, but that remains to be resolved," Vaz das Neves said.

Blacken didn't know if Wright had obtained citizenship when he was in Guinea-Bissau, but said it wouldn't have been too hard to do.

"A person living here for over a period of time who wants to apply for citizenship can normally get it regardless of his background," Blacken said.

The leftist Socialist authorities in Guinea-Bissau at the time might have even been impressed if Wright had told them about his past, said Jan Van Maanen, honorary consul for the Netherlands and Britain in Guinea-Bissau.

"In the 70s and the 80s, they used to use passports and therefore nationality as something to decorate people with," Van Maanen said.

In the United States, Wright was convicted of murder and hijacked a plane.

Eight years into his 15- to 30-year prison term, Wright and three other men escaped from the Bayside State Prison in Leesburg, New Jersey, on Aug. 19, 1970. The FBI said Wright then joined an underground militant group, the Black Liberation Army, and lived in Detroit.

In 1972, Wright - dressed as a priest and using an alias - hijacked a Delta flight from Detroit to Miami along with other BLA members, police said. After releasing the plane's 86 other passengers for a $1 million ransom, the hijackers forced the plane to fly to Boston, then to Algeria, where the hijackers sought asylum.

Algeria returned the plane and the money to the United States but allowed the hijackers to stay.

Wright and the other hijackers left Algeria in late 1972 or early 1973 and settled in France, where they got jobs and lived together, said Mikhael Ganouna, producer of the 2010 documentary "Nobody Knows my Name" about the hijacking.

But Wright left the group, and his associates were subsequently tracked down, arrested and convicted in Paris in 1976. The French government, however, refused to extradite them to the United States.

Until his arrest Monday, life was sweet for Wright in the Portuguese hamlet of Almocageme, where neighbors said he lived for at least 20 years with his wife and two children, now in their 20s.

Locals knew him as Jorge Santos, a friendly man from Africa who did odd jobs and spoke fluent Portuguese. Over the years, he worked as a nightclub bouncer, a beach stall salesman and ran a barbecue chicken restaurant.

His wife answered the door Wednesday at their whitewashed house but refused to comment on her husband's arrest.

Could model airplanes become a terrorist weapon?

Could model airplanes become a terrorist weapon?

This undated photo released Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011 by the U.S. Department of Justice shows a large remote controlled aircraft similar to what the department says suspect Rezwan Ferdaus plotted to fill with C-4 plastic explosives to use in an attack of the Pentagon and U.S. Capital. Ferdaus of Ashland, Mass., was arrested in a federal sting operation Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011 in Framingham, Mass.

BOSTON (AP) -- Model airplanes are suddenly on the public's radar as potential terrorist weapons. A Muslim American from suburban Boston was arrested Wednesday and accused of plotting to attack the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol with remote-controlled model planes packed with explosives.

These are not balsa-wood-and-rubber-band toys investigators are talking about. The FBI said Rezwan Ferdaus hoped to use military-jet replicas, 5 to 7 1/2 feet long, guided by GPS devices and capable of speeds over 100 mph.

Federal officials have long been aware of the possibility someone might try to use such planes as weapons, but there are no restrictions on their purchase - Ferdaus is said to have bought his over the Internet.

Counterterrorism experts and model-aircraft hobbyists said it would be nearly impossible to inflict large-scale damage of the sort Ferdaus allegedly envisioned using model planes. The aircraft are too small, can't carry enough explosives and are too tricky to fly, they said.

"The idea of pushing a button and this thing diving into the Pentagon is kind of joke, actually," said Greg Hahn, technical director of the Academy of Model Aeronautics.

Rick Nelson, former Navy helicopter pilot who is now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Ferdaus would have had to hit a window or other vulnerable area to maximize damage, and that would have taken precision flying.

"Flying a remote-controlled plane isn't as easy as it actually looks, and then to put an explosive on it and have that explosive detonate at the time and place that you want it add to the difficulty of actually doing it," he said.

Ferdaus, 26, of Ashland, was arrested after federal agents posing as al Qaida members delivered what he believed was 24 pounds of C-4 explosive, authorities said. He was charged with attempting to damage or destroy a federal building with explosives.

Ferdaus had a physics degree from Northeastern University and enjoyed "taking stuff apart" and "learning on my own," according to court papers.

The model planes Ferdaus eyed were the F-4 Phantom and the F-86 Sabre, small-scale versions of military jets, investigators said. The F-4 is the more expensive of the two, at up to $20,000, Hahn said. The F-86, one of which Ferdaus actually obtained, costs $6,000 to $10,000 new.

Ferdaus' plan, as alleged in court papers, was to launch three such planes from a park near the Pentagon and Capitol and use GPS to direct them toward the buildings, where they would detonate on impact and blow the Capitol dome to "smithereens." He planned to pack five pounds of plastic explosives on each plane, according to prosecutors.

James Crippin, an explosives and anti-terrorism expert, said that much C-4 could do serious damage - a half-pound will obliterate a car. But he said getting a stable explosive like C-4 to blow up at the right time would have been hugely difficult.

And there were slim prospects of causing any serious damage to buildings like the Pentagon and Capitol, which are undoubtedly hardened to withstand explosions, according to Crippin, director of the Western Forensic Law Enforcement Training Center.

"Basically, I think he's suffering from delusions of grandeur," he said.

Hahn said the heavier of the two models Ferdaus was allegedly planning to use could carry a maximum of two pounds of plastic explosive before malfunctioning. That's not including the weight of any GPS system, he added.

"It's almost impossible for him to get this done," he said.

Remote-controlled aircraft have been considered by terrorists before. In 2008, Christopher Paul of Ohio pleaded guilty to plotting terrorist attacks in the U.S. and Europe using explosive devices. Prosecutors said he researched remote-controlled boats and a remote-controlled 5-foot-long helicopter.

And after Sept. 11, federal agents asked the Academy of Model Aeronautics' 143,000 members to watch for any fellow enthusiasts who might be buying planes with bad intentions.

Well before the Massachusetts arrest, police in Montgomery County, Md., put out a terrorist warning to hobby shops to be aware of customers "who don't appear to be hobbyists" buying model airplanes with cash and asking how they can be modified to carry a device.

The Federal Aviation Administration is devising new rules for model airplanes and other unmanned aircraft, but the restrictions are aimed primarily at preventing collisions. Under current FAA rules, such planes are generally limited to flying below 400 feet and away from airports and air traffic.

Massachusetts prosecutor Gerry Leone, who handled the prosecution of would-be shoe bomber Richard Reid, said terrorists are always building bombs out of common, legitimate items, and imposing restrictions on buying model aircraft would not make sense simply because of this one case.

But he said law enforcement might want be more vigilant about such purchases.

Similarly, Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said recent advances in model airplane technology could make them more attractive to terrorists. But he said the answer is better intelligence, not trying to regulate hobbyists and their toys.

"Kids have them, people fly them, groups are organized just to engage in this type of pastime activity," the congressman said. "It would be almost impossible to regulate the little engines and things, propellers."

Pennsylvania Electoral College Proposal Divides GOP Officals, Public | The Rundown News Blog | PBS NewsHour | PBS

Pennsylvania Electoral College Proposal Divides GOP Officals, Public | The Rundown News Blog | PBS NewsHour | PBS:

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Noncandidates are keeping presidential buzz alive

Noncandidates are keeping presidential buzz alive

FILE - In this Sept. 27, 2011 file photo, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie speaks at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif. Chris Christie insists he's not running for president, but he flies around the country giving speeches and raising Republican money with a sly smile. Donald Trump might run as an independent. And Sarah Palin gets air time by hinting she'll announce some decision soon. Welcome to the Big Tease, driven by a combination of publicity, old-fashioned ego and possible presidential ambitions down the road.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Chris Christie isn't running for president but says he's listening to those who want him to. Donald Trump opted out of a bid for the Republican nomination but hasn't ruled out running as an independent. Rudy Giuliani's aides are courting New Hampshire activists. And Sarah Palin says she'll decide soon whether to join the field, even as she worries the White House might be "too shackling."

Welcome to The Big Tease, when political stars stoke the hopes of supporters by hinting they just might join the presidential fray.

A few do succumb to the temptation - most recently Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who joined the GOP field in August after months of insisting absolutely he had no interest. Others milk their moment in the spotlight, boosting their national stature, broadening their fundraising base and laying the foundation for a possible future run.

It happens in many presidential years. Democrats swooned, for a while, for New York Gov. Mario Cuomo in 1992; there was a Gen. Wesley Clark boomlet in 2004 and a drumbeat around former Republican Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee in 2008.

Cuomo stayed out, but his prolonged indecision earned him the nickname Hamlet on the Hudson. Clark and Thompson both jumped in late, only to flame out quickly.

Perry, for his part, has already learned the perils of a late entry.

After joining the race with great fanfare and rocketing to the top of the polls, Perry's shaky performance in two nationally televised debates have left many GOP activists worried he isn't prepared to be the party's standard-bearer against President Barack Obama. But many also remain skeptical of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. He's had a relatively smooth run this time after losing the nomination in 2008, but he still hasn't fired up much passionate support.

All of which explains why Christie mania was at full boil Tuesday, when the New Jersey governor delivered a long-planned speech at the Reagan Presidential Library in California.

He turned in a stinging indictment of both parties' leadership in Washington. And while he restated his refusal to enter the race, he told a woman begging him to reconsider that he was "touched" by her plea.

"The reason has to reside inside me," he said. "My answer to you is just this: I take it in, and I'm listening to every word of it and I feel it."

Giuliani, the former New York mayor, dispatched a key emissary to New Hampshire Wednesday to gauge interest among top Republicans.

One of the mayor's closest political advisers, Jake Menges, hosted private meetings with members of the Granite State congressional delegation, Manchester Mayor Ted Gatsas, likely gubernatorial candidate Kevin Smith and GOP activist Stephen Talarico, owner of Manchester Harley-Davidson.

"Jake said to me, `Just keep your powder dry for another few weeks,'" Talarico said.

Palin, the former Alaska governor who was the GOP vice-presidential nominee in 2008, was also pressed on her presidential ambitions Tuesday in an interview on Fox News. She said - again - she hadn't made a decision but did indicate she had concerns about going forward.

"Is a title worth it? Does a title shackle a person?" Palin asked. "Are they - someone like me, maverick, you know, I do go rogue, and I call it like I see it, and I don't mind stirring it up. ... Is a title and is a campaign too shackling?"

Ari Fleischer, a former press secretary for President George W. Bush, said it's "plain and simple too late" for anyone to join the GOP field. But he said different candidates have different reasons for keeping the speculation alive.

"Chris Christie has a future and needs to be protective of his future. All this interest helps him raise money for Republican candidates and enjoy one last flirtation," Fleischer said. "Palin beats to a different drum, so this just keeps her in the game longer. She likes being the center of attention and the focus."

Palin may not be the only noncandidate who enjoys the attention. New Jersey's Christie said being asked to be the leader of the free world is an ego-feed.

"What kind of crazy egomaniac would you have to be to say, `Ugh, please stop'? New Jersey's Christie asked a fundraising audience. "It's extraordinarily flattering."

Obama appeals health care setback to high court

Obama appeals health care setback to high court

Retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, 91, works in his office at the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011. His new book is titled "Five Chiefs: A Supreme Court Memoir," a personal reflection on the five chief justices he has known.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Raising prospects for a major election-year ruling, the Obama administration launched its Supreme Court defense of its landmark health care overhaul Wednesday, appealing what it called a "fundamentally flawed" appeals court decision that declared the law's central provision unconstitutional.

Destined from the start for a high court showdown, the health care law affecting virtually every American seems sure to figure prominently in President Barack Obama's campaign for re-election next year. Republican contenders are already assailing it in virtually every debate and speech.

The administration formally appealed a ruling by the federal appeals court in Atlanta that struck down the law's core requirement that individuals buy health insurance or pay a penalty beginning in 2014.

At the same time, however, the winners in that appellate case, 26 states and the National Federation of Independent Business, also asked for high court review Wednesday, saying the entire law, and not just the individual insurance mandate, should be struck down.

The Supreme Court almost always weighs in when a lower court has struck down all or part of a federal law, to say nothing of one that aims to extend insurance coverage to more than 30 million Americans.

The bigger question had been the timing. The administration's filing makes it more likely that the case will be heard and decided in the term that begins next week.

Repeating arguments it has made in courts across the country in response to many challenges to the law, the administration said Congress was well within its constitutional power to enact the insurance requirement.

Disagreeing with that, the 26 states and business group said in their filings that the justices should act before the 2012 presidential election because of uncertainty over costs and requirements.

On the issue of timing, their cause got an unexpected boost from retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, who said voters would be better off if they knew the law's fate law before casting their ballots next year.

The 91-year-old Stevens said in an Associated Press interview that the justices would not shy away from deciding the case in the middle of a presidential campaign and would be doing the country a service. "It would be better to have that known about than be speculated as a part of the political argument," Stevens said in his Supreme Court office overlooking the Capitol.

Though the Atlanta appeals court struck down the individual insurance requirement, it upheld the rest of the law. The states and the business group say that would still impose huge new costs.

In another challenge to the same law, the federal appeals court in Cincinnati sided with the administration. In a separate Supreme Court filing Tuesday night, the Obama administration said it does not appear necessary to grant review of the Cincinnati case and the government added that consolidating the two cases could complicate the presentation of arguments "without a sufficient corresponding benefit."

The law would extend health coverage mainly through subsidies to purchase private insurance and an expansion of Medicaid. The states object to the Medicaid expansion and a provision forcing them to cover their employees' health care at a level set by the government.

The individual insurance mandate "indisputably served as the centerpiece of the delicate compromise that produced" the law, according to the states, with Florida taking the lead.

The administration said in the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the law's changes in the insurance market, including requiring insurers to cover people without regard for pre-existing health conditions, would not work without the participation mandate.

The insurance requirement is intended to force healthier people who might otherwise forgo insurance into the pool of insured, helping to reduce private insurers' financial risk.

Both appeals stressed the importance of resolving the overhaul's constitutionality as soon as possible, which under normal court procedures would be by June 2012.

While a decision in that time frame would come in the midst of a heated presidential campaign, the NFIB said it is more important to resolve uncertainty about costs and requirements than drag out consideration into 2013 or beyond.

"When you talk to our members and other small-business owners about what is the biggest problem they're facing, they say uncertainty," said Karen Harned, executive director of the NFIB's legal division. "When you ask what, one of first answers is the health care law."

Stevens, who retired last year, said his former colleagues would not be affected by the potential impact of their decision on Obama's re-election chances.

"They'll decide it on the law. I'm totally convinced of that," he said.

Obama appointed Stevens' successor, Elena Kagan.

Stevens said that if he still had a vote on the court on timing, he would cast it in favor of hearing the case sooner rather than later. He would not say how he would vote on the issue of the law's constitutionality, although he said the court's 6-3 decision in a 2005 case involving medical marijuana seems to lend support to the administration's defense of the law.

Stevens wrote the opinion that held that the Constitution allows federal regulation of homegrown marijuana as interstate commerce. A central dispute in the health care case is over Congress's power under the Constitution's commerce clause to mandate the purchase of health insurance.

In addition to the competing rulings on the law's validity, a federal appeals court in Richmond, Va., ruled that it was premature to decide the law's constitutionality. Citing a federal law aimed at preventing lawsuits from tying up tax collection, that court held that a definitive ruling could come only after taxpayers begin paying the penalty for not purchasing insurance.

The administration suggested that the Supreme Court should consider that issue because of the appellate ruling.

The federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., also heard arguments in yet another lawsuit against the overhaul last week. That court has no timetable for its decision.

The other states aligned with Florida are: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming.

2,000-year-old Dead Sea Scrolls go online

2,000-year-old Dead Sea Scrolls go online

Shai Halevi, a photographer working for the Israel Antiquities Authority, IAA, photographs fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls, at the IAA offices at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, Monday, Sept. 26, 2011. Two thousand years after they were written and decades after they were found in desert caves, some of the world-famous Dead Sea Scrolls are available online. Israel's national museum and the international web giant Google are behind the project, which saw five scrolls go online Monday.

JERUSALEM (AP) -- Two thousand years after they were written and decades after they were found in desert caves, some of the world-famous Dead Sea Scrolls went online for the first time on Monday in a project launched by Israel's national museum and the web giant Google.

The appearance of five of the most important Dead Sea scrolls on the Internet is part of a broader attempt by the custodians of the celebrated manuscripts - who were once criticized for allowing them to be monopolized by small circles of scholars - to make them available to anyone with a computer.

The scrolls include the biblical Book of Isaiah, the manuscript known as the Temple Scroll, and three others. Surfers can search high-resolution images of the scrolls for specific passages, zoom in and out, and translate verses into English.

The originals are kept in a secured vault in a Jerusalem building constructed specifically to house the scrolls. Access requires at least three different keys, a magnetic card and a secret code.

The five scrolls are among those purchased by Israeli researchers between 1947 and 1967 from antiquities dealers, having first been found by Bedouin shepherds in the Judean Desert.

The scrolls, considered by many to be the most significant archaeological find of the 20th century, are thought to have been written or collected by an ascetic Jewish sect that fled Jerusalem for the desert 2,000 years ago and settled at Qumran, on the banks of the Dead Sea. The hundreds of manuscripts that survived, partially or in full, in caves near the site, have shed light on the development of the Hebrew Bible and the origins of Christianity.

The most complete scrolls are held by the Israel Museum, with more pieces and smaller fragments found in other institutions and private collections. Tens of thousands of fragments from 900 Dead Sea manuscripts are held by the Israel Antiquities Authority, which has separately begun its own project to put them online in conjunction with Google.

Photography work on the project began earlier this month in conjunction with a former NASA scientist. An advanced $250,000 camera developed in Santa Barbara, California allows researchers to discern words and other details not visible to the naked eye.

The latest photography effort by two technicians is centered on a fragment of a manuscript known as the Thanksgiving Scroll. On a computer screen was a piece of the Apocryphon of Daniel, an Aramaic text that includes a verse referring to a figure who "will be called the son of God." The first fragments of that will be online by the end of the year.

The Antiquities Authority project, aimed chiefly at scholars, is tentatively set to be complete by 2016, at which point nearly all of the scrolls will be available on the Internet.

Libya orders state security courts abolished

Libya orders state security courts abolished

Mohammed Sayad, 18, student, shows his neckless with a pre-Gadhafi's flag, at the beach in Tripoli, Libya, Monday, Sept. 26, 2011.

TRIPOLI, Libya (AP) -- Libya's transitional justice minister said Monday that he has approved a measure to abolish the country's state security prosecution and courts, which sentenced opponents of the old regime to prison.

At a press conference in Tripoli, Mohammed al-Alagi, part of Libya's new leadership after the ouster of Moammar Gadhafi, said he has signed a document to disband the bodies. The step still needs approval by the National Transitional Council that now runs the country.

"I am personally very happy to sign an approval to end the state security prosecution and court, and the state security appeals court," al-Alagi said.

He said the document includes a request to abolish a third court for special cases where many opposition members were sentenced to life terms in prisons like Abu Salim in Tripoli, where inmates were massacred by Gadhafi's regime.

Libyans are pressing forward with efforts to do away with some of the most hated remnants of the former regime even though fighting continues and the ousted leader's whereabouts remains unknown.

Hundreds of civilians fled Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte Monday to escape growing shortages of food and medicine and escalating fears that their homes will be struck during fighting between revolutionary forces and regime loyalists.

Anti-Gadhafi fighters launched their offensive against Sirte nearly two weeks ago, but have faced fierce resistance from loyalists holed up inside the city. After a bloody push into Sirte again over the weekend, revolutionary fighters say they have pulled back to plan their assault and allow civilians more time to flee.

NATO, which has played a key role in decimating Gadhafi's military during the Libyan civil war, has kept up its air campaign since the fall of Tripoli last month. The alliance said Monday its warplanes struck eight military targets near Sirte a day earlier, including an ammunition and vehicle storage facility and rocket launcher.

Sirte, 250 miles (400 kilometers) southeast of Tripoli on the Mediterranean coast, is one of the last remaining bastions of Gadhafi loyalists since revolutionary fighters stormed into the capital last month. The fugitive leader's supporters also remain in control of the town of Bani Walid, southeast of Tripoli, and pockets of territory in the country's south.

Civilians fleeing Sirte Monday described grave shortages of food, fuel, drinking water and medicine.

Eman Mohammed, a 30-year-old doctor at the city's central Ibn Sina Hospital, said the facility was short on most medicines and had no oxygen in the operating rooms. She said most days, patients who reach the hospital find no one to treat them because fuel shortages and fear keep staff from coming to work.

She said many recent injuries appear to be caused by revolutionary forces. "Most of the people killed or injured recently are from the shelling," she said.

Forces on the city's outskirts fire tank shells, Grad rockets and mortar rounds toward the city daily with little more than a general idea of what they are targeting. NATO, meanwhile, is operating in Libya under a mandate to protect civilians.

Mohammed, who is from the Warfala tribe that has traditionally supported Gadhafi, said most of the fighters in the city are armed volunteers fighting for personal reasons.

"There is a bloody aspect to it," she said, standing at a rebel checkpoint outside the city. "Many people died in the battlefield as martyrs, so their relatives are angry. It doesn't have to do with Gadhafi anymore. It's more about revenge than about anything else."

She said she didn't expect the fighters to surrender easily.

"It is just simple resistance, just those who lost relatives or who are defending their homes," she said.

Others said they also felt endangered by the fighting.

"We got scared for our children," said Amir Ali, 40, who ran a metal workshop in the city for years. He fled with his five children when the explosions got too close to their home.

"It comes from both sides," he said. "I have no idea what kind of weapons they are, but it's all heavy stuff."

He said the shortages keep many people who would like to flee from getting out.

"There are many people inside who don't have cars to leave or can't get gas," he said. "Others don't want to leave."

In a boost to Libya's economy, Italian and French energy companies have resumed partial oil production in Libya after months of civil war, a potential economic lifeline for Libya's new government as it scrambles to rebuild.

Officials of Libya's transitional government are still awaiting U.N. action to unfreeze billions of dollars in assets. They say the funds unfrozen so far aren't enough to significantly rebuild Libya's health, education and other institutions after 42 years of languishing under Gadhafi's regime.

The country's de facto prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, asked the U.N. Security Council to lift some of the economic sanctions on his country but said NATO should stay until civilians are no longer being killed.

Italian energy giant Eni said Monday it has resumed oil production in Libya after months of interruption due to the civil war that toppled Gadhafi's rule. By Monday, 15 wells had been tapped, producing some 31,900 barrels of oil per day.

The French energy company Total said it has restarted some production last week.

It was not clear how long it would take Libya to return to its pre-war production of 1.6 million barrels a day.

Libya sits atop Africa's largest proven reserves of conventional crude, and raked in $40 billion last year from oil and gas exports. Still, experts say it could take about a year or more to get Libya back to its pre-war production of 1.6 million barrels a day.

British Trade Minister Stephen Green also visited Tripoli and said his country's businesses are eager to take part in the rebuilding of Libya and will also assist with British expertise. But he said no strategic decisions would be made in Libya until the country has completed writing a new constitution and an elected government is in place.

Libya's new leaders have struggled to form a new interim Cabinet that could guide the country to elections.

Saudi women get right to vote, but can't drive yet

Saudi women get right to vote, but can't drive yet

FILE - In this Thursday, April 1, 2010 file photo, Saudi women attend the traditional Arda dance, or War dance, during the Janadriyah Festival of Heritage and Culture on the outskirts of the Saudi capital Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Saudi King Abdullah has given the kingdom's women the right to vote for first time in nationwide local elections, due in 2015. The king said in an annual speech on Sunday before his advisory assembly, or Shura Council, that Saudi women will be able to run and cast ballots in the 2015 municipal elections.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) -- Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, considered a reformer by the standards of his own ultraconservative kingdom, decreed on Sunday that women will for the first time have the right to vote and run in local elections due in 2015.

It is a "Saudi Spring" of sorts.

For the nation's women, it is a giant leap forward, though they remain unable to serve as Cabinet ministers, drive or travel abroad without permission from a male guardian.

Saudi women bear the brunt of their nation's deeply conservative values, often finding themselves the target of the unwanted attention of the kingdom's intrusive religious police, who enforce a rigid interpretation of Islamic Shariah law on the streets and public places like shopping malls and university campuses.

In itself, Sunday's decision to give the women the right to vote and run in municipal elections may not be enough to satisfy the growing ambition of the kingdom's women who, after years of lavish state spending on education and vocational training, significantly improved their standing but could not secure the same place in society as that of their male compatriots.

That women must wait four more years to exercise their newly acquired right to vote adds insult to injury since Sunday's announcement was already a long time coming - and the next local elections are in fact scheduled for this Thursday.

"Why not tomorrow?" asked prominent Saudi feminist Wajeha al-Hawaidar. "I think the king doesn't want to shake the country, but we look around us and we think it is a shame ... when we are still pondering how to meet simple women's rights."

The announcement by King Abdullah came in an annual speech before his advisory assembly, or Shura Council. It was made after he consulted with the nation's top religious clerics, whose advice carries great weight in the kingdom.

It is an attempt at "Saudi style" reform, moves that avoid antagonizing the powerful clergy and a conservative segment of the population. Additionally, it seems to be part of the king's drive to insulate his vast, oil-rich country from the upheavals sweeping other Arab nations, with popular uprisings toppling regimes that once looked as secure as his own.

Fearing unrest at home, the king in March announced a staggering $93 billion package of incentives, jobs and services to ease the hardships experienced by some Saudis. In the meantime, he sent troops to neighbor and close ally Bahrain to help the tiny nation's Sunni ruling family crush an uprising by majority Shiites pressing for equal rights and far-reaching reforms.

In contrast, King Abdullah in August withdrew the Saudi ambassador from Syria to protest President Bashar Assad's brutal crackdown on a seven-month uprising that calls for his ouster and the establishment of a democratic government.

"We didn't ask for politics, we asked for our basic rights. We demanded that we be treated as equal citizens and lift the male guardianship over us," said Saudi activist Maha al-Qahtani, an Education Ministry employee who defied the ban on women driving earlier this year. "We have many problems that need to be addressed immediately."

The United States, Saudi Arabia's closest Western ally, praised the king's move.

In Washington, National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said it recognized the "significant contributions" women have been making in Saudi Arabia. The move, he continued, would give Saudi women more ways to participate "in the decisions that affect their lives and communities."

The king, in his own remarks, seemed to acknowledge that the Arab world's season of change and the yearning for greater social freedoms by a large segment of Saudi society demanded decisive action.

"Balanced modernization, which falls within our Islamic values, is an important demand in an era where there is no place for defeatist or hesitant people," he said.

"Muslim women in our Islamic history have demonstrated positions that expressed correct opinions and advice," said the king.

Abdullah became the country's de facto ruler in 1995 because of the illness of King Fahd and formally ascended to the throne upon Fahd's death in August 2005.

The king on Sunday also announced that women would be appointed to the Shura Council, a currently all-male body established in 1993 to offer counsel on general policies in the kingdom and to debate economic and social development plans and agreements signed between the kingdom with other nations.

The question of women's rights in Saudi Arabia is a touchy one. In a country where no social or political force is strong enough to affect change in women's rights, it is up to the king to do it. Even then, the king must find consensus before he takes a step in that direction.

Prominent columnist Jamal Khashoggi said that giving women the right to vote in local elections and their inclusion in the Shura council means they will be part of the legislative and executive branches of the state. Winning the right to drive and travel without permission from male guardians can only be the next move.

"It will be odd that women who enjoy parliamentary immunity as members of the council are unable to drive their cars or travel without permission," he said. "The climate is more suited for these changes now - the force of history, moral pressure and the changes taking place around us."

Freed hikers: Iran held us because we're American

Freed hikers: Iran held us because we're American

Josh Fattal, left, addresses reporters as Shane Bauer, right, holds hands with Sarah Shourd, his fiance, fellow hiker and captive, Sunday, Sept. 25, 2011 in New York. The two men were released last week after being held for espionage in an Iranian jail for almost two years.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Declaring that they were detained because of their nationality, not their actions, two American hikers held for more than two years in an Iranian prison came home Sunday, ending a diplomatic and personal ordeal with a sharp rebuke of the country that accused them of crossing the border from Iraq.

Joshua Fattal and Shane Bauer, both 29, were freed last week under a $1 million bail deal and arrived Wednesday in Oman, greeted by relatives and fellow hiker Sarah Shourd, who was released last year.

Their saga began in July 2009 with what they called a wrong turn into the wrong country. The three say they were hiking together in Iraq's relatively peaceful Kurdish region along the Iran-Iraq border when Iranian guards detained them. They always maintained their innocence, saying they might have accidentally wandered into Iran.

The two men were convicted of spying last month. Shourd, to whom Bauer proposed marriage while they were imprisoned, was charged but freed before any trial.

The men took turns reading statements at a news conference Sunday in New York, surrounded by relatives and with Shourd at their side. They didn't take questions from reporters.

Fattal said he wanted to make clear that while he and Bauer "applaud Iranian authorities for finally making the right decision, they "do not deserve undue credit for ending what they had no right and no justification to start in the first place."

"From the very start, the only reason we have been held hostage is because we are American," he said, adding that "Iran has always tied our case to its political disputes with the U.S."

The two countries severed diplomatic ties three decades ago during the hostage crisis. Since then, both have tried to limit the other's influence in the Middle East, and the United States and other Western nations see Iran as the greatest nuclear threat in the region.

The hikers' detention, Bauer said, was "never about crossing the unmarked border between Iran and Iraq. We were held because of our nationality."

He said they don't know whether they had crossed the border. "We will probably never know."

The irony of it all, he said, "is that Sarah, Josh and I oppose U.S. policies towards Iran which perpetuate this hostility."

The two also told of difficult prison conditions, where they were held in near isolation.

"Many times, too many times, we heard the screams of other prisoners being beaten and there was nothing we could do to help them," said Fattal.

Added Bauer: "How can we forgive the Iranian government when it continues to imprison so many other innocent people and prisoners of conscience?"

They said their phone calls with family members amounted to a total of 15 minutes in two years, and they had to go on repeated hunger strikes to receive letters. Eventually, they were told - falsely - that their families had stopped writing them letters.

"We lived in a world of lies and false hope," Fattal said.

Fattal called their release a total surprise.

On Wednesday, he said, they had just finished their brief daily open-air exercise and expected, as on other days, to be blindfolded and led back to their 8- by 13-foot cell.

Instead, the prison guards took them downstairs, fingerprinted them and gave them civilian clothes. They weren't told where they were going.

The guards led them to another part of the prison, where they met a diplomatic envoy from Oman.

His first words to them? "Let's go home."

Hours later, the gates of Tehran's Evin prison opened and the Americans were driven to the airport, then flown to Oman.

The days following their sudden release, Fattal said, made for "the most incredible experience of our lives."

Shourd was with the families to greet the two on the tarmac at a royal airfield near the airport in Oman's capital, Muscat. At about 20 minutes before midnight Wednesday, Fattal and Bauer, wearing jeans and casual shirts, bounded down the steps from the blue-and-white plane. The men appeared very thin and pale, but in good health.

The first hint of change in the case came last week when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Fattal and Bauer could be released within days. But wrangling from within the country's leadership delayed efforts. Finally, Iranian defense attorney Masoud Shafiei secured the necessary judicial approval Wednesday for the bail - $500,000 for each man.

Iran's Foreign Ministry called their release a gesture of Islamic mercy.

Until their release, the last direct contact family members had with Bauer and Fattal was in May 2010, when their mothers were permitted a short visit in Tehran, which Iranian officials used for high-profile propaganda.

Since her release, Shourd has lived in Oakland, Calif. Bauer, a freelance journalist, grew up in Onamia, Minn., and Fattal, an environmental activist, is from Elkins Park, Pa., a Philadelphia suburb.

Recession upends dreams of aspiring teachers

Recession upends dreams of aspiring teachers

In this photo taken Saturday, Aug. 27, 2011, Kim Estey, is seen with bridal magazines at the home of her fiancee in Sacramento, Calif. Saturday, Aug. 27, 2011. Estey, 27, has not been abel to find a full-time teaching job since earning her credential at California State University, Sacramento. For the past three years Estey has been working part-time as a substitute teacher for three school districts and she and her fiancee have had to postpone getting married as she looks for a full-time position.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- Stay-at-home-mom Cindy DePace was just hitting 30 when she decided to return to the work force by going back to school and becoming a teacher.

She loved working with kids, could be home in the summer with her own children and had always heard that someone with an education degree would never have trouble finding a job.

Five years later, she has a degree in early childhood education and tens of thousands of dollars in student loans to repay, but no teaching job. Instead, she files records at a law firm in South Carolina's capital.

For decades, the growing number of children in the U.S. and efforts in many states to lower class sizes created a high demand for teachers. Private-sector workers who lost their jobs or were looking for a mid-career change often were encouraged to return to school and earn a teaching credential, while states set up shortcuts to get them licenses.

But the Great Recession and its ripple effects on the state and local tax dollars that fund public schools have upended the conventional wisdom that a teaching job is a golden ticket to career stability.

DePace earned her education degree from private Columbia College and got divorced along the way. Now 35, she has given up her dream of working in a classroom.

She had five interviews, attended several job fairs and filed countless applications without getting a response.

"I've got $60,000 worth of student loans that I have to pay back. I'm paying them back as a single mom, and I'm not even working in what I went to school for," she said. "So I feel like I just wasted my money."

A national survey of school districts in June by the Center on Education Policy estimated that 48 percent of them cut teaching jobs last school year. The survey found 84 percent of districts are bracing for additional funding cuts this year.

A survey in May of more than 1,000 school superintendents across the country by the American Association of School Administrators found that 74 percent anticipate having to cut jobs this year, with the majority of those being teachers or teacher aides. An association survey of 692 school administrators found that 48 percent laid off employees last year.

In California alone, budget cuts have led to about 30,000 teachers and more than 10,000 support staff being laid off in the past three years, according to estimates by the unions that represent them. The number of public school teachers in Michigan has shrunk by nearly 9 percent since peaking at nearly 118,000 during the 2004-05 school year, a loss of about 10,000 jobs. That parallels an 8 percent drop in the number of Michigan public school students but also reflects shrinking state aid.

Those just entering the profession also are vulnerable because of school district rules that require administrators to lay off the most recently hired teachers first, meaning some graduates lucky enough to find a job are out of work within a year. The layoffs have made competition fierce for the few job openings that do become available.

Andrea Ross-Woody, a principal at a private school near Sacramento, Calif., said she received about 50 applications for a teaching job that pays $1,700 a month with no benefits. Some applicants have been looking for full-time work for several years. Others recently completed expensive credential programs at for-profit colleges and are carrying large loads of debt.

"It just amazes me that they keep putting more teachers out there and there are no jobs," said Ross-Woody. "We just have a lot of teachers who are out of work. It's just a very sad situation."

In Austin, Texas, a district with 86,000 students is hiring just 72 teachers. Six years ago, it hired 800.

Most of its open positions are for specialties such as bilingual elementary school teachers or science and math teachers in middle and high schools. Graduates with degrees in early childhood education face stiff competition for very few positions, said Michael Houser, a recruiter for the Austin Independent School District.

"It's a triple tragedy in a way," said Wellford "Buzz" Wilms, an education professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, who has been training new teachers for three decades. "The kids invest all this time and they face such a bleak job market. These are some of the best kids in the world, and we miss putting them where they are needed the most."

College students are getting the message. At UCLA, the number of applicants for its teaching program has fallen by more than a third since 2003, Wilms said.

The enrollment numbers for California State University, which graduates the majority of the state's teachers, are even starker. Enrollment peaked in fall 2002 with 31,000 students but has fallen over the past nine years to 13,500 students last year, said Mike Uhlenkamp, a spokesman for California State University.

Nationally, the number of bachelor's degrees given in education started to decline after 2006, while the number of degrees in fields such as business and nursing continues to increase, according to U.S. Department of Education data.

Some students saw it coming.

Tasha Brannan graduated from Winthrop University in South Carolina in May with a degree in early childhood education, but already had decided to change course as the economy tanked and friends told her about their difficulties trying to land teaching jobs.

"I had heard from so many people who graduated a semester before me or a year before me that had a lot of trouble finding something in the education field. I was really fortunate to find something as quick as I did because I have student loans I have to pay back," she said.

Brannan, 22, is applying some of the skills she learned in her teaching program - patience, flexibility - to a different career: working with a firm that hires temporary workers.

How soon the picture for aspiring teachers will brighten is as clear as predicting when the economy will turn around.

In his recent national address on job creation, President Barack Obama talked about investing $35 billion to prevent the layoffs of up to 280,000 teachers while hiring tens of thousands more, but his plan faces uncertain prospects in a divided Congress.

In the meantime, education professors and school district recruiters offer the same advice: Before graduating, find a job such as a teacher's aide or a substitute that could be a bridge to a full-time teaching position.

That's the route 27-year-old Kim Estey, of Sutter Creek, Calif., has tried to take.

Since earning her teaching credential at California State University, Sacramento in 2008, Estey has worked part-time as a substitute teacher for three districts, earning about $100 a day and hoping to get leads on potential job openings. She recently started tutoring at nights and on weekends to earn extra money.

"I still live with my parents at 27 because they don't want me to give up on my career," Estey said. "There's no way I can move out. I'm engaged and can't plan on getting married until I get a job."

About half the students in her credential program have left education and found work in other fields. But Estey still hopes she can land a full-time teaching job even as she faces more competition from new graduates and seasoned teachers who were recently laid off.

"It's a bad climate right now, but this is really what I'm supposed to be doing," she said. "I'm hoping by next year I'll get something. There is a job out there for me. I've just got to be patient."

Economic worries all over the world

Economic worries all over the world

A stock trader watches his screens at the German stock exchange in Frankfurt, Germany, Friday, Sept. 23, 2011. Stock markets in Europe and the U.S. recouped some of their previous day's hefty losses Friday but investors remained skeptical about whether the world's leading economies will come up with a coordinated plan to shore up the global economy.

The world economy is in a world of hurt.

Europe is wrestling with a debt crisis. Economic growth in powerhouse China appears to be slowing. And in the United States, political paralysis has left policymakers with few tools to fight a slowdown.

Christine Lagarde, head of the International Monetary Fund, warned this week that the world was entering a "dangerous phase." The leader of the World Bank said he loses confidence daily that the global economy can avoid a new recession.

Financial markets fear the worst. The Dow Jones industrials fell almost 6 percent Wednesday and Thursday before an uneasy calm returned Friday. The carnage hit markets in Europe and Asia, too.

Pick a spot on the globe and you'll find economic trouble. Here's a region-by-region guide to what worries the experts.

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EUROPE: BATTLING A DEBT CRISIS AND WATCHING GREECE

European policymakers have failed to convince financial markets that they can resolve a massive debt crisis. Investors fear that Greece and other countries will be unable to pay their debts and default, forcing banks to absorb big losses on government bonds.

Greece, Ireland and Portugal have already required bailouts from the European Union and the IMF. Italy and Spain, which are much bigger economies, might need them, too.

A $149 billion bailout has kept Greece afloat for the past year. It's due for another $148 billion rescue negotiated over the summer. But creditors are balking at delivering the second package. They say Greece has fallen behind on commitments to cut government deficits and make its economy more competitive.

European officials are speaking openly of the possibility of a Greek default. The fears have spooked international markets. A default by Greece or any of the other troubled European countries would send shock waves through the banking system and the global economy.

Investors are terrified they'll endure a repeat of the panic that struck Wall Street in 2008. Then, banks stopped lending to each other because they were worried about each other's solvency.

Losses on European government bonds could start a similar crisis. If global credit markets were to freeze the way they did three years ago, that would slow economies on both sides of the Atlantic.

European governments have opted for austerity measures, cutting spending and raising taxes instead of taking steps to jump-start sputtering economic growth.

Recent reports suggest the European economy is already decelerating. The IMF just shaved its forecast for European growth this year to 1.6 percent from 2 percent, and for next year to 1.1 percent from 1.7 percent. One closely watched index of industrial activity just signaled an outright contraction.

Pressure is growing on the European Central Bank to reverse course and start cutting interest rates. Just two months ago, the central bank was worried about inflation and was raising rates.

---

THE UNITED STATES: FED ACTS, BUT WHAT NOW?

U.S. markets sank this week even though the Federal Reserve offered a bigger dose of economic stimulus than investors had expected: The Fed plans to reshuffle $400 billion of its investments in hopes of pushing down interest rates on mortgages and other long-term loans.

Lower rates are supposed to coax consumers and businesses into borrowing and spending. The Fed also plans to invest proceeds from maturing U.S. Treasury debt into mortgage bonds in an effort to support the housing market.

But economists say the Fed's effort - dubbed Operation Twist after a similar Fed program conducted during the Chubby Checker dance craze of the early 1960s - probably won't make much difference.

Rates on mortgages and other loans are already the lowest in decades. Frightened Americans would rather cut their debts than borrow, and businesses aren't seeing enough sales to justify hiring and expanding despite rock-bottom borrowing costs.

The Fed's announcement underscored the fear that the American central bank had run out of tools to stimulate the economy.

That leaves fiscal policy - government spending programs and tax cuts - as the only other way to juice growth. But political bickering is preventing Washington from doing much of anything.

Congressional Republicans are focused on cutting government deficits, not widening them in the name of helping the economy. They are resisting President Barack Obama's $447 billion plan to generate jobs with payroll-tax cuts and more spending for roads, bridges, schools and other infrastructure projects.

Economist Eswar Prasad of Cornell University says the U.S. government should tolerate higher deficits now to spur economic growth - as long as it delivers a credible plan to bring its budget under control in the future.

"We are seeing the exact opposite," he says. The government is cutting spending now, but has yet to deliver a realistic plan to curb medium- and long-term deficits.

---

CHINA: HINT OF A SLOWDOWN RATTLES INVESTORS

The powerful Chinese economy is supposed to account for a third of global growth this year. Increasingly, other countries depend on China's insatiable demand for raw materials and machinery to give their own economies a lift. The mining towns of western Australia, for instance, are booming as they fill orders from China for iron, zinc and coal.

So any signs the Chinese economy might be slowing are sure to frazzle investors. And a report this week showing that Chinese manufacturing is contracting sent financial markets into a tailspin.

Perhaps it shouldn't have been a surprise: China's central bank has been raising interest rates to slow growth and bring inflation under control.

Analysts say investors overreacted to one limited report. The world's second-biggest economy may be slowing, they say, but it still boasts enviable rates of growth. The IMF this week lopped just a tenth of a percentage point off its estimate for Chinese economic growth this year, bringing it to a still-sizzling 9.5 percent. Its estimate for the U.S. is just 1.5 percent.

Yet despite China's rising power, experts say its economy is still not big or strong enough to compensate for meltdowns elsewhere: Chinese investment and spending is only one-sixth that of the European Union and United States.

"From a global perspective, China's domestic demand is still way too small to offset the impact of a recession" in Europe and the U.S., Deutsche Bank economist Ma Jun said in a report.

To make up for a 3 percentage point drop in growth in those economies, China would have to grow by 18 percent this year, he says.

"This is mission impossible."

Economic worries all over the world

Economic worries all over the world

A stock trader watches his screens at the German stock exchange in Frankfurt, Germany, Friday, Sept. 23, 2011. Stock markets in Europe and the U.S. recouped some of their previous day's hefty losses Friday but investors remained skeptical about whether the world's leading economies will come up with a coordinated plan to shore up the global economy.

The world economy is in a world of hurt.

Europe is wrestling with a debt crisis. Economic growth in powerhouse China appears to be slowing. And in the United States, political paralysis has left policymakers with few tools to fight a slowdown.

Christine Lagarde, head of the International Monetary Fund, warned this week that the world was entering a "dangerous phase." The leader of the World Bank said he loses confidence daily that the global economy can avoid a new recession.

Financial markets fear the worst. The Dow Jones industrials fell almost 6 percent Wednesday and Thursday before an uneasy calm returned Friday. The carnage hit markets in Europe and Asia, too.

Pick a spot on the globe and you'll find economic trouble. Here's a region-by-region guide to what worries the experts.

---

EUROPE: BATTLING A DEBT CRISIS AND WATCHING GREECE

European policymakers have failed to convince financial markets that they can resolve a massive debt crisis. Investors fear that Greece and other countries will be unable to pay their debts and default, forcing banks to absorb big losses on government bonds.

Greece, Ireland and Portugal have already required bailouts from the European Union and the IMF. Italy and Spain, which are much bigger economies, might need them, too.

A $149 billion bailout has kept Greece afloat for the past year. It's due for another $148 billion rescue negotiated over the summer. But creditors are balking at delivering the second package. They say Greece has fallen behind on commitments to cut government deficits and make its economy more competitive.

European officials are speaking openly of the possibility of a Greek default. The fears have spooked international markets. A default by Greece or any of the other troubled European countries would send shock waves through the banking system and the global economy.

Investors are terrified they'll endure a repeat of the panic that struck Wall Street in 2008. Then, banks stopped lending to each other because they were worried about each other's solvency.

Losses on European government bonds could start a similar crisis. If global credit markets were to freeze the way they did three years ago, that would slow economies on both sides of the Atlantic.

European governments have opted for austerity measures, cutting spending and raising taxes instead of taking steps to jump-start sputtering economic growth.

Recent reports suggest the European economy is already decelerating. The IMF just shaved its forecast for European growth this year to 1.6 percent from 2 percent, and for next year to 1.1 percent from 1.7 percent. One closely watched index of industrial activity just signaled an outright contraction.

Pressure is growing on the European Central Bank to reverse course and start cutting interest rates. Just two months ago, the central bank was worried about inflation and was raising rates.

---

THE UNITED STATES: FED ACTS, BUT WHAT NOW?

U.S. markets sank this week even though the Federal Reserve offered a bigger dose of economic stimulus than investors had expected: The Fed plans to reshuffle $400 billion of its investments in hopes of pushing down interest rates on mortgages and other long-term loans.

Lower rates are supposed to coax consumers and businesses into borrowing and spending. The Fed also plans to invest proceeds from maturing U.S. Treasury debt into mortgage bonds in an effort to support the housing market.

But economists say the Fed's effort - dubbed Operation Twist after a similar Fed program conducted during the Chubby Checker dance craze of the early 1960s - probably won't make much difference.

Rates on mortgages and other loans are already the lowest in decades. Frightened Americans would rather cut their debts than borrow, and businesses aren't seeing enough sales to justify hiring and expanding despite rock-bottom borrowing costs.

The Fed's announcement underscored the fear that the American central bank had run out of tools to stimulate the economy.

That leaves fiscal policy - government spending programs and tax cuts - as the only other way to juice growth. But political bickering is preventing Washington from doing much of anything.

Congressional Republicans are focused on cutting government deficits, not widening them in the name of helping the economy. They are resisting President Barack Obama's $447 billion plan to generate jobs with payroll-tax cuts and more spending for roads, bridges, schools and other infrastructure projects.

Economist Eswar Prasad of Cornell University says the U.S. government should tolerate higher deficits now to spur economic growth - as long as it delivers a credible plan to bring its budget under control in the future.

"We are seeing the exact opposite," he says. The government is cutting spending now, but has yet to deliver a realistic plan to curb medium- and long-term deficits.

---

CHINA: HINT OF A SLOWDOWN RATTLES INVESTORS

The powerful Chinese economy is supposed to account for a third of global growth this year. Increasingly, other countries depend on China's insatiable demand for raw materials and machinery to give their own economies a lift. The mining towns of western Australia, for instance, are booming as they fill orders from China for iron, zinc and coal.

So any signs the Chinese economy might be slowing are sure to frazzle investors. And a report this week showing that Chinese manufacturing is contracting sent financial markets into a tailspin.

Perhaps it shouldn't have been a surprise: China's central bank has been raising interest rates to slow growth and bring inflation under control.

Analysts say investors overreacted to one limited report. The world's second-biggest economy may be slowing, they say, but it still boasts enviable rates of growth. The IMF this week lopped just a tenth of a percentage point off its estimate for Chinese economic growth this year, bringing it to a still-sizzling 9.5 percent. Its estimate for the U.S. is just 1.5 percent.

Yet despite China's rising power, experts say its economy is still not big or strong enough to compensate for meltdowns elsewhere: Chinese investment and spending is only one-sixth that of the European Union and United States.

"From a global perspective, China's domestic demand is still way too small to offset the impact of a recession" in Europe and the U.S., Deutsche Bank economist Ma Jun said in a report.

To make up for a 3 percentage point drop in growth in those economies, China would have to grow by 18 percent this year, he says.

"This is mission impossible."