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December 11, 2009
Behind-the-scenes: On the front lines of the drug war
Posted: 11:00 PM ET
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Program Note: Go inside a sophisticated, newly discovered underground tunnel on the Mexican-U.S. border with Anderson Cooper tonight at 10 p.m. ET.

Ismael Estrada
AC360° Producer

It's an all-too common scene on patrol with a joint Mexican law enforcement task force in Juarez, Mexico.

Two people are shot dead in broad daylight Wednesday in a city lost in a drug war between rival cartels over the lucrative drug route into the United States.

Gunmen fire on a car, killing the driver; the passenger starts to flee and is gunned down in the street. These are the 11th and 12th killings in the Mexican city that day. Locals said killings are more frequent in the evenings. At this point, the sun hasn't even started to go down.

Juarez has become a deadly city where bodies, blood and gun-shell casings are commonplace in the streets.

In 2008, more than 1,600 people were killed in drug-related violence; this year local government officials put that number at more than 2,400. The carnage is taking place in a city with a population of around 1.5 million, literally at America's doorstep. Mexican President Felipe Calderon has declared a war on drug cartels and the way they operate their businesses.

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More about: 360° Radar •  Ismael Estrada •  Mexico
President Obama's Nobel Peace Prize speech
Posted: 04:53 PM ET
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AC360°

President Obama accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on Thursday with much discussion of war and the limits of nonviolence.

But he also praised the peacemakers of the past and said the world can and should still strive for peace.

The following is a transcript of Obama's acceptance speech:

Your majesties, your royal highnesses, distinguished members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, citizens of America and citizens of the world:

I receive this honor with deep gratitude and great humility. It is an award that speaks to our highest aspirations - that for all the cruelty and hardship of our world, we are not mere prisoners of fate. Our actions matter, and can bend history in the direction of justice.

And yet I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the considerable controversy that your generous decision has generated. In part, this is because I am at the beginning, and not the end, of my labors on the world stage. Compared to some of the giants of history who have received this prize - Schweitzer and King; Marshall and Mandela - my accomplishments are slight. And then there are the men and women around the world who have been jailed and beaten in the pursuit of justice; those who toil in humanitarian organizations to relieve suffering; the unrecognized millions whose quiet acts of courage and compassion inspire even the most hardened of cynics. I cannot argue with those who find these men and women - some known, some obscure to all but those they help - to be far more deserving of this honor than I.

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The blind side ... of Congress
Posted: 12:01 PM ET
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Tom Foreman | BIO
AC360° Correspondent

As a journalist, I’m used to being pushed around in the polls. It’s OK. I know you don’t like us much. You have doubts about the media’s integrity, trustworthiness, and honesty, and frankly there are times when I do too; when I want to say, “Move over. Make some room on that pew for me.”

Yet the good folks at Gallup have given my profession an early holiday gift that is lifting spirits in newsrooms coast to coast. A new poll shows that you, the public, consider members of Congress much less trustworthy than journalists. The House crowd was already in the ethics ICU, but now they are practically in need of life support.

Among the professions Gallup tested, nurses were the most trusted. Doctors, police officers and clergy, also took predictably high slots on the list. But then comes the bad news for the legislative bunch. Chiropractors, bankers, lawyers, advertising types, even insurance salespeople, and stockbrokers are all rated as more ethical. Congress members are down in the basement near HMO operators and car salesman.

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More about: 360° Radar •  Opinion •  Raw Politics •  Tom Foreman
December 10, 2009
New border tunnel discovered
Posted: 10:15 PM ET
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Editor's Note: Authorities have uncovered an underground tunnel between Tijuana, Mexico and San Diego, California. Anderson will be live from this new tunnel tonight at 10 p.m. ET.

Anderson Cooper | BIO
AC360° Anchor

Heading to San Diego, where once again an enormous tunnel has been discovered. It was being built to smuggle people and/or drugs from Tijuana into the US.

The level of sophistication of these tunnels is extraordinary. In addition to lighting, electrical, and ventilation systems, this new one even has an elevator on the Tijuana side. It was still being built when it was discovered, and authorities arrested more than a dozen men inside.

A few years ago we got an exclusive look at another tunnel U.S. authorities had just discovered that opened up into a warehouse on the U.S. side. It wasn't clear how long that one had been in operation. Watch our report from 2006 here.

Tonight we'll take you deep underground inside the new tunnel, and we'll update you on the war Mexico is fighting against drug traffickers - a war that has claimed more than 7,000 lives this year alone.

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More about: 360° Radar •  Anderson Cooper •  Mexico
Outsourcing the American dream
Posted: 12:29 PM ET
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Editor's Note: This article continues our series excerpted from AC360°'s contributor David Gewirtz's upcoming book, How To Save Jobs, which will be available in December. Over the next few months, we'll be excerpting the first section of the book, which answers the question, "How did we get here?" Last time, we looked at the failure of the H-1B visa program. This time,we look at how outsourcing is becoming a growing problem for American employees. To learn more about the book, follow David on Twitter @DavidGewirtz.

David Gewirtz | BIO
AC360° Contributor
Editor-in-Chief, ZATZ Publishing

Back in the dot-com boom, the dot-coms had a lot of work to be done, and not enough Americans were available to do it all. Many of the dot-com firms began to outsource much of their work to make up for the lack of available U.S. workers.

At about the same time, many companies were concerned about the so-called Y2K crisis. If you recall, this was the worry that many computer programs were built with only two-digit date codes, but once the year went from 1999 to 2000, all the date calculations in all those programs would fail.

American companies started to send work offshore.

The Internet, of course, made this much easier to do. Email and the Web, along with the rise in instant messaging, made communication across previously daunting distances virtually instantaneous (and dirt cheap). With the availability of high-speed broadband Internet and VOIP (Voice-over-IP), a telephone call from New York City to Bangalore often costs less than a call over the plain ol' copper telephone system from New York City to Albany.

And that's why, when your computer fails, you're probably going to wind up talking to someone in India instead of someone in Indiana. When you call a U.S. number for support, your call is routed over the Internet (for free) to a call center located across the ocean. Call centers no longer have to absorb extreme telephony charges.

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December 9, 2009
Homegrown Terrorism: A study of the radicalization process
Posted: 09:45 PM ET
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Editor's Note: Five people arrested in Pakistan had been reported missing in the United States, and police are confident they were planning terrorist acts, a Pakistani police official told CNN. Tune in tonight to hear more about the increasing amount of homegrown terrorism on AC360° at 10 p.m. ET.

David Headley, a Chicago, Illinois, man is accused of involvement in terror plots in India and Denmark.
David Headley, a Chicago, Illinois, man is accused of involvement in terror plots in India and Denmark.

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross and Laura Grossman
The Center for Terrorism Research

This study, Homegrown Terrorists in the U.S. and U.K.: An Empirical Study of the Radicalization Process, is a product of over a year and half of research into the phenomenon of homegrown terrorists–Westerners who have chosen to take up arms against the society in which they were born or raised.

Homegrown Terrorists in the U.S. and U.K. examines six different steps are particularly significant as homegrown terrorists radicalize: the adoption of a legalistic interpretation of Islam, coming to trust only a select and ideologically rigid group of religious authorities, viewing the West and Islam and irreconcilably opposed, manifesting a low tolerance for perceived religious deviance, attempting to impose religious beliefs on others, and the expression of radical political views.

These steps have recurred frequently among homegrown terrorists, and they help to provide insight into these individuals’ state of mind as they hurtle toward the embrace of violence again innocents.

Read the full report here...

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More about: 360° Radar
December 8, 2009
Video: Gergen on abortion, health care
Posted: 08:45 AM ET
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More about: 360° Radar •  Anderson Cooper •  David Gergen •  Health Care •  Women's Issues
December 7, 2009
Financial Dispatch: White House to slash bailout cost by $200 billion
Posted: 05:03 PM ET
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Andrew Torgan
CNN Financial News Producer

The Obama Administration is expected to slash the estimated cost of the Troubled Asset Relief Program by $200 billion, effectively paving the way for a massive federal jobs program.

The latest projection, which will be officially unveiled by the White House this week, would cut TARP's price tag by $200 billion to $141 billion, according to a Treasury Department official.

And officials tell CNN that President Obama will recommend using the $200 billion to fund a series of projects - including building bridges and roads and weatherizing homes, as well as providing further aid to the unemployed and to small businesses. That’s expected to come in a speech on Tuesday.

Such a move is certain to draw fire from Republican lawmakers, who have railed against using any leftover bailout funds or money that has been paid back by banks for any new projects.

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More about: 360° Radar •  Bailout Turmoil •  Economy
Sound Off: Your comments 12/4/09
Posted: 06:43 AM ET
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Editor's Note: After Friday's AC360°, many of you sent in comments about the verdict in the Amanda Knox murder trial. Opinions were split about whether or not Knox is guilty. What do you think?
_________________________________________________________________________________________

I think it is pathetic how we have been potraying Amanda Knox as an innocent beautiful American girl. What about the victim's family? What about their beautiful girl who was brutally murdered? I don't see an innocent girl here, she does not care, coming into the courtroom all American because we always have it our way. I even heard her parents say that the sec.of state was going to get involved. Really? I think as Americans we should be ashamed. This girl deserves life in prison without parole. Young peole have taken the meaning of fun to a whole new level including killing for pleasure. We have even deemed the Italian justice system as incompetent. It's time for America to respect other countries and let justice be served. Let us at least have some decency to acknowledge that Amanda is not the victim in this case.

Your coverage is excellent in trying to portray different sides of an issue, but you have totally failed to do so in the Amanda Knox case by not covering the "victim's side". It seems like you are criticizing the Italian legal system. Who are we to judge? no one really knows if she is guilty or not, but her original comments and behavior contributed to the verdict. Maybe justice was indeed served.

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More about: 360° Radar
December 4, 2009
Interactive: The evidence in the Knox trial
Posted: 11:43 PM ET
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CNN

Amanda Knox is accused of murdering her roommate, British student Meredith Kercher, on November 2, 2007, in Italy. She faces life in prison if found guilty.

Go here and scroll down to view the evidence in the Knox trial.

More about: 360° Radar •  Crime

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