Hagel, McCain Clash at Confirmation Hearing

Facing a rocky confirmation process, Chuck Hagel today defended his record before his former Senate colleagues, including an openly impatient Sen. John McCain.

"I'm on the record on many issues, but no one individual vote, no one individual quote, no one individual statement defines me," Hagel said in his opening statement at his first confirmation hearing for secretary of defense.

"My overall worldview has never changed: that America has and must maintain the strongest military in the world, that we must lead in the international community to confront threats and challenges together," Hagel said.

Who Is Chuck Hagel? Obama's Nominee for Secretary of Defense

A Vietnam veteran and former Republican senator from Nebraska who left office in 2009, Hagel, 66, is president Obama's nominee to replace Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Despite his 12-year career in the Senate, Hagel faces opposition from many of his former Republican colleagues.

In the hearing's testiest exchange, McCain grilled Hagel on the former senator's opposition to the Iraq "surge," a stance that separated Hagel from most members of his party in 2007.

The Arizona senator championed the "surge" both as a senator and in his 2008 presidential campaign, while Hagel joined Democrats in vocally criticizing the strategy. McCain pressed Hagel at today's hearing to say whether he believes the surge was a mistake.

When Hagel declined to answer "yes" or "no," McCain told his former colleague, "I want to know if you were right or wrong. That's a direct question," repeatedly accusing Hagel of refusing to answer the question.

Graham Says Hagel 'Sends Chills Up My Spine' Watch Video

Obama Announces Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense Watch Video

Obama Taps Sen. Chuck Hagel for Defense Secretary Watch Video

"You're on the wrong side of it, and your refusal to answer whether you were right or wrong on it is going to have an impact on my judgment on whether to vote for your confirmation," McCain concluded

Hagel also underwent some tough, pointed questioning from Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., an ally of McCain's in the Senate. Graham pointed out Hagel's decision not to sign letters on Middle-East policy during his Senate career, at one point asking Hagel, "Do you think that the sum total of your record, all that together, that the image you've created is one of sending the worst possible signal to our enemies and friends at one of the most critical times in world history?"

Hagel said he did not.

Senate Republicans and pro-Israel groups have voiced grievances with Hagel's record, including opposition to unilateral sanctions against Iran, support for talks with Hamas, opposition to deeming Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization, and a reference to Israel-backing groups as the "Jewish lobby."

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich., acknowledged such concerns as he opened the committee's hearing, referencing "troubling statements [Hagel] has made about Israel and its supporters in the United States."

Hagel defended himself under questioning from multiple senators.

"When I voted against some of those unilateral sanctions on Iran, it was a different time," Hagel said, referring to votes in the early 2000s. "We were in a different place with Iran at that time. As a matter of fact, the Bush administration did not want a five-year renewal of [the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act] at that time because they weren't sure of the effectiveness of the sanctions."

Hagel said his record of public statements shows he has consistently referred to Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist groups and Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism.

"The way I approached every vote I took in the Senate was what I thought would be the most effective," Hagel said, defending his vote against labeling Iran's guard corps as a terrorist group. "What was the situation at the time, how can we do this smarter and better?"

Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., the committee's top Republican, said he will oppose Hagel's nomination.

"Senator Hagel is a good man who has a record of service," Inhofe said of his former GOP colleague, while concluding, "He is the wrong person to lead the Pentagon.

Hagel was introduced at the hearing by former Sens. Sam Nunn, D-Ga., and John Warner, R-Va., two respected former members of the Armed Services Committee, both of whom lavished praise on Obama's nominee.

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BlackBerry must remember strengths

BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins displays one of the new Blackberry 10 smartphones at the product launch January 30.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• BlackBerry sales have slumped in the U.S. but is still strong in emerging markets


• New models launched should remember why they are popular in developing world


• In places like Brazil and South Africa, the 10 is the update to their current phone


• in Sub-Saharan Africa there is expected to be 175 million new customers in the next 3 years

Watch Jim Clancy on CNN International's "The Brief" at 4p.m. ET GMT Friday.

(CNN) -- BlackBerry's loss of market share in the U.S. is the stuff of legends. Last fall, it was estimated only about 2% of American phone users were still carrying their BlackBerry mobile with its iconic keypad.

But consider this: sub-Saharan Africa is expected to add 175 million new mobile users in just the coming 3 years. That's according to the GSMA, which represents the world's mobile operators.

"Mobile has already revolutionized African society and yet demand still continues to grow by almost 50 percent a year," said Tom Phillips, Chief Government and Regulatory Affairs Officer, GSMA.

That could be good news indeed for BlackBerry. Research in Motion, the maker of BlackBerry, estimates it holds a 70% market share in countries like South Africa.

The company's new phones, announced this week, are not the ones some of its best customers in emerging markets would like to buy. They're too expensive. But Research in Motion -- which also this week changed its company name to BlackBerry -- is pledging some of its six new models will address that.

While millions in China, Europe and the U.S. have adopted Android or iOS smartphones with a vengeance, millions more users in emerging markets are enthused about what's in store for the new BlackBerry 10. It's the update for what many of them are already using.

They live in countries like Brazil, Malaysia, Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa. They have embraced the BlackBerry for a combination of factors that all point to the different way mobile devices are used.

Unlike their counterparts in Europe and America, the mobile in their pocket is more likely to be their primary link to the internet.

BlackBerry Messenger is the connection that allows these users unlimited conversations without paying charges for SMS data. While young, brand-conscious Chinese may be willing to part with several months' salary to buy the latest iPhone, African users are looking for more practical (and cheaper) connections.

What separates developed countries from their developing counterparts at street level can be summed up in a single word: infrastructure.

Isobel Coleman, senior fellow and Director of the Civil Society, Markets and Democracy Initiative at the Council on Foreign Relations, says mobile technology has proved it can bridge the gap where infrastructure is lacking.

"It's a culture, it's an economy, it's innovation, education, healthcare, it's all of these things," says Coleman.

You can take that to the bank. For many Africans, their cell phone account is the first bank account they've ever owned.

In emerging markets, mobile phone banking is growing because of the lack of infrastructure. Fewer bank branches often mean long distances to travel and long lines once you've arrived.

Africans are expected to transfer more than $200 billion per year or 18% of the continent's GDP by 2015.

Oh, and that keyboard. No matter where you are in the world, there will always be a demand for a keyboard that clicks. The company appears to understand that as BlackBerry 10 models come with both soft keypads and the traditional BlackBerry buttons.

I asked some of my Twitter followers to weigh in on the BlackBerry 10 roll out. While some said Android or Apple's iOS were in their future plans, many others expressed continued enthusiasm for the BlackBerry.

Soji, a pianist and teacher in Nigeria tweeted back "I'm falling in love with this BB. Cheaper to own."

From Kuala Lumpur, Amir wrote "I need a physical keyboard to type while also having a touch-screen for photos etc. Security factor also important."

Hans-Eric from South Africa reinforced the sentiments of many mobile users in emerging markets: "The cost of data is simply too high without it (BlackBerry.)"

The voices from emerging markets couldn't have been clearer. What they expect from BlackBerry 10 is a stronger, longer lasting battery, durability and continued low cost connectivity.

CFR's Coleman agrees that BlackBerry (and anyone else) trying to win and hold this mobile device sector has to understand how these devices are being used and give the customers what they want.

"Cheap. Rugged. Not too many bells and whistles. Practical."

There is little doubt smartphones are changing the way people use the internet, how they bank, shop and interact socially.

But it's worth keeping in perspective that in a world where there are now an estimated 1 billion smartphones, there are 5 billion feature phone users. That's a lot of upside growth potential for BlackBerry and all the other players out there.

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Most Timbuktu texts saved say curators

JOHANNESBURG: Most of the priceless ancient books and manuscripts housed in a centre in Timbuktu were smuggled to safety as Islamists overran the Malian city last year, curators revealed Wednesday.

"A vast majority was saved... more than 90 per cent," said Shamil Jeppie, Timbuktu Manuscripts Project director at the University of Cape Town.

Jeppie said more than 20,000 manuscripts had been moved out of the South African-sponsored centre by May last year and hidden mostly in the capital Bamako and elsewhere in Timbuktu.

The texts were spirited out in trunks and placed deep in the vaults of another building.

It was feared the manuscripts had been destroyed by Islamists during their rampaging retreating from French forces, who now control the city.

The insurgent fighters had already destroyed many of the city's centuries-old shrines, the iconic legacy of Timbuktu's golden age of intellectual and spiritual development.

The fighters took the city in April, swiftly implementing a version of Islamic law which forced women to wear veils and set whipping and stoning as punishment for transgressions.

Islamist fighters had considered the texts and the shrines -- which helped earn the city UNESCO world heritage status -- to be idolatrous.

But details of an amazing effort to save the irreplaceable documents are now coming to light.

The texts, most dating from the 13th and 14th centuries, include a prized biography of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad and texts about music, astronomy, physics, traditional medicine.

"Archivists and librarians associated with the Ahmed Baba library, in fact, over the months of the occupation, worked to take the manuscripts out, to conserve them and hide them," Jeppie said.

In a statement, the project office said "a limited number of items have been damaged or stolen, the infrastructure neglected and furnishings in the library looted."

Jeppie suspects some of the delicate manuscripts could have also been damaged during movement but not at the "hands of these ignorant people."

The Ahmed Baba collection, the largest of its kind in Timbuktu, was home to around 40,000 texts.

They were housed in a state-of-the-art archive, paid for by international donors, including South Africa.

Opened in 2009, it is meant to keep the manuscripts safe and to act as a centre for research.

"There are two buildings" housing the documents, curator Ben Essayouti El-Boukhari told AFP. "There is the old one and the new one built by South Africans."

The old building is where most of the manuscripts had been kept -- including some dating back to the pre-Islamic era.

But with phone connections down, officials have been unable to get a full picture of the extent of the damage elsewhere in the city.

Officials have previously estimated there are more than 100,000 manuscripts held in several private libraries and by families in Timbuktu.

- AFP/jc

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Tennessee also hard hit

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: Georgia DOT reports major damage on and near Interstate 75 in Bartow County


• Georgia television news crew sees tornado form; damage reported in Adairsville


• A man dies in a building collapse as storm hits Bartow County, Georgia, official says


• A Tennessee man dies when a tree falls on his home, emergency managers say

Is there severe weather near you? Share your photos and videos on iReport, but stay safe.

(CNN) -- A weather system stretching from Michigan to the Louisiana coastline threw down high winds and spawned a handful of tornadoes Wednesday, including one that caused significant damage in the northwest Georgia town of Adairsville.

At least two people died, authorities reported.

In the Adairsville storm, winds caused significant damage to a motel and a manufacturing plant, according to Craig Milsap, the fire chief and interim emergency management director for Bartow County. The motel's guests are believed safe and workers at the plant have all been accounted for, he said.

The National Weather Service also reported major structural damage and overturned cars in downtown Adairsville, where a news crew for CNN affiliate WSB-TV witnessed a tornado form and touch down Wednesday morning. The tornado destroyed a home and flipped several cars, the station reported.

The storm caused major damage on and near Interstate 75, the Georgia Department of Transportation said. The weather service, citing emergency management officials, said 100 cars had been overturned near Exit 306 at Adairsville.

The state transportation agency asked motorists to stay away from the area until further notice.

The weather service also reported multiple buildings damaged in Calhoun, Georgia.

One person died in Bartow County when a building collapsed during the storm, Milsap said.

In Tennessee, a 47-year-old man died early Wednesday when high winds toppled a tree onto the roof of his home in Nashville, the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency said. Other injuries were reported in Chester, McNairy and Henderson counties, spokesman Jeremy Heidt said.

The National Weather Service also reported severe weather or damage Wednesday in Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Kentucky and Indiana.

Southeast Alabama, much of Georgia and parts of North Carolina and South Carolina were under a tornado watch through 8 p.m. ET.

Earlier, in Alabama, the storms blew the metal roof off a building in Sheffield, CNN affiliate WHNT said. The storm also damaged a church steeple in Rogersville, the station reported.

In Kentucky, winds blew off much of the roof of the Penrod Missionary Baptist Church and damaged several homes, CNN affiliate WFIE reported.

KFVS: Power outages from storms

In Nashville, the weather service listed dozens of damage reports across the region: a funnel cloud was reported early Wednesday in Jackson County, there were dozens of reports of downed trees and power lines, and law enforcement reported damage to homes and businesses.

CNN affiliate WSMV also reported the partial collapse of an office building in Mount Juliet.

"I built it myself to take an event like this. And it looks like a freight train hit it," the station quoted building owner Dewey Lineberry as saying. "It's just destroyed. It laid the building down on top of cars, it put the building on top of people. It's unbelievable."

WFIE: Storms blow new roof off tri-state church

Workers who were inside the building when the storm hit took cover under mattresses, the station said.

The storm came dangerously close to WSMV, the station reported: Workers had to move to a safe room when a buzzer in the newsroom alerted them of storm danger around 4 a.m. (5 a.m. ET) Wednesday, the station reported.

In Wilson County, Tennessee, strong winds damaged four buildings, though it was not immediately known if it was the result of a tornado, Emergency Management Director John Jewell told CNN.

WKRN: Confirmed tornado

One family became trapped inside their mobile home and were rescued, he said.

About 14,000 people in the country were without power, Jewell added.

On Tuesday, the storms raked Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, among other places, with heavy rain and high wind.

William Jones waited out the storm with his family inside their truck, CNN affiliate KFSM reported.

"We pulled over and come to stop and about the same time we stopped was when it started to cross the road about 100-150 yards ahead of us," the station quoted him as saying. "We watched it tear out all the trees, throw the debris in the road."

A large springlike storm system is pushing severe thunderstorms, damaging winds and unstable conditions favorable for tornadoes eastward through the Mississippi Valley.

Heavy gusts in excess of 70 mph could bring significant damage. "I think it's definitely a dangerous night and day," CNN meteorologist Ivan Cabrera said as the front moved in.

WBKO: Tractor trailer flips on I-65

Flood warnings and watches speckled the weather map from Michigan to southern Louisiana. Many regions should see heavy downpours, Cabrera said, but the front is not expected to stall out and dump excessive amounts of precipitation in any particular area.

The wet weather was predicted to trigger winter storms in the northern Plains states. A freezing rain advisory is in effect for much of Iowa and Wisconsin.

Photos: Finding art in icy weather

CNN's Vivian Kuo contributed to this report.

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Report: Several injured in Phoenix office shooting

Scene outside a Phoenix, Ariz., office building where several people reportedly were injured in a shooting on Wednesday morning, Jan. 30, 2013.

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KPHO

(CBS) PHOENIX - Phoenix police are investigating a shooting at a city office building that has left several people injured, CBS affiliate KPHO reported.Police say there was an altercation at a business in the 7300 block of North 16th Street about 10:30 a.m. Wednesday. The suspect fired multiple rounds, hitting several people, according to KPHO.

It is unknown at this time how many people were hit or the severity of their injuries.

Police are looking for a suspect.

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Phoenix Gunman Shoots Three at Office Complex

A gunman shot and wounded three people at an office building in Phoenix, Ariz., today and police are now searching for the shooter, authorities told ABC News.

There are no reports of deaths at this time.

Police are clearing the office complex in the in the 7310 block of 16th Street, near Glendale Avenue.

Officials say there was only one gunman, who remains at large.

Police are also investigating a separate scene near Glendale Avenue, according to ABC News affiliate KNXV-TV. It's not clear if it's related to the office shooting.

The shooting took place moments after former Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, the victim of a shooting in Phoenix in 2011, testified before Congress on gun control.

In the weeks since 20 students were gunned down at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school on Dec. 14, 2012, several mass shootings have garnered public attention as the nation debates its relationship to firearms.

Five days ago, two men were arrested for a opening fire at Lone Star College in Houston, Texas. No one was injured. Earlier this month, a 16-year-old student was arrested after shooting a classmate in Taft, Calif.

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Is the U.S. getting Egypt wrong again?

Egyptian riot police stand guard as people protest against Egypt's President Mohamed Morsy in Cairo on December 29, 2012.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• National protests against Morsy set for second anniversary of Egypt's revolution


• Cynthia Schneider: U.S. out of step, underestimates the anti-Morsy sentiment


• She says proponents of secular democracy think the U.S. backs Muslim Brotherhood


• She says massive protests will show U.S. needs to align itself with the popular will

Editor's note: Cynthia Schneider is a professor in the practice of diplomacy at Georgetown University; dean at the School of Diplomacy, Dubrovnik International University; and a senior nonresident fellow at Brookings Institution. She is also a former U.S. ambassador to the Netherlands.

(CNN) -- Protests planned around Egypt -- particularly in Cairo's Tahrir Square -- on the second anniversary of the January 25 revolution are expected to be an explosion of dissent, revealing the deep divisions in the country between President Mohamed Morsy and the Egyptian people.

Opposition to Morsy's authoritarianism is broader than the world recognizes. In making accommodations for Morsy's government, the United States is -- once again -- out of step with the Egyptian people.

Cynthia P. Schneider

Egyptians may not know exactly what they want, but they know what they don't want. Although an effective political opposition has yet to coalesce, Egyptians from all sectors of society are united in their refusal to accept another repressive regime.

Egypt is on a collision course. An ever growing, if periodically discouraged, portion of the population opposes the government and Morsy's Muslim Brotherhood, and supports the revolution's goals of social and economic justice, accountable government, and basic freedoms, including freedom of expression and protection of minorities. Yet the government is moving in exactly the opposite direction, with its authoritarian control over political, social, and religious life.

The government's investigation of the wildly popular "Egyptian Jon Stewart" Bassem Youssef -- charged with insulting Morsy and undermining his command -- and the forced "retirement" of respected journalist Hani Shukrallah, editor of state-owned Al-Ahram's English-language website, are just two very public examples of the vice tightening on freedom of expression.

In fact, the Arab Network for Human Rights says about 24 lawsuits for insulting Morsy have been filed against journalists and activists since his election in June.

The regime is trying to put the revolution genie back in the bottle. But it is clamping down on a population that has discovered its voice. In opposition to this repression, Egyptians at all levels are increasingly engaged in politics.

A Cairo cab driver -- ever the measure of popular sentiment -- recently debated the failings of the Constitution with a passenger. After reaching the destination, the driver leapt out, grabbed a dogeared copy of the Constitution he kept in the front seat, and pointed to a passage to prove his point to his passenger.

The December demonstrations against President Morsy and the Muslim Brotherhood-backed Constitution, which attracted an even broader segment of the population than those who stood in Tahrir Square in 2011, revealed the broadening chasm between the regime and the people in Egypt.

Assembled outside the Presidential Palace were old and young, veiled and unveiled, rich and poor. Whether they arrived in chauffeur-driven cars or whether they marched from Cairo's outlying shantytowns, the hundreds of thousands joined together in their refusal to accept a state that squashed the dreams of the revolution and dictated political, social, and religious behavior.

Many call the second wave of the revolution in the fall of 2012 the "Mothers' Revolution." Parents and grandparents went into the streets to protest the divided loyalties in their families between the Islamists (Brotherhood or Salafis) and those supporting a democratic, secular Egypt. In Egypt, secular means freedom from state control of religion, not nonreligious.

The clash between these two visions of Egypt -- secular with freedom and social justice, or a religious state run by the Brotherhood with its version of Sharia law -- played out inside families and on the streets.

Soldiers protecting the Presidential Palace during the December demonstrations were moved to tears when an Egyptian woman, referring to Morsy, shouted at them, "Why are you protecting this man who is pitting Egyptians against each other?"

Mohamed El Gindy, a successful businessman who opposes Morsy and spent much of December camping in Tahrir with the young revolutionaries, has experienced this division within families firsthand. A relative who had joined the Salafis informed him that the extreme Islamist group had put El Gindy at No. 5 on its "hit list," which is widely believed by Egyptians to exist. The relative was unapologetic until El Gindy told him that he might as well put El Gindy's mother on the list, too, since the octogenarian also had joined the street protests.

Egypt and its families may be divided, but on one subject, all are united -- in the belief that the United States is supporting the Muslim Brotherhood-dominated government.

Visible in the throngs at the December demonstrations were signs opposing Qatar and the United States -- yes, the U.S. and Qatar were lumped together as supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood regime.

"This is such a historic opportunity to restore the image of the U.S., but instead it is putting itself in the same position as Qatar. ... And this from President Obama -- so disappointing," Riham Bahi, a professor at American University in Cairo, said, reflecting views heard repeatedly last December in Egypt.

Opposition leader and blogger Bassem Sabry was even more blunt: "With the Constitution in play, you are subsidizing an Islamist state." Sabry said he was always pro-U.S. "until the revolution."

In addition, the Pentagon plans to proceed with the delivery of 20 F-16 jets to Egypt, a step that looks to Egyptians like a vote of confidence in Morsy. Unchanged since the revolution, U.S. aid policy toward Egypt still makes the military alliance its priority.

Two years after the Egyptian Revolution, the U.S. government finds itself again backing an authoritarian regime against the popular will. As January 25 approaches, with massive protests planned against Morsy's government, this is a precarious position for both the U.S. and Egypt.

In his second term, Obama should adopt a more agile and informed policy toward Egypt, one that matches the words often heard from the White House -- "The United States always has stood with the Egyptian people" -- with action.

Follow @CNNOpinion on Twitter.

Join us at Facebook/CNNOpinion.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Cynthia Schneider.

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Cycling: Doping doctor 'worked in various sports'

MADRID: A Spanish doctor on trial over a major blood doping racket involving top professional cyclists said Tuesday he had worked for athletes in "all kinds" of sports.

Eufemiano Fuentes, 57, was testifying at his trial in the so-called Puerto affair, one of the biggest ever doping scandals, which came to court this week seven years after it erupted.

Fuentes is charged with public health offences rather than sports doping, which was not illegal at the time in Spain.

Although the doctor admits providing blood transfusions for athletes, who he refuses to name, he denies this risked their health.

That may limit the trial's impact on the sporting world, which is reeling from US cyclist Lance Armstrong's admission that he doped his way to seven Tour de France victories.

"I worked on a private basis with individual athletes of all kinds," Fuentes told the court in Madrid in his four-hour testimony on Tuesday.

Police detained Fuentes in 2006 when they seized 200 bags of blood and other evidence of performance-enhancing transfusions, in an investigation dubbed "Operation Puerto".

Asked who those bags of blood belonged to, Fuentes told the court: "It could be other kinds of athlete, but in 2006 it was mainly cyclists."

Investigators listed 58 cyclists suspected in the scandal.

Of the 58, only six have received sporting sanctions: Spain's Alejandro Valverde, Germans Jan Ullrich and Joerg Jaksche and Italians Ivan Basso, Michele Scarponi and Giampaolo Caruso, who was later cleared by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

Fuentes, his sister Yolanda and three other defendants are charged with endangering public health rather than incitement to doping, which was also not a crime in Spain at the time of the arrests.

He denies that his treatment endangered the cyclists' health.

He told the court on Tuesday that athletes such as footballers and boxers came to him for "medical and nutritional advice, physical and medical tests to guarantee that their health would not suffer".

He said he did not know whether the cyclists he treated told their team managers about it.

Fuentes said that he and another doctor, Jose Luis Merino Batres, tested the viscosity of the athletes' blood -- known as the haematocrit value -- and extracted blood if they found the level too high.

After freezing the blood in a bag to preserve it, they re-injected it if the haematocrit value had fallen too low, "because that too is dangerous" for the health, Fuentes said.

Merino has been spared going on trial for the time being since he has Alzheimer's disease.

Fuentes said he kept a "blood diary" recording the extractions and tagged the frozen blood with codes identifying the athletes.

Former cyclist Jesus Manzano, a former rider on Spanish team Kelme of which Fuentes was the head doctor, has alleged generalised doping in the team and says he himself underwent unsafe transfusions.

A court official said Tuesday that Armstrong's former team-mate Tyler Hamilton will testify at the trial, after the judge granted a request by the World Anti-Doping Agency, a civil party in the case.

Other trial witnesses include Alberto Contador, Tour de France winner in 2007 and 2009, who returned to competition last year after a two-year ban for a separate case in which he denied doping. Contador, due to appear on February 5, was cleared of any involvement in the Puerto affair.

The date for Hamilton's testimony had yet to be set.

Fuentes's defence lawyer was due to take the floor on Wednesday and the trial is scheduled to last until March 22.

- AFP/jc

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Arm transplant vet looking forward to swimming, diving

BALTIMORE A soldier who lost all four limbs in an Iraq roadside bombing says he looks forward to driving and swimming with his new arms.

Twenty-six-year-old Brendan Marrocco spoke at a news conference Tuesday at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. He was joined by the surgeons who performed the double-arm transplant there.

Marrocco says he's happy and amazed to have new arms. He has prosthetic legs but says that without arms, he felt "kind of lost for a while."

"It's given me a lot of hope for the future," Marrocco said. "I feel like it's given me a second chance."

The procedure was only the seventh double-hand or double-arm transplant ever conducted in the United States.

Dr. W. P. Andrew Lee, the lead surgeon on Marrocco's team, said this surgery "was the most extensive and complicated" transplant surgery ever performed, involving the connecting of bone, nerves, blood vessels, muscles, and other tissue. He said his team had rehearsed four times on cadavers in the last two years.

Marrocco said he already can twist the wrist in his left arm, which had a lower amputation than the right, allowing doctors to begin that arm transplant at his elbow. Lee said nerves regrow at about an inch per month, so given the length of an arm, it will take several months to more than a year for most normal arm movements to occur with Marrocco.

Lee said Marrocco, a New York native, will check out of the hospital Tuesday, and begin outpatient therapy while staying nearby for several months.

The infantryman was injured by a roadside bomb in 2009. The New York City man also received bone marrow from the same dead donor to minimize the medicine needed to prevent rejection.

The military is sponsoring operations like these to help wounded troops. About 300 have lost arms or hands in the wars.

Through all the procedures and the recovery, Marrocco has generally maintained a positive attitude.

Play Video

Young Injured Vet Tells Story

In a 2010 interview with CBS News correspondent David Martin (at left), he said: "I just seem to have a good lookout on things. I'm still alive. My buddy wasn't as fortunate."

Marrocco was referring to one of the other members of his squad, whom he described as his best friend, who was killed when their Humvee ran over a tripwire.

"I remember the flash, the sound, it was ridiculously loud. I remember all the screaming in the truck trying to see who was hurt. After that I remember waking up in the hospital," Marrocco said.

He described the thing that took his limbs as a "copper dart" that was "molten hot," saying it "cauterized my wounds." The New York native said he has marveled at the fact that he survived, when others did not, adding that his friend who died "wasn't hurt nearly as bad as I was."

Even after waking up in the hospital and realizing that he lost his arms, Marrocco said his father told him his reaction was relatively nonchalant, saying "I just shrugged my shoulders and went back to sleep."

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Palin and Fox Part Ways, but Is She Really Over?

Sarah Palin's break up with Fox News should not have been, well, breaking news, as she had publicly complained in August on Facebook that the network had canceled her appearances at the Republican National Convention. And going back even further, Palin didn't give Fox the scoop in October 2011 when she announced she wasn't going to run for president. Still, the news of the Fox split overtook Twitter and the news cycle by storm.

One thing I've learned in my years covering Palin, which began on Aug. 29, 2008, when Sen. John McCain stunned the country by selecting her as his running mate: Everyone has an opinion on whatever she does, and she can get clicks and coverage like no one else.

The prevailing theory now is that since Palin no longer has a megaphone like Fox News through which she can blast her opinions, her moment is now officially over.

The 'Ends' of Sarah Palin

It might be true, but there have been so many "ends of Sarah Palin" that it's almost too hard to keep track of them all. She was over when she lost the 2008 campaign, she was over when she quit the Alaska governorship, she was over when she decided to do a reality show, she was over when she decided not to run for president, and now again, she's over because her appearances on Fox News are over.

Secret Service Scandal: Fired Agent 'Checked Out' Sarah Palin Watch Video

I, for one, did think Palin would lose her relevancy when she quit the Alaska governorship, and also when she didn't run for president. But in both cases, people who both love her and hate her just couldn't get enough information about her, and she still got an incredible amount of news coverage. Her voice was heard loud and clear, even if it blasted only from her Facebook posts. That's just another example of what she's been able to pull off that others who've come before or after just haven't. Palin's been written off from Day One, but like a boomerang, she just keeps coming back.

Yes, she wasn't really helpful to Mitt Romney's campaign, but she also never really explicitly backed him. And what an odd pair they would have made if she had. In her interview last weekend with Steve Bannon, the executive chairman of Breitbart News who made "The Undefeated," the positive 2011 movie about her, she said, "The problem is that some on the right are now skittish because of the lost 2012 election. They shouldn't be. Conservatism didn't lose. A moderate Republican candidate lost after he was perceived to alienate working-class Reagan Democrats and independent voters." Not a sign that she wants to rethink some of her policy points, or that she will retreat into the shadows.

Another Possible TV Home

I think more likely than her fading away (we all still cover every eyebrow-raising Facebook post of hers) is that she will possibly find an on-air home elsewhere, at somewhere like CNN. She told Breitbart.com that she "encourages others to step out in faith, jump out of the comfort zone, and broaden our reach as believers in American exceptionalism. That means broadening our audience. I'm taking my own advice here as I free up opportunities to share more broadly the message of the beauty of freedom and the imperative of defending our republic and restoring this most exceptional nation. We can't just preach to the choir; the message of liberty and true hope must be understood by a larger audience."

Later in the interview, she added, "I know the country needs more truth-telling in the media, and I'm willing to do that. So, we shall see."

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