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Attack Planned in Dallas; Iran Admits Second Nuclear Site; Focusing on H1N1 Vaccine

Aired September 25, 2009 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: We are watching several developing stories this morning. President Obama comes out swinging against Iran in the wake of the public revelation of a secret nuclear facility.

Also, arrests are made in two unrelated terror plots. One in Dallas, the other in Illinois. The plots may be separate but the aim was the same.

Let's begin with that terror arrest in Dallas now. Investigators say the teenaged suspect was ready to blow up a downtown skyscraper. Our Sean Callebs is in Dallas this morning. Interesting, Sean. Yes, he's a teenager.

SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, he's a teenager. He's in federal custody. He's going to be in this federal court in just a matter of hours. He is charged with planning to unleash a weapon of weapons of mass destruction. A 19-year-old Jordanian in the country illegally perhaps staying beyond his visa. Now what authorities say first attracted their attention to Hosam Maher Husein Smadi were his rants and raves on the internet. Basically spewing venom, promising terrorist attacks here in the United States.

So undercover agents posing as al Qaeda operatives began conversing with him and in this 10-page arrest warrant it details how they had about 65 conversations with Sumadi over the past year. And all came to the head on the 23rd of this month.

Basically what came down, Smadi said he was prepared to strike a terrorist attack against the United States. The feds in the sting operation got a vehicle and told them that it was loaded with ammonium nitrates, C-4, blasting caps. The same kind of stuff that Timothy McVeigh used to bring down the federal building.

He then drove to an building here, an icon really in Dallas. Fountain Place. Parked in the garage. Authorities gave him a cell phone to use to remotely detonate this. They asked him if he wanted ear plugs and he said no. He wanted to hear the explosion. All that information again in the arrest warrant. What happened? He was simply arrested and now he's in custody and he could be facing life imprisonment. Heidi...

COLLINS: All right. Boy, what an alleged plot there. Sean Callebs following the story for us in Dallas, Texas this morning. Thank you, Sean.

Now, in an unrelated sting operation, FBI agents arrested an Illinois man who they say was trying to attack a federal courthouse in Springfield. Our Ted Rowlands reported last hour that Michael C. Finton thought he parked a van full of explosives in front of that courthouse but they were actually fake explosive given to Finton by an FBI agent posing as a low level Al Qaeda operative. The investigator say they have been watching Finton for about two years.

Those two investigations are also unrelated to the alleged plot uncovered in New York and Colorado. We've been talking about it here for several days. The main suspect in that case is due in court next hour. We'll take a closer look at that case and bomb making allegations by federal agents coming your way in about 25 minutes.

We are talking about the terror plots on our blog this morning. Does knowing about them actually make you feel safer or less safe? Does it make you more vigilant or would you really rather not hear about them at all? Go to cnn.com/heidi, go ahead and post your comments there. We'll bring some of them to you a little bit later on in the show.

Calls this morning for Iran to come clean once and for all about its nuclear ambitions. This after a startling revelation by Iran that it is in fact building a second nuclear facility now. The leaders of the United States, Britain and France are demanding the site be opened to international inspectors.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Iran's decision to build yet another nuclear facility without notifying the IAEA represents a direct challenge to the basic compact at the Center of the Nonproliferation Regime. These rules are clear. All nations have a right to peaceful nuclear energy. Those nations with nuclear weapons must move towards disarmament. Those nations without nuclear weapons must forsake them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: Very quickly, we want to let you know regarding this story. We're just now hearing here at CNN that apparently Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was scheduled to speak at 5:00 p.m. tonight in New York at the U.N.. That speech has now been cancelled. Also, next week Iran is set to meet with members of the U.N. Security Council about its nuclear agenda. No word on whether that meeting will still take place.

So why is Iran all of a sudden admitting to the existence of this second plant? Our senior international correspondent Matthew Chance joining us now from Moscow with more on that. So Matthew, that seems to be one of the questions that we're trying to uncover this morning. Did they really admit to it or did they admit to it only after being found out?

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The timing of it is very confusing, Heidi. It seems that the Iranians have been shrouding this whole project, to build this second uranium- enrichment facility in a whole lot of secrecy over the past several years. It's been a long running project. It's something that the U.S. security service along with those in France and United Kingdom as well have been saying they've been monitoring for the past several years and so it's something that's been on the sort of intelligence radar for a while.

Why they chose now to disclose it? Well, it seems the only reason they did that is because they became alert to the possibility that western security agencies were onto them and they essentially had been busted when they found that out, they wrote this letter apparently on Monday. The Iranian government did to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, essentially in some vague terms revealing that this facility existed.

And then on Thursday, according to President Obama speaking at the U.N., you know, a few - you know, an hour or so ago, it was then that the United States on Thursday, the British and the French as well, went to the U.N. nuclear watchdog with all the intelligence that they gathered on this issue over the past several years and so the timing of why the Iranians chose right now to write this letter - rather on Monday to write this letter seems to have been driven by this idea that they were busted by the western intelligence services.

COLLINS: Yes. No question really. And we did hear some very tough words this morning from those world leaders mentioned specifically saying that the configuration and the size of this particular plant really isn't consistent with peaceful producing nuclear energy.

But you are in Moscow. And the Russian side of things very interesting in all of this. We talk about potential sanctions that could come later, tougher sanctions. Where does Russia fall in all of this?

CHANCE: You know, it's not clear. It's interesting to see when President Obama, Nicholas Sarkozy and Gordon Brown of Britain were on that podium at the U.N.. These three key members of the Security Council, two of them were missing, of course, the Russians and the Chinese.

COLLINS: That's right.

CHANCE: And it's not clear yet whether the Russians traditionally resisted the idea of tougher sanctions against the Iranians because they got such close commercial ties with the Islamic state, whether that will change. Two things have changed though over the past couple of days recently.

First of all, very crucially, the U-turn by the Obama administration on missile defenses in Eastern Europe. This was a big roadblock in continuing the flourishing of the relationship between the Russians and the U.S., that's off the table. The Russians have indicated that they may look again at the idea of sanctions.

Now this explosive revelation may really drive the Kremlin to the position of the United States. We just have to wait and see what comes out of the next security council meeting. Heidi. COLLINS: Certainly. Because if the U.S. and Russia and a few other world leaders knew about this second facility, and then tried to talk to Russia about possible sanctions, it seems they would potentially be a little warmer to the idea because of this new information. So very interesting. We know that you're following it very closely through your sources.

Matthew Chance coming to us from Moscow, Russia this morning. Thank you, Matthew.

In fact, in just a few minutes we're going to be talking to an international security expert now who just happened believe it or not to have dinner with Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, last night. Jim Walsh coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Nuclear tensions on the rise. This morning world leaders are demanding answers now that Iran has admitted it has a second secret nuclear site.

Our next guest brings an extraordinary perspective because just last night international security consultant Jim Walsh had dinner with Iran's president. Jim is joining us now from New York.

OK. Actually, this is like the fourth time you've had dinner with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran. What is that like? How does that go? Where does he sit? Do people ask questions, I mean, especially in light of what's going on at the U.N. and then again this morning on this admission of a second nuclear facility. What happened?

JIM WALSH, INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CONSULTANT: Well, it's typically a long affair. This one was three hours plus. There are about 40 of us around the table eating dinner. There are lots of questions. Questions about his Holocaust comments. Questions about Israel. About the nuclear program.

I asked about a colleague of mine (INAUDIBLE) who is currently sitting in an Iranian prison and I asked him to look into that case. So lots of questions especially about U.S-Iranian relations.

COLLINS: Are there any answers?

WALSH: Sometimes there are and sometimes there aren't. But Heidi, there are ways to learn things indirectly. As you said, this is my fourth time. One year he was very combative and defensive. Another year he was sort of professor, trying to teach us in the room.

Last night he was very different from any of the previous three times. He was conciliatory. He did not launch into the Holocaust or the Israel stuff as he's done in the past even though he had the opportunity to. He didn't rail against the United States as he has in the past. Very conciliatory. Talk about the (INAUDIBLE) plus one as useful and as a way to resolve these problems. I never heard him say that before. COLLINS: Yes, fascinating except I would have to say hang on a minute because I think he may have maybe been tuned into the fact that this announcement, if you will, was going to happen this morning. So maybe that was the conciliatory tone that you hadn't quite seen before this announcement by President Barack Obama that we just saw and also Gordon Brown and Nicolas Sarkozy about this second nuclear facility. Did he know that was coming? Is there any way to know?

WALSH: I didn't know he was going to do it. He did talk about two other proposals he made about allowing Iranian scientists to meet American and other scientists and another nuclear proposal. It may have been a factor. They may have decided to do this in advance or this may have added to it. I actually think that this despite as weird as this sounds, Heidi, this might be a positive development.

First of all it shows that the U.S. and western intelligence is pretty darn good that it found this undeclared facility. And the U.S. has a terrific track record there. That should give us Americans confidence as we go forward.

COLLINS: Yes, except that, Jim, we've been saying that Iran has admitted to this and yet there are really very big questions about really the time line here and whether or not it was an admission because they were found out. So with three U.N. sanctions already in place on this country still going ahead and building a second facility, I don't know.

I mean we got this new resolution that went into play yesterday. Voted on unanimously by the security council. Saw it live on our air. Is anything going to really stop Iran from doing what they want to do?

WALSH: I think so. You know, the national intelligence estimate and the latest consensus which was reaffirmed by Leon Pannetta less than a month ago was that Iran has not made a final decision about whether to go for the bomb. This is not inevitable. It's not inexorable.

And remember in the past, Heidi, in 2003 when sites were revealed, that's the point at which Iran began to negotiate and compromise. Libya is another example. Libya was in nuclear negotiations with the U.S. and Britain, we caught a ship that is filled with centrifuge parts and that put pressure on Libya to go ahead and close those negotiations and settle up the deal.

So as ironic as it may be, this may end up helping those (INAUDIBLE) talks that happened in October. It may help push towards an improvement or a road to resolve this problem.

COLLINS: Yes but quoting the president as we just heard this morning, the size and configuration of this particular facility not consistent with the peaceful production of nuclear energy. So I don't know. The questions remain obviously. I know everybody has their eye on it today.

Jim Walsh, dinner guest of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Thanks so much for being here, Jim. We appreciate it. WALSH: Thank you, Heidi.

COLLINS: Protecting yourself and your family against the H1N1 flu. We'll be able to get the vaccine soon but will everyone who should get it actually get it?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Checking our top stories now. In central Florida investigators are trying to figure out what sparked a massive fire at a biodiesel plant. The (INAUDIBLE) facility housed thousands of gallons of flammable fuel. The fast spreading fire and several explosions leveled the facility and destroyed several nearby vehicles. The only employee inside the plant at the time said she suspects lightning may be to blame.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has been released from the hospital after an overnight stay. Ginsburg, who is 76 years old, felt ill at her office following treatment for an iron deficiency. The court says she is stable and was taken to the hospital as a precaution.

A swearing in ceremony is set for this afternoon for a man who will replace the late Senator Ted Kennedy. Longtime Kennedy aide Paul Kirk will become Massachusetts's newest senator. He was tapped by Governor Duvall Patrick to serve as interim senator until an election in January. Earlier today Massachusetts assistant attorney general dismissed a case by the state republican party to block Kirk's swearing-in.

In less than two weeks, the long-awaited H1N1 vaccine will be available to the public. But the question is will people actually get it? A new poll from the University of Michigan shows only 40 percent of parents want it for their kids even though it's recommended for all kids.

Our senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen was at a briefing at the White House yesterday. Elizabeth, we talked to you when you were there. But what are you hearing now this morning? What are federal health officials worried about here?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Heidi, what I heard from those folks at the White House yesterday and continue to hear is that they are concerned that parents are going to just say no to the H1N1 shot even though as you pointed out, all kids are supposed to get it. Their concerned parents will say it's the flu and no big deal.

But look at this statistic. 56 children have died of H1N1 since April and many more have been hospitalized at a pretty good percentage of those hospitalizations have involved a stay at the intensive care unit. They want parents to think carefully before they say no to the H1N1 vaccine.

COLLINS: Was there any discussion about people just saying this is brand new. I don't know much about this vaccine. COHEN: Sure. They completely understand that that's what people are going to say. Look, for seasonal flu, which that shot has been around forever, most parents don't get that one. So when something is new, sure, they're worried that parents are going to say they're scared of something new. What they were trying to say is yes, but you should be scared that your child is going to die from the flu.

COLLINS: All right. Well, understood. Let's go ahead and talk about your "Empower Me Friday." Because we usually go ahead and help one person with a health care problem on this. And today we are helping Yolanda who actually has a swine flu question. So let's go ahead and look at that.

COHEN: Heidi, I will tell you we chose Yolanda's question for a very selfish reason. I also have a large family. My husband and I sat down and said who needs what and which kid needs how many shots and what do I need and you need? It's like calculus. I mean, it really tried our brain cells to figure this out.

So we decided to help Yolanda to try to figure out what she needs. First of all, Yolanda and her husband assuming that they are healthy relatively young people, they each need just one flu shot. They need the regular flu shot. So she needs to get a shot. And he needs to get a shot. We're talking just one. One.

They do not need H1N1 as long as they are - let's say 30s or 40s and relatively healthy. Now the kids are a different situation. So let's take a look at that. Let us take a look. They have three kids. The children are ages 14, 11 and 7. OK. We don't have kids so I'll just make them up. There they are. 14, 11 and 7.

All right. This 14 year old is going to need two flu shots this year. The reason why he's going to need two is one is seasonal and one is swine flu. So again, two shots for this child. This child is also going to need two shots. One seasonal and one swine flu shot. This child is only seven years old. All right. So this child is seven years old. This child is going to need two shots, a seasonal and an H1N1 plus one additional shot, a second H1N1 shot because kids under the age of 10 need two shots or probably two doses of the nasal vaccine if that's what they want to get. So these kids are going to have to get two, two and three.

COLLINS: Yes. Wow.

COHEN: It's tough. I'm telling you, we're going to talk about this as the months come because this vaccine is out soon. It's in 10 days. I tell you even folks at the CDC are confused about how many shots people need. So we're going to over this again and again and help people figure out exactly what they need and what their kids need.

COLLINS: Yes. And I'm sure doctors, personal physicians will be doing the same, I hope.

COHEN: I think they're going to be confused, too. I'll be honest with you. It's not easy. COLLINS: What about paying for all of these? This particular gal, Yolanda, she's unemployed, no insurance.

COHEN: Right. I have great news for Yolanda. The seasonal flu shot is available for free at CVS and Walgreens if you're uninsured or unemployed. You have to bring in some paperwork showing that. But they say they'll give it to you for free. And H1N1 shots should be free for pretty much everyone because the government is giving them away.

COLLINS: All right. Very quickly. People have questions for "Empowered Patient," where do they go.

COHEN: Yes. Send me your swine flu questions or any questions at empoweredpatient@cnn.com.

COLLINS: You're right.

COHEN: Now I got.

COLLINS: All right. Very good. Elizabeth Cohen, thanks so much.

COHEN: OK. Thank you.

COLLINS: Trying to make bombs. Investigators check out beauty supply shops looking for ties to an alleged cross-country terror plot.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: A key terror suspect is due in federal court in Denver this morning. Federal investigators say Najibullah Zazi was trying to build bombs for an attack somewhere in the United States.

Attorney General Eric Holder says Zazi's arrest disrupted an "imminent threat."

CNN's homeland security correspondent Jeanne Meserve has more now on the case.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN HOMELAND SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The explosive that ripped apart London transit cars in 2005 killing 52 people was TATP, tri-acetone tri-peroxide. The government alleges that Najibullah Zazi was attempting to cook up the same deadly concoction and use it.

LEO WEST, FORMER FBI EXPLOSIVES EXPERT: There's no known commercial use for TATP. It's an improvised explosive mixture. It really has no other purpose and really only somebody intent on some sort of criminal or terrorist act would be interested in making it.

MESERVE: The government alleges that Zazi had instructions for making TATP on his computer and did Internet searches for component chemicals. Over the summer the government says Zazi and others bought large quantities of some of those chemicals from beauty supply stores in the Denver area.

How many times did he come in?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's like four times.

MESERVE: September 6th and 7th, Zazi allegedly stayed in a Denver area hotel where authorities believe he may have cooked the chemicals to concentrate them. On those same dates the government says Zazi tried with increasing urgency to contact someone about the explosives recipe saying he needed answers right away.

September 8th court documents allege Zazi searched the Internet for places in Queens, New York, to buy one final component of TATP, muriatic acid. The next day he started his drive east to New York. The government says, a search of the Queens apartment where he stayed did turn up a scale with Zazi's fingerprints which could have been used in weighing components for a bomb.

Two others arrested and charged in the case were released on bond. Najibullah Zazi's father Mohammad and Ahmad Afzali, the Imam picked up in New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: We wanted to quickly show you this exclusive video obtained by CNN too. It shows Najibullah Zazi shopping at one of those beauty supply stores. Zazi faces a charge of conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction. In court today prosecutors are expected to ask to move the case to New York.

Let's bring you up to speed on other terror investigations unrelated to the case in Colorado and New York. Now a Jordanian teenager is due in court in Dallas today. He is accused of trying to blow up a downtown skyscraper. The FBI provided him with phony explosives.

It's a similar but separate story in Springfield, Illinois. Well, this man thought he parked a van full of explosives in front of a federal courthouse. It was also filled with fake bombs.

And then there's the case in North Carolina from last month. Seven men are accused of planning a holy war overseas but now prosecutors say the suspected ring leader of that group, Daniel Patrick Boyd, was also planning to attack the U.S. Marine Corps base in Quantico, Virginia.

We are talking about these terror plots on our blog this morning. Just wondering how you feel. Do you want to know about them when the government and investigators let us know? Or would you rather not know that these things are happening?

Let's get over to Heidi Mac now and take a look at it. You see here where we sort of explain the story that we're covering today and then on to some of our responses.

Jerry says, "Yes, it makes me feel more safe. It's the unknown that's really scary. The more information I am made aware of the better."

And then this one coming from John: "It's sort of a catch-22. It's a good thing to know what our government is doing to keep us safe but if we knew everything that they did their efforts would be more easily thwarted and we might feel less secure."

And finally this one, that I can't -- actually those are the only two that we're going to do right now. So we have gotten a lot of responses. And we appreciate that as always. You can write into us at CNN.com/Heidi.

And new developments this morning on Iran's nuclear actions: President Obama and the leaders of Britain and France accuse Iran of building a second nuclear plant and trying to hide it from the world for years.

CNN's Dan Lothian joining us now from Pittsburgh, where the leaders are gathering for the G-20 Economic Summit.

So Dan I don't know that we really expected this type of announcement this morning from the G-20 but we have been hearing some strong reaction from world leaders.

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, very strong reaction. And as you pointed out you know, this is something at least according to the Obama administration that had been ongoing now for years but the U.S. intelligence along with French and British intelligence became aware of this recently and the president deciding to make it public today, as you pointed out accusing Iran of having this covert uranium enrichment facility underground.

U.S. officials though, say that it has not yet been started up but there is a lot of concern. And President Obama accusing Iran of breaking the rules and saying it's time for them to step up to their international responsibilities.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: And that compact depends on all nations living up to their responsibilities. This site deepens a growing concern that Iran is refusing to live up to those international responsibilities including specifically revealing all nuclear related activities.

As the international community knows, this is not the first time that Iran has concealed information about its nuclear program. Iran has a right to peaceful nuclear power that meets the energy needs of its people. But the size and configuration of this facility is inconsistent with a peaceful program.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LOTHIAN: Again joined by British Prime Minister Brown and French President Sarkozy and much stronger language from them; Sarkozy talking about a time line and also sanctions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NICOLAS SARKOZY, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE (through translator): We were already in a very severe confidence crisis. We are now faced with a challenge, a challenge made to the entire international communities. The six will meet with the Iranian representatives in Geneva. Everything, everything must be put on the table now.

We cannot let the Iranian leaders gain time while the motors are running. If by December there is not an in depth change by the Iranian leaders, sanctions will have to be taken. This is for the peace and stability. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LOTHIAN: The International Atomic Agency has already reached out to Iran seeking any kind of information that they can get on this facility and seeking it immediately.

Now, the big thing to be watch before Heidi is China. China has not been willing to embrace any talk whatsoever of sanctions. A senior administration official just a short time ago at a briefing was asked if they had been able to get any sort of information ahead of us receiving it and what their reaction was and he said stay tuned.

COLLINS: Yes, understood. That is the big question right now. Also, I'm sure people are wondering if this information, this announcement actually threatens to overshadow some of the G-20 goals.

LOTHIAN: Well, you know in many ways it will. Because the president was not expected to step before the microphones until a press conference later this afternoon and he came out and made this statement. This of course is the news driver throughout the day.

But still a lot of important issues will be addressed throughout the day here at the G-20 focusing on the global economic crisis and trying to get some kind of regulations to prevent another crash like we saw here as many believe that we were on the brink of another depression.

Also, taking a look at international trade: again, economists believing that some of the trade disparities, in particular with China, were part of the cause of the crash. So those are issues that will still be addressed but certainly away from the spotlight of Iran.

COLLINS: Absolutely, all right we are watching all of it alongside you. Thanks so much, I surely appreciate the reporting today.

Also, in a town where businesses have been shuttered left and right, one Detroit landmark has been thriving since the 1940s. Bargain burgers are keeping the highway diner alive no matter how deep the recession.

CNNmoney.com's Poppy Harlow got a taste for "Assignment Detroit." (BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: May I take your orders?

EARL OWEN, TELWAY DINER: We get into a recession, and my business usually picks up. And you can tell when unemployment comes in and business picks up. Whenever Social Security checks come in, my business picks up.

POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: Ninety-five cents for a cheeseburger. How on earth do you make any money, Earl?

OWEN: Well, we do it on volume. That's a whole system is mainly on volume.

HARLOW: Why do you set the prices this way?

OWEN: Number one, I want everybody to be able to eat anything when they want to eat. If you have 85 cents and you got 35 cents for a cup of coffee and you can still get something to eat.

I would rather do a lot of business and not make as much money than do a little business and make a lot of money. I've had these customers over there that's 80-something years old and have been coming here for 50 years, and Detroit I tell you the truth, they think it's their home.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been here longer than you've been here.

JOYCE CLOUTIER, TELWAY DINER: Well, we just get used to seeing them every morning. I mean, it's like clockwork. Guarantee someone is going to be here by 8:00. If they're not here at 8:00, pushing 10:00 you're looking for them. And you're like, hey, he didn't show up.

OWEN: The other part is the workers. We treat them like family, every one of them. If one of them gets in a financial situation, we all try to help them out.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

COLLINS: Poppy Harlow is joining us now live.

So Poppy, Earl is just one example of a business owner in Detroit. They've gone through a whole lot there obviously.

HARLOW: He can, he's 79 years old, Heidi. And he plans to work, he told us, as long as he can.

Well, you see him there with his two sons who are going to take over the business after him, Mark and Alan. And there's really no such thing they say as a day off for their father. He gets up at 3:30 in the morning every day.

And this might just be one diner in Detroit but what this is, is an example just like in the auto industry of generation after generation Heidi, working at these same small businesses and we just went in there earlier last week -- earlier this week actually when we were in Detroit, we walked in. My producer and I, they said diet coke and sprite. They remembered us from about three months before, Heidi.

So a small business thriving in a city with 29 percent unemployment...

COLLINS: Yes.

HARLOW: ... despite the recession - 85-cent burgers that will help you out in any economic climate, Heidi.

COLLINS: Yes, interesting yesterday we were talked to some folks in Pittsburgh obviously going through the G-20 right now the steel industry crash if you will about what lessons Detroit could possibly take from all of that.

HARLOW: Yes, they could learn a lot from Pittsburgh. It's doing much better.

COLLINS: Yes definitely, all right Poppy, thank you.

Need to get some dirt on a potential date? A new application for your mobile phone that will be tougher on your dates than even your dad was.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Our tech trends now: used to be you met a member of the opposite sex and just trusted your gut, right? Then you could Google the person if you felt like you needed to and now there's a new option. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Rather than trying to guess what might be wrong with this guy, why not get some facts. Why not date-check him?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How far is that coffee place?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Out of the door.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is amazing. His criminal record. Clean. All his social networking information, property he co-owns in Hawaii with a guy named Jack.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: Date check. It's a new application that you can download to your mobile device. It includes a sleaze detector that checks a person's criminal record for things like convictions, sex offenses, felonies and even misdemeanors. And net worth check that shows details of any property the person owns and how much that property is worth and even a compatibility check that shows the person's birth date, horoscope and astrological information. The company behind this new technology is called Intelius. Its chief marketing officer, Susan Koehler, is joining us now live from Seattle.

Susan good morning to you.

SUSAN KOEHLER, CHIEF MARKETING OFFICER, INTELIUS: Good morning Heidi.

COLLINS: I think one of the things we need to talk about is where does an app like this come from? Is this from people who are more and more meeting on the Internet and they really don't know -- they don't have any references as to who they may be sitting down to have coffee with?

KOEHLER: That's exactly right. The world has become so transient. People move. They're in big cities.

It's not like the old days when you were dating somebody next door that you've known their family for 100 years. With social networks and online dating you talked about, it's really exploding out there. People need to know.

COLLINS: Yes. And you mentioned in one of the pieces of information I read about this that you can read MBA but does that really mean a Master of Business Administration or does it mean "married but available."

KOEHLER: Absolutely. All of the stories that we get with people using the product and writing it, it really is -- there's a lot of deception out there. There's people with a lot of false personas. People want to know. They don't want to waste time and they don't want to get hurt, whether it's heartbreak or risk of physical injury.

COLLINS: Yes. Because come of these things can be serious. We're making light of it but seriously, when you're talking about prior convictions and so forth, it can be very serious.

What about legal issues involved here? Is it difficult to put that type of information out?

KOEHLER: What we do is we correlate from billions of records that are out there, mostly the public records, from the courthouses, from legal documents.

So that kind of information is accurate tied to the name; we present that. We have an ability to basically synthesize and analyze 80 billion records so that we can get that individual information to you on the go.

COLLINS: Ok. So what if I have a name -- I decided to go meet this person for coffee for the first time or maybe for a drink or whatever. But sadly his name is John Smith. How do I know that what I have pulled up on my phone, which is highly alarming to me, is the right John Smith?

KOEHLER: Right. So, the John Smith that you just put in and would you have had to have...

COLLINS: By the way, I would never date a John Smith. No offense to John Smiths out there.

KOEHLER: First of all you'd only need one piece of information. The name or his e-mail or his phone number, and we can go to work for you. Now, we'll say with that John Smith what his address is. You get that right away. Right then you might have an idea of which person it is or which it isn't.

Then we take you to the sleaze detector. That's where we can correlate and say how many criminal records are there for the John Smiths in this state. All of that is free. If you want to get more details, then you can click and pay a fee. It's $19.95 to do a state criminal check, for example.

COLLINS: Ok. Understood. So you really have to make sure you have the right person clearly. That would really be embarrassing if you didn't.

What about this award? You guys are getting press now, obviously, as one of the reasons you're here because you won a pretty big award in San Diego. Tell me about that. For date check.

KOEHLER: Yes. The demo got awards. Basically they premiere the top 70 applications for the mobile phones. We were there demonstrating. We got some great response. There's been a lot of press.

It's a product that the time has come. If you look at some of the data of what is going to happen in the next couple years, by 2012, that's only a few years away, there's three trends that are happening.

One is people are using social networks through the mobile phone more and more. It's going to go from 80 million to 800 million. Then the whole dating online market is going to explode. It's going to be $1.4 billion in terms of a market.

There's a lot of trends that are going on here. And then mobile smart phones, they're going to double. They're going to represent 23 percent of the mobile market.

COLLINS: You guys seem like you are definitely onto something. I know you have some other products. Nanny check: the same idea of looking into nannies that you may be considering hiring; certainly something for everybody out there. We really appreciate the time.

Congratulations on the award. Date check from Intelius. Susan Koehler, thanks so much.

KOEHLER: Thanks, Heidi.

COLLINS: Talk about a sign of these troubled times. Police officers buying their own guns?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) COLLINS: With the tight economy some police officers in Omaha, Nebraska, have the option to buy their own guns. The department says officers in the emergency response unit are spending more than $2,000 of their own money to buy 15 rifles.

They are high powered weapons used by police S.W.A.T. teams nationwide. Officers don't mind buying the guns because they say it's something they can't do without.

Vice President Joe Biden, getting a firsthand look at the devastation; in fact, some live pictures coming in right now of the vice president and FEMA director Craig Fugate are in Georgia right now touring those areas that have been so devastated by floods that actually killed nine people earlier this week in Georgia. The rain left some neighborhoods in and around the Atlanta area under water. The vice president will be visiting some of the families affected by those floods.

Reynolds Wolf is joining us now live with more on this; everybody wondering what's going to happen this weekend. I know Reynolds, it was tough for you, your family and your neighborhood personally.

REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN METEOROLOGIST: We were cut off there for a while. But I'm going to tell you, a lot of people still have it quite a bit worse.

Looks like rain may be in the forecast which is going to raise many fears no doubt. 1 to 2 inches of rainfall in the forecast; some places could see 4 to 6 inches possible.

If you take a look at this particular map you'll notice green popping up across the landscape especially in the southeast, especially in Georgia where we still have a lot of flood watches and warnings that will be in effect through the weekend. With a chance of rain in the forecast, of course, people certainly are going to be concerned.

Very quickly highs today 85 in Atlanta, warm, muggy day for you which could spawn some of those showers. 70 degrees in Washington, 63 in Denver, 85 in Houston and 92 in Los Angeles.

That's a wrap on your forecast. Let's send it back to you -- Heidi.

COLLINS: All right Reynolds. Fingers crossed here in the southeast definitely. Appreciate that.

A Russian billionaire makes play for the New Jersey Nets but will the deal be a slam dunk for the team.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: The New Jersey Nets are steps closer to being owned by a Russian billionaire. CNN's Mary Snow takes a look at how significant this deal is and the impact it could have on U.S. professional sports. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: He's tall enough to be a basketball player and professes a passion for the game but it's Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov's cash that landed him on center court. Prokhorov, considered Russia's richest man, reached a deal with the New Jersey Nets. It's expected he'll take over the struggling team and help finance a new arena.

Plans for that arena have been in the works since 2004 when the team's current owner announced the Nets would moved to Brooklyn but since then the move has hit serious roadblocks.

Financial adviser Rob Tillis has worked on the 2004 acquisition. How significant is this deal?

ROB TILLIS, CEO INNER CIRCLE SPORTS: It's a significant development in U.S. professional sports because the first time we had had a major foreign investor come to take control of a major professional sports team. We've seen this trend more frequently in Europe in years past.

SNOW: A Russian oligarch made big headlines when he took over Britain's Chelsey soccer team. Here in the U.S., Prokhorov's $200 million foray into basketball could see the same kind of attention. But it's also seen as significant from a financial standpoint for the National Basketball Association.

KURT BADENHAUSEN, ASSOCIATE EDITOR, FORBES: This is a huge deal for the NBA. Revenues last year for the NBA were up only 2 percent. This year potentially they could be down. The NBA is really hurting financially.

SNOW: The Cleveland Cavaliers are getting a boost from a Chinese investor who took a minority stake in the team earlier this year. Those who work in sports marketing say expect more overseas investments in U.S. Teams.

If vision of the NBA is to become a truly global league, they're going need the involvement of international business community.

SNOW: NBA commissioner David Stern says interest in basketball is growing globally saying, quote, "we are especially encouraged by Mr. Prokhorov's commitment to the Nets and the opportunity it presents to continue the growth of basketball in Russia."

But in Russia, Prokhorov is facing criticism from some lawmakers questioning why he isn't investing the money there. Prokhorov says that part of his interest in acquiring the Nets is to develop basketball back in Russia. The deal still needs to be examined by the NBA and get a final approval by its board of governors.

Mary Snow, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE) COLLINS: And that's all for now. We hope you have a good weekend, everybody. I'm Heidi Collins. CNN NEWSROOM continues with Tony Harris.