wednesday october 12th. american officials are outraged and say iran will pay. this texas used car salesman is the unlikely suspect in an alleged assassination plot backed by iran. the u.s. claims that mons orr arbab arbabsiar was going to kill the ambassador of the united states. saying ar baubs yea wanted to blow up a restaurant killing the diplomat and potentially many americans right along with him. officials gathered in washington and gathered the diplomatic corps at the state department to ensure them they are safe. the obama administration is also deciding how to respond to iran. >> it's an outrage that violated one of the fundamental premises of which nations deal and that is the sanctity and safety of their diplomats. this is really over the top. they have to be held accountable. >> the u.s. linking the alleged plot to the elite quds force that is part of iran's revolutionary gad, but it is far from clear if quds was acting on its own or from top iranian leaders. iran calls the plot a fabrication and accusing the united states of stupid mischief, quote/unquote. president obama says the fight for jobs, not over. plans to break his jobs legislation into smaller bills and press congress to pass each of those. the senate blocked his $474 billion jobs package, happened last night, a voes of 50-49. the president needed 60 votes to advance it. herman cain's surge in the polls made him a target lart night at the republican debate in new hampshire. his 999 tax plan drew fire as an unworkable plan that didn't stand a chance in congress. and cain, the former ceo of godfather's pizza, wants 999. jon huntsman thought that was the price of a pizza. and this morning, in detroit, a nigerian man pleaded guilty to all counts on the second day, just the second day, of his trial. abdulmutallab charged with trying to blow up an airliner with explosives hidden in his underwear. it happened christmas day, you may recall, in 2009. the new libyan government says its fighters now control 90% of sirte. that is the hometown of former leader moammar gadhafi. troops loyal to gadhafi have been holding out ever since tripoli fell six weeks ago. our dan rivers is with the fighters. >> reporter: this is pretty much the front line. you can hear, a lot of shooting going on down this road. we're right in the outskirts of the city, and it is what sounds like a very fierce battle indeed going on just a few hundred yards up the road. [ speaking in foreign language ] we ventured down that road quickly, because it's not somewhere you want to lengther. >> the new political leadership of libya will declare the country liberated once sirte falls. a cargo ship captain is facing criminal charges in new zealand today. his ship his a reef leaking tons of crude into the sea. patties of slimy oil washing up on new zealand's beaching. workers are trying to remove the rest of the oil from that ship but are dealing with high winds and strong swells. [ cheers and applause ] a year ago tonight, rescuers, may recall, began pulling 33 men out of a collapsed mine in chile. the group spent 69 gruels days trapped a half mile underground. stick around. i'm going to be talking with journalist jonathan franklin about the astonishing revelations about those miners and their lives underground. that from his new book on those miners called "33 men." now is your chance to "talk back." one of the big stories of the day, if you watched last night's republican presidential debate, mitt romney. he was ready for the assault. waiting for those inevitable attack on the thing that makes him most vulnerable in the eyes of many republican, and that is health care. >> mitt romney, your chief economic adviser glenn hubbard, who you know well, he said that romneycare was obamacare. >> we have less than 1% of our kids that are uninsured. you have 1 million kids uninsured in texas. >> so it was a swit comeback, but still, romneycare is an issue that's not going away. today's "talk back" question, does romney's changing position on health care matter to you? carol costello is joining us from new york. and, carol, a lot of people think that mitt romney perhaps flip-flops on different issues, different sides here. what do we suppose is kind of the measurement here? his own health care plan? >> interesting wait he answered rick perry's question. he didn't really answer the question. he deflected it. he's thinking up new ways on to you to address this health care thing. the biggest thorn, though, in mitt romney's side is what his opponents call romneycare. as i said, that's what opponents call the health care plan. romney created it in massachusetts had he was governor. turns out the obama administration was entranced with romney's plan and according to nbc news, obama officials met with romney's advisers to create obamacare, and, yes. both plans include a requirement to buy insurance. romney says, yeah. so? >> the truth is, our plan is different, and the people of massachusetts, if they don't like it, then get rid of it. right now, 3-1, but i'm not running for governor of massachusetts. i'm running for president of the united states and as president i will repeal obamacare, grant a waiver on day one to get that start and make sure we return to the states what we had when i was governor, the right to care for our poor in the way we thought best for our respective states. >> still, makes you wonder. here's governor romney on fox news the day he signed the ma massachusetts law. >> when i set out to get everybody health insurance i couldn't have cared less and i don't care less about how it works politically. in my view, it's the right thing to do. >> so mitt romney was for the individual mandate before he was against it, at least on the national level, and he says as president he will repeal the very health care law he inspired. so the "talk back" question today, does romney's changing position on health care matter to you? facebook.com/carolcnn. facebook.com/carolcnn. i'll read your responses later this hour. >> carol, thank you. a rundown of the stories we are covering. first, an alleged murder for hire plot to kill an ambassador to the united states. we dig deeper as the u.s. points fingers at iran. then blackberries. they're going down all over the world. now that's also hitting here at home. the united states. and then, while the occupied wall street protesters are battling corporate greed, some wall street workers are scaring for their own job. we'll tell you why. and scientists don't know where this is going to land. later, strange story. a family gets lost in a corn maze. >> i'm really scared. it's really dark and we've got a 3-week-old baby with us. woman: saving for our child's college fund was getting expensive. man: yes it was. so to save some money, we taught our 5 year old how to dunk. woman: scholarship! woman: honey go get him. anncr: there's an easier way to save. get online. go to geico.com. get a quote. 15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance. it'll cause cavities, bad breath. patients will try and deal with it by drinking water. water will work for a few seconds but if you're not drinking it, it's going to get dry again. i recommend biotene. all the biotene products like the oral rinse...the sprays have enzymes in them. the whole formulation just works very well. it leaves the mouth feeling fresh. if i'm happy with the results and my patients are happy with the results, i don't need to look any farther. so if i didn't know better i'd say you're having some sort of big tire sale. yes we are. yeah. how many tires does ford buy every year? over 3 million. you say you can beat any advertised price on tires? correct. anywhere? yes. like this price? yes. riously? yes what about this one? i'll beat it. this one? s we will. right, i only have one more question for you...this one? (laughing) yeah. get $100 rebate when you buy four tires. 100 bucks! only at your ford dealer. 3 million tires. 11 major brands, fiona's kind-of-nice. i don't know why you're not here. we are following the trial of umar farouk abdulmutallab, the so-called underwear bomber. in the courtroom at the time he actually pleaded guilty to the charges. first of all, take us inside. tell us what happened, how this came about, whether or not this was a rather surprising development? >> reporter: yeah. it definitely was a surprise. it started out the day, of course, started at 9:00 with an immediate recess that lasted about 45 minutes to an hour. when they came back into court, standby counsel addressed the judge, just nancy edmonds and said his client wanted to enter a plea of guilty. from there, they went through all of the counts. the judge was very, very specific and very careful to go over all of the counts with him and one by one he said, i plead guilty. to each and every count. and then after that, he read a statement saying i knowingly did all this and was inspired by mr. al awlaki, recently killed in a military action two weeks ago and said he did it 0 to avenge the killing of innocent muslims and the that the u.s. was guilty. he also said he was guilty under u.s. law but not under the law of the koran. after all that ended he said at the end, a la akla which also means god is great, and that was how it ended. >> what was the reaction when he made that statement? >> reporter: well, a lot of buzz. in the courtroom, i was in that overflow room watching it from the overflow room. of course, in the courtroom, you could not leave, but the buzz was to stay in the overflow room or in the courtroom and there was a lot of activity, a lot of typing going on. people trying to get it out. this trial, again, was supposed to last three weeks to a month. there was a three to four jury selection process. it took a while to get going. almost two years and all this preparation, and on the second day of the trial he pled guilty. >> quick, if you can button it up for us. what happens to him now? >> reporter: repeat that again? >> what happens to him now that he's actually pleaded guilty? >> reporter: he will remain in custody. he will most likely get life in prison. many of the counts he pled guilty to had maximum penalties of life in prison with consecutive sentences. sentencing will be on january 12th, and that's when we're gel that decision by the judge. the judge makes that decision. >> thank you very much for bringing the latest on a trial a lot of folks have been watching carefully. thank you very much, laura. u.s. officials are fired up over an alleged plot to the assassinate saudi arabia's ambassador to the united states here on american soil. congressman peter king is calling it an act of war. the state department is issuing a rare worldwide alert warning americans to be onguard against terror attacks, and u.s. officials are right now briefing the diplomatic corps about the alleged murder for hire scheme. iran categorically rejects the claim calming it an evil plot. it reads like a spy novel. saudi ambassador adel ap jubeir was to have been blown up in his favorite restaurant in washington. they've arrested this man. manssor arbab arbabsiar jailed in new york last month. he's accused of working with members of an arm of the iranian revolutionary guard to carry out the assassination. arbabsiar believed he was hiring assassins from a mexican drug cartel for $1.5 million. a drug cartel member turned out to be a paid informant for the u.s. drug administration pap recorded conversation taken directly from the federal complaint quotes that arbabsiar said, he wants you to kill this guy. the paid source says there's going to be, like american people there, in the restaurant. do you want me to do it outside or in the restaurant? well, about baubs jahr answ abat matter how you do. joining us live abu dhabi. is it reasonable to believe members of the revolutionary guard and quds force would be able to plan such an attack? >> reporter: suzanne, it's still hard to know. while the quds force is an elite force in iran, analysts and experts, you know, since this news broke, they've been scratching their heads. they're baffled by this. when you look tat from the saudi side to try to understand how high up the target of this alleged plot goes up in the saudi government, it goes up quite high. al jubeir not just an ambassador to the u.s. for saudi arabia. we spoke to robert jordan and asked why al jubeir might have been a target. here's what he told us. >> he is so close to king abdullah it makes him a target to some degree and a almost like a son to the king. some have said that his duties as foreign policy adviser have continued. so he spentds a tremendous a lot of time in riyadh consulting with the king and involved in almost every high diplomatic level meeting that king abdullah has. >> reporter: suzanne, it's, ambassador al jubeir goes up very high in the saudi government. not your average run of the mill diplomat. somebody who if they had successfully targeted him, that would have been a direct strike at the king of saudi arabia as well. suzanne? >> mohammed, he's been around washington a long time. i actually know him. what do we make of the fact that they believe that the highest level of the iranian leadership was involved in that? is that a plausible scenario? who do you suppose they're talking about here? >> reporter: well, it's hard to know, because you could talk, be talking about elements with the quds force. talking rogue elements. who exactly are they taking their direction from? and the more you speak to analysts and iranian experts since yesterday, it's just unclear at this point. if this does point to the top level of iran's government or not. but these are all questions that are being very diligently asked right now, suzanne. >> and mohammed, iran and saudi arabia. explain to us why it would be that they would be on opposite sides? >> reporter: well, suzanne, iran and saudi arabia have a relationship of enmity and hostility that's lasted years. no surprise there's tension between those two countries. go back to the iran/iraq war. saudi arabia backed iraq in that war. one source of tension. there's the sunni-backed saudi arabia, the shiite government of iran. these are super powers in the region that are very budge divided across the ideological spectrum and sectarian spectrum as well. more recently during the arab spring that's taken root in this region, because reiahrain, 70% . the country in the past, the saudi government, very much supports the sunni leadership's bahrain. once it looked that leadership was threatened in mash, saudi arabia and other countries in the gulf sent forces into bahrain to try to prop up the government there, to try to make sure their stability was ensu ensured. a source of tension. the saudis pointing to iran. iran pointing to saudi arabia. a lot of tension and it's been boiling over as of late. suzanne? >> mohammed jamjoom, thank you. the juv gloves came off again. the latest debate, a lot of facts and figures thrown around. some you true, some, not so true. tom foreman from washington to do fact checking. listen to comments from one of the front-runners, mitt romney. >> if you go back a few years before that clip and go to jfk's time, the government at all levels, federal, state and local, was consuming about 27% of the u.s. economy. today it consumes about 37% of the u.s. economy. >> so, tom what do we think? what do we make of that? >> what he's trying to imply, suzanne. the idea, the growth of government has become sort of rampant. crazy. have to bring it under control. government expenditures risen dramatically since the 1960snumbers are basically right. total government spending in 1963, about $27.7% of gdp, the last year of john kennedy the presidency. 20010, a dramatic increase. something he's not mentions. some increase, military spending. many republicans support, and some has been growth of things like the population living longer. so that social security costs a lot more. different programs like this. it has been existing programs having to take on bigger burdens or we're choosing to take on bigger burdens with them and are actually getting something for that money. it's not a matter of government expanding, expanding, expanding. in some cases it's expanding because the need we addressed a long time ago has expanded with it. so overall, we consider that, we have to say he got his numbers right, but this is true and incomplete. sort of bordering towards just true. nonetheless, there is an incompletion to this, suzanne. >> pretty fair. what about michele bachmann talking about the economy and the president? >> michele bachmann with the economy and the president. listen to the statement she made about health care reform. >> but the number one reason that employers say that they aren't hiring today is obamacare. >> she has said this before, suzanne. last debate, said the same thing. the number one reason we're not getting jobs is because of health care reform. employers don't know what it's grog to cost, don't want to add new job. that's her whole case. here's the problem with what she's saying. this is not based on an incredible study or big, comprehensive look at this as far as we can tell. all it seems to be based on, a report from an international investment firm where they issued a report saying health reform is arguegly the biggest impediment to hiring, not based on a study. just their opinion to investors, and that same report cited ten other things including tax codes, financial regulation, environmental laws and much more as being impediments to job growth in this country. so for her to simply say that health reform is the number one block to job creation has to fall in the category of false. there's simply no empirical evidence to say that's really the case, suzanne. >> tom, thanks for keeping them honest. appreciate it. you want to be sure to tune in for the cnn western republican presidential debate. that happening in las vegas. it's coming next tuesday night at 8:00 eastern and cnn the anderson cooper is going to be the monitor. if you have problems checking your e-mail or surfing the web on your blackberry. here is why. the company is reporting outages. we'll look at some of the problems worldwide. vegetables...60 calories. ya' know those jeans look nice. they do? yup. so you were checking me out? yup. [ male announcer ] progresso. 40 soups 100 calories or less. i'm not a line item on a budget. and i'm definitely not a pushover. but i am a voter. so washington... before you even think about cutting my medicare and social security benefits... here's a number you should remember. 50 million. we are 50 million seniors who earned our benefits... and you will be hearing from us... today and on election day. ♪ millions of blacks bare users aren't able to check e-mails or surf the web today. a problem for the rest of the world tore days now, now the u.s. is getting hit hard. i want to go to dan simon from san francisco who's got some of the details on this. why do we think this is happening, dan? >> well, it's a very good question. you know, blackberry ran their base in canada and they have a proprietary e-mail technology that does not affect other smartphones. if you use a blackberry it's going to affect you. when you send an e-mail using a blackberry it goes to their servers and reaches the destination. the reason it doesn't happen to others, they don't have that problem. so here's the deal. blackberry is using what they call a core switch to transmit all of these e-mail. they're having a problem with their core switch and put out a statement and the it says that although the system is designed to fail over to a backup switch, the failover did not function as previously tested. let's take a step back for a moment. you have a smartphone. there are two propositions that you want. number one, want to be able