NBA Brawl; Iran, North Korea Dominate Agenda at APEC Summit
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: This is CNN SATURDAY NIGHT. The message to North Korea, get rid of your nuclear weapons programs. That from President Bush and leaders at a summit in Chile. Also, the big brawl everyone is talking about, from the court chaos to the fans fears. What are the repercussions after NBA stars and fans go wild? And can money or more specifically money used for plastic surgery buy you happiness? We're going to talk to a contestant and a host from the controversial reality series where head to toe surgery completely transforms the contestant. "The Swan" are ahead. These stories and a lot more next on CNN SATURDAY NIGHT. Good evening, I'm Carol Lin from the CNN Center in Atlanta. Ahead this hour, hurricanes in the Midwest, tornadoes in Vegas, and naked news anchors covering it all. Tonight, you're going to see how far television will go to grab your attention. Plus, the story everyone is buzzing about tonight, basket brawl. I've got a veteran NBA player talking about the rights and wrongs of the players and the fans. But you're going to get the last call. How far should professional athletes be allowed to go to defend themselves? Give us a call at 1-800-807-2620. It is a busy show for you tonight. But up first, men behaving badly. The NBA and some of its fans achieved a new level of outrageousness last night. To the videotape. Detroit's Pistons Palace. Detroit and Indiana in the final seconds. There's a foul. Some shoving and it gets worse. Stuff thrown from the crowds, players in the stands, fans on the court, punches, pandemonium. It was ugly, embarrassing and totally out of control, and it cost four players some court time for a while at least. So who's fault is it? Well, Steve Overmyer is here from CNN Sports to talk more about this.</s>STEVE OVERMYER, CNNSI CORRESPONDENT: I think...</s>LIN: Never seen anything like it.</s>OVERMYER: No, this is something, it's a first. And you can throw the blame to a lot of people and a lot of sides on this one. The Motown melee is what they're calling it. And it's still sending shockwaves through the NBA and beyond. Police are still investigating the brawl and hoping to have all the rest made by Thanksgiving. The players involved in the fight have been advised not to speak with the media, but it's certainly caught the attention of the rest of the league.</s>RICK CARLISLE, INDIANA PACERS HEAD COACH: A hard fought game by two top teams was marred by the fact that at the end, a lot of mistakes were made by a lot of people without question.</s>OVERMYER (voice-over): What started out as just a hard foul turned dangerous the moment Ron Artest left the court to attack a fan in the stands. The dreadful display of disorder forced officials to call the game with 45 seconds left in the clock.</s>BEN WALLACE, DETROIT PISTONS CENTER: Stay off the floor. You know, we got to stay out the stands, you know. We don't want you going through the stands. You know, you really, you know, crossing the line. You're, you know, in their territory, so to speak. So you know, it's never a need to run up in the stands.</s>OVERMYER: One fan crossed that territory by throwing the beer on Artest. What Indiana players are now forced to answer is what about a provocation, if any, justifies action?</s>ALONZO MOURNING, NEW JERSEY METS CENTER: Yes, he was wrong for doing it. But was the fan -- did the fan have any right to do that? No, not at all. You know, the fan -- no fan has the right to throw anything from the stands to hit any player on the court.</s>RICHARD JEFFERSON, NEW JERSEY METS FORWARD: You could throw whatever you want at people, not believing that they're going to come do it. But in the end, would a 5'9 person really throw something if he were just on the street? Would a 5'9 person throw something at a 6'5, 240 pound individual? No, unless you believed that oh, I can't be touched.</s>OVERMYER: Well, there's certainly a lot more than just touching going on. A lot of punches being thrown. And now, when the NBA has suspended Ron Artest, Steven Jackson, Jermaine O'Neal, and Ben Wallace indefinitely, pending further investigation. The length of those suspensions, though, expected to be announced tomorrow. The one thing that really stood out to me, though, when I was looking at some of this video was watching -- seeing the faces on some of those kids in the stands there.</s>LIN: Yes.</s>OVERMYER: Seven, eight-year old kids...</s>LIN: Crying.</s>OVERMYER: ...didn't exactly understand what was going on out there. How do you explain that to a kid who just wanted to go to the games to watch it with his mom or dad?</s>LIN: So in terms of what's factored into the suspension, how much is the fans behavior, the provocation by the fan, going to be a factor...</s>OVERMYER: It should be.</s>LIN: But also, pressure...</s>OVERMYER: Right.</s>LIN: ...on the NBA to clean up its ranks, send a message that these guys are not a bunch of thugs who are allowed to get away with any kind of behavior?</s>OVERMYER: Well, you heard the NBA's first statement was our players were in the wrong. You should never go in the stands for any reason whatsoever. What you're hearing a lot from the media, and what you see a lot in the video is the fans were the ones that were doing a lot of the -- you know, starting this fighting, if you will. But I think that there's going to be some lengthy suspensions being handed out and lengthy -- you know, some pretty heavy fines are going to be on there. And you're definitely going to be expecting some lawsuits as well.</s>LIN: All right, by the fans.</s>OVERMYER: Yes, exactly.</s>LIN: Hunting for money. All right. Thanks very much, Steve. All right, so add this to the long line of bench clearers, side line shoving matches, and every other time a supposed grown-up with a number on his back lost his temper on the playing field. Nearly every sport has had a contest ruined by this behavior caught on camera. Sara Dorsey has a few of them.</s>SARA DORSEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It happened again. More flying fists, this time rival team South Carolina and Clemson went for the jugular.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Congratulations to the fans here at Death Valley. They stayed in their seats. They were professional about it. They were adult.</s>DORSEY: Fans don't always stay on the sidelines though. William Legg Junior and his 15-year old son charged Kansas City first base coach Tom Gamboa at a White Sox game. Gamboa never saw the shirtless duo coming. Legg dodged prison time, getting 30 months of probation. The Toronto Maple Leafs Tai Domi (ph) in 2001 threw water on a fan. When the man fell into the box, Domi unloaded on him. The penalty for that incident? A $1,000 fine, but no suspension. Here fans hit Dodgers back-up catcher Chad Kruder (ph) in the head and stole his hat, setting off this battle in the ballpark. Kruder (ph) got an eight game suspension and 18 other coaches and players were punished. Great tickets sometimes sell grave danger in the stands. In 1995, soccer star Eric Cantona performed his best kung fu move on a fan. Cantona was banned worldwide for eight months and ordered to 120 hours of community service. And who could forget the famous chair throwing incident this year? After being heckled by A's fans Texas Rangers relief pitcher Frank Francisco launched a chair into the audience, breaking a woman's nose. He was suspended for 15 games and still faces misdemeanor assault charges. Some of the more memorable sports, squabbles, scraps, and scuffles. Sara Dorsey, CNN, Atlanta.</s>LIN: More on this in just a few minutes with my guest, Kenny Smith, nine seasons with the NBA. You know who this guy is. Now a hoops analyst with TNT, he's going to be in the hot seat for our hot topic segment in just a few minutes. And that leads us to our last call question. How far should professional athletes be allowed to go to defend themselves? Give us a call at 1-800-807-2620. Across Iraq today, several deadly incidents. Insurgents killed nine people in three separate attacks in Baghdad. One of the victims, a U.S. soldier was killed in an ambush. And farther north, U.S. troops came across a grisly sight in Mosul. They found the bodies of nine Iraqi soldiers, all shot in the back of the head. But there was a positive development in Iraq. A Polish woman, who was abducted late last month, was suddenly freed and returned to Poland. Theresa Kaliffa (ph) is married to an Iraqi and lived in Iraq for years. The Polish government's not talking about the details of her release. Says it's a security matter. All right, well President Bush is in South America for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit. They are not -- well, they might be talking about trade, but really, it's Iran and North Korea that are dominating the agenda. CNN's senior White House correspondent John King reports.</s>JOHN KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Russia's Putin is one key voice in the nuclear showdown with North Korea. China, too, another. Add in South Korea's president and the prime minister of Japan, and you get this, no direct negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang. Six party talks, more international isolation.</s>GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The message is clear to Mr. Kim Jong Il. Get rid of your nuclear weapons programs.</s>KING: U.S. officials are upbeat because reviving North Korean diplomacy on his terms is Mr. Bush's end goal at the annual Asian Pacific Summit. The six party talks broke off five months ago. North Korea waiting because Mr. Bush's election opponent favored direct negotiations. But that won't happen now that Mr. Bush has four more years.</s>BUSH: The six party talks are -- it will be the framework.</s>KING: China has talked with North Korea since Mr. Bush's victory. And U.S. officials say President Hu is optimistic Pyongyang will soon be back at the bargaining table. The standing U.S. offer grants security assurances and economic incentives to North Korea, but only after it first signs a pledge to permanently end its nuclear weapons program. South Korea's Roh this week urged the United States to be more flexible. Mr. Bush wants to first get new talks underway and then talk tactics. The president is clearly in good spirits, but also cautious by design. Canada's prime minister was among six bilateral meetings in just five hours. But no questions here and just two all day, both at the Japan session. No direct answer when asked if U.S. intelligence about Iran's nuclear program can be trusted. Instead, Mr. Bush said reports Iran rushed to process nuclear materials just before a deadline to halt such activity raises suspicions.</s>BUSH: This is a very serious matter. The world knows it's a serious matter. And we're working together to solve this matter.</s>KING: And barely a word during the brief photo opportunity with Mr. Putin. In private, U.S. officials say a concerned president asked a man he likes to call friend to square dramatic steps to expand Kremlin political authority with his oft stated committed to democracy. The Russian leader vigorously defended his actions. And the White House could only say discussions would continue. (on camera): The blow of re-election didn't spare Mr. Bush from criticism, especially on key economic issues. And he promised to work both for a stronger dollar and lower U.S. budget deficits amid complaints on both sides of the Pacific that current U.S. policy is causing a drag on other economies. John King, CNN, Santiago, Chile.</s>LIN: And we're going to keep our eyes overseas right now. Iran and North Korea you were hearing about in John's report. Two nations unapologetically grouped in the White House's axis of evil. President Bush today in Chile holding nothing back in his warnings to those countries regarding their nuclear intentions. But what if? That's the problem we're trying to sort out here with our military intelligence analyst Ken Robinson. He's here to talk about the what if scenario. All right, lots of warnings, lots of words and diplomacy in Chile right now with President Bush. But what if North Korea continues to pursue its nuclear program? What if Iran is seriously developing nuclear warheads or even a bomb, despite its promises to the Europeans? How much muscle is the United States willing to exercise? You have actually seen the operational military plans for both countries?</s>KEN ROBINSON, MILITARY INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: The United States military continually plans for threats in areas. And plans for North Korea and plans for Iran have been on the books for many years and constantly updated. The military to military confrontation has always been very unthinkable in both locations because you can't act unilaterally the same way we did with Iraq, simply because of terrain and simply because of numbers. But there's a recognition right now that multilateralism and bringing in China to help, bringing in Europe to help is the way forward in these areas. Does the United States strategically have a way to deter them with its own nuclear capability? Certainly. Is that an option?</s>LIN: Right.</s>ROBINSON: Unlikely. Which means that the next measures of economic coercion are probably the way forward in both situations.</s>LIN: All right, let's talk about an interesting theory or scenario you think may actually come up where Russia steps in, in terms of the diplomacy and what happens if Iran continues to go forward with a nuclear program. What's your theory?</s>ROBINSON: Well, the -- I believe that at the conference that we're going to see on the 22nd and 23rd in Sharm el-Sheik on the Red Sea in Egypt, all the foreign ministers are going to come together. And they're going to talk about post Iraq. What will Iraq be next? What will the policies be toward it? And how -- what is the way forward to extricate the United States from the situation that it's in right now? If the ingredients of that show multilateral cooperation, then the potential is that the foreign minister's visit -- the Russian foreign minister's visit to Tehran in October could lead toward a Putin visit. And if Putin...</s>LIN: Why do the Russians make sense in this equation?</s>ROBINSON: Well, it's money. It's all about money. The -- there's a facility in Russia -- in Iran that's called Bashir. It's a nuclear facility. And the Iranians want to keep it. And they want to keep it going. And the Russians want to sell fuel to run that facility, because economically, it's in their favor. Plus, it gives them access. It gives them influence. And as long as the Iranians take the spent fuel and give it and account for it, so it can't be weaponized, and give it back to Russia, everyone would be OK with that. And so, everyone is posturing right now for what the final deal is going to look like. And so, this could possibly be a case where the president of Russia could come in as an interlocutor and defuse the situation, prevent a military confrontation, and help his own country economically.</s>LIN: What, as far as forces massing -- obviously, we have forces in Afghanistan and we have forces in Iraq. Both very busy. But you're also saying that there are planes or other infrastructure assembling in Uzbekistan?</s>ROBINSON: Well, our view of unilateralism has shaped their behavior, the government of Iran, because we have United States forces in both locations on either border. And in Uzbekistan, there are bombers that are positioned there. It gives the Iranian government, and there are two in my mind. One is the elected government. And two, the people run of the show.</s>LIN: The mullahs.</s>ROBINSON: The mullahs. And it gives them pause for cause. They know that negotiation is the way forward. They don't want those plants bombed. They don't want them destroyed. They want to maintain a nuclear power capability. Russia may be the solution.</s>LIN: All right, we'll see. Thanks very much, Ken. Always forward looking to talk to you in these sort of pending crisis situations. Thank you.</s>ROBINSON: Yes.</s>LIN: In the meantime, still ahead tonight, we're going to go back to our top story. Basket brawl. And I'm going to talk with a former NBA all-star to see if the pros have it right in defending themselves on and off the court. Also, taking it all off to boost the TV ratings. You may be shocked to see who stripped down to pump them up. And can plastic surgery turn you into a swan and bring you real happiness? 14 surgical procedures. I'm going to talk to a contestant from the reality TV show "The Swan" a little bit later on. See what she has to say.