As the space shuttle zips across the equator, traveling south to north, but generally heading east, it experiences a "yank" northward from the equatorial bulge. The equator pulls it northward as it comes up from below, leaving its eastward velocity unchanged. As the ship passes over head, the equator pulls it back, until its northward velocity is finally (by symmetry) what it was before. This yank effectively moves the plane of the orbit to the west, by a few degrees. This precession occurs with each equatorial pass, and is factored in when plotting the paths of objects in low earth orbit.
The same equatorial bulge is responsible for the precession of the earth's axis. Our north pole is pointed (approximately) at the north star, but that wasn't the case 10,000 years ago, and it won't be true 10,000 years from now. The sun and moon pull on the near side of the equatorial bulge, and try to straighten the earth up, so that its axis is perpendicular to the plane of the solar system. They try, but when you apply force to a spinning top, it gyrates. The rotational axis doesn't straighten up; it moves to the side. So our north pole traces out a circle in the sky every 26,000 years. It is currently pointed at the north star, but in 10,000 years or so that star will hang directly above the United States, and other countries at that latitude. Well, enough of spheroids and orbital mechanics.