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Wednesday, March 22, 2006

How Is This An Issue?

I can not believe this issue exsist. I realize how large the armed services are, but someone of authority needs to handle these types of cases. If our government can hand out billions for overseas aid, we should certainly take care of our servicemen and women

washingtonpost.com For Injured U.S. Troops, 'Financial Friendly Fire'By Donna St. George His hand had been blown off in Iraq, his body pierced by shrapnel. He could not walk. Robert Loria was flown home for a long recovery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where he tried to bear up against intense physical pain and reimagine his life's possibilities.The last thing on his mind, he said, was whether the Army had correctly adjusted his pay rate -- downgrading it because he was out of the war zone -- or whether his combat gear had been accounted for properly: his Kevlar helmet, his suspenders, his rucksack.But nine months after Loria was wounded, the Army garnished his wages and then, as he prepared to leave the service, hit him with a $6,200 debt. That was just before last Christmas, and several lawmakers scrambled to help. This spring, a collection agency started calling. He owed another $646 for military housing."I was shocked," recalled Loria, now 28 and medically retired from the Army. "After everything that went on, they still had the nerve to ask me for money."Although Loria's problems may be striking on their own, the Army has recently identified 331 other soldiers who have been hit with military debt after being wounded at war. The new analysis comes as the United States has more wounded troops than at any time since the Vietnam War, with thousands suffering serious injury in Iraq or Afghanistan."This is a financial friendly fire," charged Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), chairman of the House Committee on Government Reform, which has been looking into the issue. "It's awful." Davis called the failure systemic and said military "pay problems have been an embarrassment all the way through" the war.Army officials said they are in the process of forgiving debts for 99 of the 331 wounded soldiers, all now out of the military. The other cases have not been resolved, said G. Eric Reid, director of the U.S. Army Finance Command. Complex laws and regulations govern the cancellation of debts once soldiers leave the service, he said.Part of the problem is that the government's computerized pay system is designed to "maximize debt collection" and has operated without a way to keep bills from going to the wounded, Reid said. In the past seven months, a database of injured troops has been created to help prevent that. Now, he said, the goal is to make "a conscious decision . . . on the validity of that debt" in every case.Early this year, the Army reported that, in looking at a two-month period, it had identified 129 wounded soldiers -- still active in the military -- who had debts. Those were resolved. But the Army cannot pinpoint the full number of wounded active-duty troops with debts.The House Government Reform Committee has for several years been looking at pay problems among service members. Last spring, the committee asked the Government Accountability Office to investigate debt among the war's wounded and whether troops were being reported to collection and credit agencies. The findings are due early next year.Although efforts are being made to correct such problems, Rep. Todd R. Platts (R-Pa.) said that for some troops, "we've so mismanaged their pay that . . . we've sent debt notices while they're still in combat, in harm's way." Hounding wounded troops is unfathomable, he said. "For even a single soldier, this is unacceptable," he said.At the root of the problem is an outdated Defense Department computer system, which does not automatically link pay and personnel records. This creates numerous pay errors -- and overpayments become debts, said Gregory D. Kutz, the GAO's managing director for forensic audits and special investigations. "They've been trying to modernize it since the mid-1990s," he said. "They have been unsuccessful."No one can say how many troops have pay problems across the military, Kutz said, but the GAO has found that, in certain Army National Guard and Reserve units, more than 90 percent of soldiers have had at least one overpayment or underpayment during deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan. Steps have since been taken to improve the system, but the problem will not be eliminated, Kutz said, until the larger computer system is reengineered.Typically, troops get a boost in pay while in combat. When they come home, the system can take extra weeks to catch up with the change, and some people are overpaid. For wounded troops -- still adjusting to their injuries and changed futures -- a debt notice can be another bitter discovery."It was like I was being abandoned. I was no good to the military anymore," recalled Loria, who served more than five years. "They figured the pay glitch was my fault and I was going to pay for it."Loria was a combat engineer in Iraq in February 2004 when he rushed out with other soldiers to rescue a comrade wounded by a roadside bomb near Baqubah. After helping load the soldier onto his Humvee, Loria started to drive away. A second bomb exploded."My whole body hurt," he said, "and I felt like I was on fire." He noticed that his hand and lower arm seemed to be hanging off to the side.A week later, Loria awoke in a hospital bed at Walter Reed, his wife watching over him. He had to learn to walk again, and, worse, he had to accept that "I was never going to do something that required two hands." Still, he said, he tried to remember that others died in Iraq and that "so many people in Walter Reed were 10 times worse off than myself."After he left the hospital, his financial trouble started. First, his wages were garnished. "I was missing car payments and phone bill payments and everything else," he said. Then, when he was leaving the military, shortly before Christmas, his debts were laid out: $2,200 in travel related to follow-up hospital treatment, $2,400 for combat-related pay he should not have collected and several hundred dollars more for military gear that went missing after his injury.The full force of his debt hit as he was trying to get to his family in New York for the holidays. "I had a quarter-tank of gas, three cats in my vehicle and no money whatsoever," he said.His outraged wife, Christine Loria, called the local newspaper in Middletown, N.Y., which published an article, and New York lawmakers became involved: Democratic Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles E. Schumer and Rep. Maurice D. Hinchey (D). Within a matter of days, the debts were cleared, and Yankees owner George Steinbrenner donated $25,000 to Loria.Months later, home with his wife and stepson, Loria was stunned to receive a call from a collection agency. He owed $646 for housing: nine days of rent, damaged window blinds, a broken refrigerator tray."They call and they call and they call," he said. "They're nasty to me." Sometimes, he said, he feels outraged. "I don't know how much you want from me. I already gave you one arm and a part of a leg."As Loria battled with bill collectors, Ryan Kelly, 25, took his problems to the GAO. He did this at the suggestion of a friend and fellow volunteer at the Wounded Warrior Project, a nonprofit program in Roanoke for injured troops.Kelly had been wounded in Iraq in July 2003, when his Humvee was blasted by a roadside bomb. "It blew my leg pretty much clean off," he said.Like Loria, Kelly spent months at Walter Reed, recovering and learning to walk again without his lower leg and foot. The Army staff sergeant struggled with questions about his future. Because he had been injured as a reservist, he was told, there was no guarantee he could deploy to Iraq again. "I didn't want to stay in the Army if I was just going to be a warm body, filling a slot," he said.When Kelly left the military last year, he recalled, "it was an intense, emotional time." He thought little of the final two checks totaling $2,700 because he was owed vacation and travel pay, he said. Later, he was bewildered as pay stubs continued to come in the mail, each blank except for a notation of a $2,230 debt.Frustrated, Kelly called the Disabled Soldier Support System, a unit where a counselor told him the Army had mistakenly paid him for an extra 22 days. But Kelly said he was told it would all work out well because the military owed him for his leave and travel. A few weeks later, he said, "I got a check, and I thought, 'Oh, that's nice.' "But after he and his wife moved to Arizona, he received a bill for $2,230 -- with the threat of a referral to a collection agency. "I was pretty speechless," he said.When Kelly called the GAO, he learned that the debt was already listed on his credit history."What benefit is the Army getting, aggressively going after disabled service members for $500 or $1,000 or whatever? Why not give injured service members a little leeway?"That sentiment is common.Tyson Johnson, 24, of Prichard, Ala., was stunned after being struck by a mortar round in Iraq to find a bill waiting for him when he came home from the hospital. It was for $2,700, the bonus he had been given when he enlisted."I definitely felt betrayed, because I went over there and almost lost my life," said Johnson, a corporal when he was injured. His debt was resolved after his story made news. "I really didn't need more stress."Sgt. Gary Dowd, 28, was caught in an ambush 30 miles north of Tikrit, Iraq, in 2003 and suffered multiple injuries, losing his left hand and forearm.After 13 months of treatment, he retired from the Army early this year. Shortly afterward, he received a letter at his home in Tampa asking him to repay $600 for a survivor-benefit insurance plan he had opted out of when he signed his deployment papers.There was no number on the bill to call -- no way to protest. "I was pretty irked that they thought I owed them something," he said. "I feel like I've given them enough."Although Dowd feels there is no ill intent, he said, "I do wish that once they realized they had an injured service member, they would flag them and say: 'This guy has been in the hospital. He's going through enough already.' "

It WAs OK?

I found this on the American Thinker site. Read and enjoy.
Under Clinton, NY Times called surveillanceJanuary 12th, 2006

The controversy following revelations that U.S. intelligence agencies have monitored suspected terrorist related communications since 9/11 reflects a severe case of selective amnesia by the New York Times and other media opponents of President Bush. They certainly didn’t show the same outrage when a much more invasive and indiscriminate domestic surveillance program came to light during the Clinton administration in the 1990’s. At that time, the Times called the surveillance “a necessity.”
“If you made a phone call today or sent an e-mail to a friend, there’s a good chance what you said or wrote was captured and screened by the country’s largest intelligence agency.” (Steve Kroft, CBS’ 60 Minutes)
Those words were aired on February 27, 2000 to describe the National Security Agency and an electronic surveillance program called Echelon whose mission, according to Kroft,
“is to eavesdrop on enemies of the state: foreign countries, terrorist groups and drug cartels. But in the process, Echelon’s computers capture virtually every electronic conversation around the world.”
Echelon was, or is (its existence has been under-reported in the American media), an electronic eavesdropping program conducted by the United States and a few select allies such as the United Kingdom.
Tellingly, the existence of the program was confirmed not by the New York Times or the Washington Post or by any other American media outlet – these were the Clinton years, after all, and the American media generally treats Democrat administrations far more gently than Republican administrations – but by an Australian government official in a statement made to an Australian television news show.
The Times actually defended the existence of Echelon when it reported on the program following the Australians’ revelations.
“Few dispute the necessity of a system like Echelon to apprehend foreign spies, drug traffickers and terrorists….”
And the Times article quoted an N.S.A. official in assuring readers
“...that all Agency activities are conducted in accordance with the highest constitutional, legal and ethical standards.”
Of course, that was on May 27, 1999 and Bill Clinton, not George W. Bush, was president.
Even so, the article did admit that
“...many are concerned that the system could be abused to collect economic and political information.”
Despite the Times’ reluctance to emphasize those concerns, one of the sources used in that same article, Patrick Poole, a lecturer in government and economics at Bannock Burn College in Franklin, Tenn., had already concluded in a study cited by the Times story that the program had been abused in both ways.
“ECHELON is also being used for purposes well outside its original mission. The regular discovery of domestic surveillance targeted at American civilians for reasons of ‘unpopular’ political affiliation or for no probable cause at all… What was once designed to target a select list of communist countries and terrorist states is now indiscriminately directed against virtually every citizen in the world,” Poole concluded.
The Times article also referenced a European Union report on Echelon. The report was conducted after E.U. members became concerned that their citizens’ rights may have been violated. One of the revelations of that study was that the N.S.A. used partner countries’ intelligence agencies to routinely circumvent legal restrictions against domestic spying.
“For example, [author Nicky] Hager has described how New Zealand officials were instructed to remove the names of identifiable UKUSA citizens or companies from their reports, inserting instead words such as ‘a Canadian citizen’ or ‘a US company’. British Comint [Communications intelligence] staff have described following similar procedures in respect of US citizens following the introduction of legislation to limit NSA’s domestic intelligence activities in 1978.”
Further, the E.U. report concluded that intelligence agencies did not feel particularly constrained by legal restrictions requiring search warrants.
“Comint agencies conduct broad international communications ‘trawling’ activities, and operate under general warrants. Such operations do not require or even suppose that the parties they intercept are criminals.”
The current controversy follows a Times report that, since 9/11, U.S. intelligence agencies are eavesdropping at any time on up to 500 people in the U.S. suspected of conducting international communications with terrorists. Under Echelon, the Clinton administration was spying on just about everyone.
“The US National Security Agency (NSA) has created a global spy system, codename ECHELON, which captures and analyzes virtually every phone call, fax, email and telex message sent anywhere in the world,”
Poole summarized in his study on the program.
According to an April, 2000 article in PC World magazine, experts who studied Echelon concluded that
“Project Echelon’s equipment can process 1 million message inputs every 30 minutes.”
In the February, 2000 60 Minutes story, former spy Mike Frost made clear that Echelon monitored practically every conversation – no matter how seemingly innocent – during the Clinton years.
“A lady had been to a school play the night before, and her son was in the school play and she thought he did a-a lousy job. Next morning, she was talking on the telephone to her friend, and she said to her friend something like this, ‘Oh, Danny really bombed last night,’ just like that. The computer spit that conversation out. The analyst that was looking at it was not too sure about what the conversation w-was referring to, so erring on the side of caution, he listed that lady and her phone number in the database as a possible terrorist.”
“This is not urban legend you’re talking about. This actually happened?” Kroft asked.
“Factual. Absolutely fact. No legend here.”
Even as the Times defended Echelon as “a necessity” in 1999, evidence already existed that electronic surveillance had previously been misused by the Clinton Administration for political purposes. Intelligence officials told Insight Magazine in 1997 that a 1993 conference of Asian and Pacific world leaders hosted by Clinton in Seattle had been spied on by U.S. intelligence agencies. Further, the magazine reported that information obtained by the spying had been passed on to big Democrat corporate donors to use against their competitors. The Insight story added that the mis-use of the surveillance for political reasons caused the intelligence sources to reveal the operation.
“The only reason it has come to light is because of concerns raised by high-level sources within federal law-enforcement and intelligence circles that the operation was compromised by politicians—includingmid- and senior-level White House aides—either on behalf of or in support of President Clinton and major donor-friends who helped him and the Democratic National Committee, or DNC, raise money.”
So, during the Clinton Administration, evidence existed (all of the information used in this article was available at the time) that:
-an invasive, extensive domestic eavesdropping program was aimed at every U.S. citizen;
-intelligence agencies were using allies to circumvent constitutional restrictions;
-and the administration was selling at least some secret intelligence for political donations.
These revelations were met by the New York Times and others in the mainstream media by the sound of one hand clapping. Now, reports that the Bush Administration approved electronic eavesdropping, strictly limited to international communications, of a relative handful of suspected terrorists have created a media frenzy in the Times and elsewhere.
The Times has historically been referred to as “the Grey Lady.” That grey is beginning to look just plain grimy, and many of us can no longer consider her a lady.
William Tate is a writer and researcher and former broadcast journalist. He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

This is an Invasion

This article from www.sbcsun.com/ is proof that our president should seal the borders. Not all people come here to work and many are criminals. If I am not mistaken shots fired from one country and enters another country is an invasion.

2:49 p.m. January 10, 2006

LOS ANGELES – Federal officials have warned U.S. Border Patrol agents that they could be the targets of assassins hired by immigrant smugglers, according to a confidential memo obtained by the San Bernardino County Sun newspaper.
"Unidentified Mexican alien smugglers are angry about the increased security along the U.S./Mexico border and have agreed that the best way to deal with U.S. Border Patrol agents is to hire a group of contract killers," the Department of Homeland Security said in a Dec. 21 Officer Safety Alert. The alert states that the smugglers intend to bring members of the Mara Salvatrucha street gang – known as MS-13 – into the country to perform the killings, The Sun reported Tuesday.
Federal officials consider MS-13, with an estimated 30,000 members in 33 states, to be one of the most dangerous gangs in the country. It was formed in Los Angeles by immigrants from El Salvador.
The safety alert was based on an FBI report. An FBI spokesman in Washington said he could not comment.
Michael Friel, a spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said he could not comment directly on the confidential memo but recalled that agents' lives have been threatened before.
"It's no surprise that these smugglers, these criminals, would be threatening our agents," Friel said. "And that would be a huge mistake on their part if they try."
On Tuesday, the agency issued a statement saying it takes seriously the risks of securing America's borders.
"Border Patrol agents and CBP officers are prepared to respond appropriately to threats either against the country or themselves," the statement said. "Border Patrol agents and CBP officers have received various types of threats in the past and have worked diligently with their law enforcement partners to address these threats ... The difficult and sometimes hazardous duty of securing our borders is CBPs first and foremost responsibility."
Border Patrol officials say assaults on agents increased significantly during the past year.
On Dec. 30, in an incident that strained U.S.-Mexico relations, an agent shot and killed an 18-year-old man who allegedly threw a large rock at him near the wall separating Tijuana and San Diego.
Last week, agents in Texas reported two separate incidents in which they were shot at from the Mexican side of the border.
T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council, a 6,500-member union, said the DHS alert proves agents' lives often are at risk.
"MS-13 has shown that its members have very little regard for human life," he said. "Some of the atrocities they have committed are truly unspeakable, and it worries me to know that our agents on the line are now the targets."

Great Link

This article and link was sent to me by I friend. It is headed straight for my "Favorites."Wednesday, July 13th, 2005EXCLUSIVE: Saddam Trained 4,000 Terrorists; ...and... Coalition Bases Being Turned Over to Iraqis
Move America Forward - From Baghdad, Iraq


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - July 13, 2005 CONTACT: Mark Washburn at Mark@MoveAmericaForward.org or (916) 441-6197
Iraqi General: Saddam Harbored 4,000 Terrorists on War’s Eve

* “Voices of Soldiers” Truth Tour Obtains Exclusive Briefing from Iraqi General on Status of Iraq Security Forces

* 18 Coalition Bases Have Been Turned Over to Iraqi Forces

(SACRAMENTO) – The “Voices of Soldiers” Truth Tour organized by Move America Forward (website: www.MoveAmericaForward.org) and RighTalk Radio Network (www.RighTalk.com) has learned in an exclusive briefing that Saddam Hussein harbored approximately 4,000 terrorists in Iraq in the six months leading up to Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Iraqi Lt. General Abdul Qader Jassim told the “Voices of Soldiers” Truth Tour delegation that these Iraqi-trained terrorists were designed to undermine Iraq’s enemies, most specifically Israel and Iran. Jassim also said that many of these same individuals are believed to be involved with or assisting the terrorist insurgents seeking to undermine the current Iraq regime.
Lt. General Abdul Qader Jassim reported that recruiting, training and equipping Iraqi forces has progressed significantly with Iraqi security forces about 60% of where they need to be to assume complete control in Iraq’s defense and protection of its people from terrorist attacks.
Also during the briefing, U.S. Col. Ben Hodges announced that as of today 18 Coalition Bases have been turned over to Iraqi Forces. There are an additional 91 Coalition bases that still need to be turned over to the Iraqi’s, Col. Hodges said.
The briefings by Iraqi Lt. General Jassim and U.S. Col. Hodges lasted approximately 2 hours and took place in Baghdad, Iraq.
“Saddam Hussein was operating as one of the world’s largest sponsors of terrorism before Coalition Forces put him out of business,” said Howard Kaloogian, Co-Chairman of Move America Forward.
“We are closer to winning the war on terrorism because of Operation Iraqi Freedom, and anyone who doubts that needs only look to see how determined Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups are to see us fail here,” Kaloogian said.
The “Voices of Soldiers” delegation includes talk show hosts from around the country as well as the leadership of Move America Forward who have been filing live reports on the situation in Iraq to radio stations and networks covering the entire nation.
“We’ve been talking to soldiers and Marines who are fighting on the front lines of the war against terrorism. Universally, they have told us they are proud to serve their country and believe their efforts in Iraq are an important part of winning the war against terrorism,” said Melanie Morgan, Co-Chair of Move America Forward and also radio host on KSFO 560 AM (San Francisco).
The group will be traveling throughout northern Iraq speaking with U.S. Troops throughout the week.
“We’re giving our troops a chance to talk to the American people, because there is no better source for accurate and honest assessments as to the progress being made in Iraq. And so far, we’ve found that everyone has been more than willing to tell the American people things are better than you might be hearing from certain media outlets,” Morgan said.
The purpose of this trip is to provide a means for the men and women of the U.S. military serving in Iraq to have their voices heard – direct and unfiltered. The talk show hosts will broadcast live from Iraq – with broadcasts streamed at www.RighTalk.com
Last week the group received an extensive briefing on conditions in Iraq, the status of Operation Iraqi Freedom, and other national security issues from officials at the U.S. Central Command, based at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida. Brigadier General John Custer (CENTCOM’s #2 official and top Intelligence Officer) led the briefing.
“There are some people, quite frankly, seeking to undermine the U.S. military and would like nothing better than to lose the war on terror. They are suggesting our trip is somehow paid for by the U.S. Government or taxpayers and at the direction of the Bush White House – and that is completely untrue,” said Lt. Col. Buzz Patterson, a host with the RighTalk Radio Network, bestselling author and board member of Move America Forward.
“We’ve paid our own way to get here, because we felt like our guys and gals serving in the military deserved to have their voices and opinions communicated directly to Americans without the biased reporting of the mainstream media. Our troops are being used as pawns for political expediency and it’s disgusting” Patterson said.
The radio talk show hosts currently in Iraq include: Melanie Morgan (KSFO 560 AM - San Francisco, CA); Michael Graham (WMAL 630 AM – Washington, D.C.); Mark Williams (KFBK 1530 AM – Sacramento, CA); Martha Zoller (WDUN 550 AM – Atlanta/Gaineville, GA); Lt. Col (Ret.) Buzz Patterson (National – RighTalk Radio Network); Brad Maaske (providing live reports to the Ray Appleton Show on KMJ 580 AM – Fresno, CA).
More information on the “Voices of Soldiers” Truth Tour can be found at www.VoicesOfSoldiers.com and www.MoveAmericaForward.org

Good vs Evil: Good Wins

An article from The American Thinker.com which makes for a great read. And yes for those who like to complain it is from a right sided view. The Passion of the Left: Hating Christians January 21st, 2006 "If viewers happened to be tuned into CSPAN several weeks ago, they were in for quite a spectacle. CSPAN was re-airing a conference that took place in May of 2005 with the ominous title, “Examining the Real Agenda of the Far Religious Right.” Sponsored by the New York Open Center, the conference was anything but open-minded. Instead, participants launched into a litany of complaints against the so-called Christian Right that bordered on bigotry. I half expected it to end with a pitchfork armed mob breaking down the doors of a local church. Perusing the Open Center’s website, one will find the sort of New Age psychobabble melded with eastern mysticism and apocalyptic environmentalism that is common on the left these days. Having been taught by multiculturalism to hate their own western religious background, they turn instead to the east. It just goes to show you that people need to believe in something. Those who run the Open Center obviously believed they were enlightened in holding their anti-Christian confab, but elitist would be more like it. Every time a speaker referred to a particular Christian belief or quoted a remark they found particularly inflammatory, the audience snickered knowingly, as if to say, “what a fool.” Obviously, the secular fundamentalists of the Open Center consider themselves far more reasonable than those nutty Christians. But judging by the level of paranoia expressed at the conference, I wouldn’t bet on it. At one point, a speaker spoke about the need “to save democracy” from the “Christian Right,” to which the audience broke out in applause. An associate professor of comparative studies equated the zeal of the “Christian Right” with that of “suicide bombers.” A former Pentecostal minister gave a presentation titled, “Christian Jihad,” while someone claimed to unveil, “The Real Hidden Religious Agenda: The Theocratic States of America.” For those suffering under such delusions, evangelical Christians are indeed the biggest threat to America and the entire world for that matter. Meanwhile, actual threats from a different religion go unnoticed. Not once during the conference was it mentioned that the real suicide bombers are Islamists who have been killing innocent civilians all over the world. Call me crazy, but isn’t the zealot who’s actually acting on his beliefs just a tad scarier than the one who’s simply talking about it? Anyway, in a democratic society, belief does not equal theocracy. Islamists on the other hand, are actively pushing a system that hearkens back to the 7th Century and they’re not taking no for an answer. To compare this approach to that of American citizens simply exercising their democratic rights is beyond ludicrous. The conference attendees seemed particularly concerned with Christians who believe literally in the Book of Revelations, The End Days, The Rapture, Armageddon and so on. They labeled such beliefs Dominionism and decried its real or imagined influence. They spoke menacingly about Tim LaHaye’s “Left Behind” series and referred to its “surprising popularity.” The fact that 82% of the country is Christian seems not to have come under consideration. Much like those who lament the popularity of conservative talk radio as if it weren’t simply a case of supply and demand, the Left is simply in denial about the nature of their country. Lest it be thought that Christians were the sole objects of wrath, “Neoconservatives” or in other words Jews, were also reviled. Apparently, it’s the Christians and the Jews that are the problem. The funny thing is that’s exactly what the Islamists are always saying. And that’s exactly why some of us are so concerned with maintaining that bulwark of Western civilization, the Judeo-Christian alliance. At precisely the time that Jews, Christians and all those interested in advancing democracy should be banding together in the face of a fascistic and totalitarian threat, the Left would have us hasten our demise. It’s no coincidence that as Christianity has declined in the West, Islam has been ascendant. Whether through demographics in Europe or ideological sway in America, Islam is clearly on the rise. In an ironic twist you couldn’t make up if you tried, the attacks of 9/11 seem actually to have helped this along. The number of Muslim converts is growing, with disaffected secularists being ripe for the picking. Meanwhile, Saudi money continues to pour into the coffers of U.S. institutions and to taint future generations with the stain of Wahhabism. The left flank in the battle against Christianity certainly hasn’t been neglected. The fact that President Bush is a man of faith has upped the ante for the left and they’ve been in anti-Christian overdrive ever since his election. While organizations such as the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State were doing damage long before Bush’s presidency, the campaign to erase Christianity from American public life has reached new heights in the past six years. This combined with the encroachments of Islamism has led to an ideological battle in which Christianity finds itself on the defensive. Although almost a year ago, the attitudes expressed by leftist attendees at the Open Center conference have if anything magnified in the time since. A recent article by Bill Moyers demonstrated the same anti-Christian fervor, complete with references to the “rapture index.” Moyers’ main bone of contention is that evangelical Christians somehow threaten environmentalism. Never mind terrorism, it’s the specter of global warming we should be worried about. Then there’s the new television show, The Book of Daniel, which portrays an Episcopal priest and his family as a collection of druggies, perverts and sociopaths. When NBC’s Nashville affiliate chose not to run the show due to the large number of complaints from viewers, those on the left immediately cried, “censorship.” To them, not publicizing one of their pet projects is tantamount to banning it. Yet Christians are not taking the abuse lying down. Groups such as the American Center for Law and Justice, The Alliance Defense Fund and others have had great success tackling the legal front. The recent hoopla over the “war on Christmas” was really generated by the Left, which is simply outraged that Christians are now fighting back. Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation have jumped into the fray as well, demonstrating that Christians are not alone in this struggle. The secularists’ attempts at bullying are in fact starting to have the opposite effect and Christianity in America is now stronger than ever. I certainly hope so, for in civilizational battles, those that cease to believe in anything tend to fall by the wayside. And if people aren’t willing to fight for their civilization, there’s always someone waiting in the wings that is." Cinnamon Stillwell is a columnist for SFGate.com and a staff writer for the New Media Alliance. cinnamon@cinnamonstillwell.com Cinnamon Stillwell

It Is about the Politics of Death

With the new president in Iran calling for the death of all the Jewish people, most of our Jewish politicians only seem to care about protecting abortion. Chuck Schumer Di Fi, Babs Boxer and ect are silent. Here is an article from My Way News.
Jan 15, 10:14 AM (ET)By NASSER KARIMI
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran, whose president has denied the Holocaust, said Sunday it would hold a conference to examine the scientific evidence concerning Nazi Germany's extermination of 6 million Jews.
Hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has recently provoked global condemnation for saying the Holocaust is a "myth" and calling for Israel to be wiped from the face of the earth. Iran further alarmed Western countries last week by restarting its research at a nuclear facility after a two-year freeze.
"It is a strange world. It is possible to discuss everything except the Holocaust," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters. "The Foreign Ministry plans to hold a conference on the scientific aspect of the issue to discuss and review its repercussions."
Asefi did not say where or when the conference would be held or who would attend.
Earlier this month, the Association of Muslim Journalists, a hard-line group, proposed holding a similar conference.
But Asefi said he was not aware of the association's wishes. He said the conference he announced was planned and supported by the ministry.
On Saturday, Ahmadinejad urged the West to be open-minded enough to allow a free international debate on the real aspects of the Holocaust.
Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., has said he understood Iran was considering a conference to call into question the evidence that the Nazis conducted a mass murder of European Jews during World War Two.

Amacrap.com

I have noticed over the past year that Amazon.com's reviews had been over run by some idiots. And I found a very well writen article on the following blog site:
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/006205.php
January 23, 2006
Leftists Against Free Speech And Dialogue
One of the least-welcome developments of the Internet has been the rise of e-graffiti, especially at places like Amazon.com, where the victims overwhelmingly have been conservative writers. It appears that those who oppose conservative thought have little love for free speech when practiced by those who disagree with them, and their only intellectual recourse is to deface websites that sell the books written by conservatives. Kate O'Beirn's book, Women Who Make The World Worse attracted not just the usual flood of phony reviews from Kate's detractors but also a hacked picture of the book's cover. That hack job, in all senses of the word, is not only obvious but childishly so.
One could make an argument -- a specious argument, but at least an argument -- that Kate's approach to her subject generates the ill will it received. However, Fred Barnes' book about George Bush, the newly-released Rebel In Chief, focuses on Bush himself, not his opposition. Such is the lack of intellectual heft and tolerance on the Left that the Amazon site has already been overrun by the bookburners. Michelle Malkin provides a glimpse of the faux reviews entered from the book's "readers". The picture got hacked briefly and replaced with the image at the right. Daniel Coppens of Crown Forum notes:Amazon already has contracts with Liberal newspapers and magazines that are free to post bad reviews (obviously) of Conservative books. However, they offer no such contracts to Conservative media and therefore offer no way to refute what is said in the negative Liberal reviews, other than what we are allowed to put in our own 'quotes' section. These types of business practices by Amazon are completely unacceptable; for them not to monitor these images that anyone can put up and for them not to make any effort to support their Conservative business partners is awful.
I would put it somewhat differently, and list Amazon as a victim of this as well. It offers free access to post reader reviews to assist their customers in selecting the books they want to read. Instead, the Left hijacks this system to get a free ride for their sloganeering and abuses Amazon by illegally interfering with its business. The Left doesn't want people to hear what conservatives have to say, perhaps knowing that they have been intellectually outclassed and proven disastrously wrong by history and current events. Instead, they issue mindless attacks, childish insults, and do everything possible to keep people from having access to conservative thought.
That's not the actions of people who have confidence in themselves. Those are the actions of a fearful, small-minded, vulgar group of Neanderthals who have suddenly seen Homo sapiens and realized that their days are numbered. These mouthbreathers cannot offer any new ideas, so instead of trying to compete with conservatives, they're busy with the electronic equivalent of sticking their fingers into their ears and shouting, "LA-LA-LA-LA, NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU!!" as loudly as possible.
In short, the Left consists of ill-educated, ill-mannered children. That they keep going to such lengths to prove it shows that they don't have anything else to offer.
Posted by Captain Ed at January 23, 2006 12:25 PM

They Were There

I found this on csnews.com. And since this site is not backed by Mr. Soros I am sure some will call it fiction.
Demolishing the WMD MythBy David ThibaultCNSNews.com Editor in ChiefJanuary 30, 2006This isn't the type of commentary about weapons of mass destruction that you have seen so often over the last 18 months, from media liberals like the Washington Post's Richard Cohen, who at every turn have insisted that Saddam Hussein had no WMDs or links to al Qaeda when he was routed from office by U.S. and coalition military forces in 2003.Armed only with the conclusions of United Nations and Bush administration-appointed weapons inspectors that no significant WMD caches had been discovered in Iraq, these media misfits and the liberal apparatus in Congress has had a field day castigating President Bush for his decision to invade Iraq.Nobody states the Democrats' weak-kneed response (What would F.D.R. and Harry Truman think?) better than the Massachusetts Democratic senator that the party entrusted with its presidential nomination in 2004 - John Kerry."Let's be clear: there is no question that Americans were misled into war in Iraq. Simply put, they were told that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction when he did not," Kerry proclaimed on Nov. 14, 2005, in a speech -- and you have to give him points for audacity here -- meant to honor American veterans.The website of U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the House minority leader, still claims in a release dated Jan. 12, 2005, that "President Bush has refused to concede what has been obvious for months: the primary justification for the invasion of Iraq was not supported by fact."Enter Georges Sada, one of Saddam Hussein's top generals and military advisors, whose book, "Saddam's Secrets - How an Iraqi General Defied and Survived Saddam Hussein," is causing quite a stir and may or may not be giving Kerry and Pelosi heartburn.Sada is unsparing in his criticism of Republican President George H. W. Bush for failing to finish the job in the first Persian Gulf War and rid the world of Saddam. And he blasts away at Democratic President Bill Clinton for his weak responses to terrorist attacks and the Saddam threat in the 1990s.Not only does Sada praise the current President Bush's decision to invade Iraq in 2003, stating that U.S.-led coalition forces "did us a great service," he demolishes the myth that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction and posed no international threat.Sada details a frightening passage in which Saddam asked for his advice about attacking Israel with chemical weapons -- the nerve gases Tabun, Sarin 1 and Sarin 2. He also explains how Saddam managed to smuggle his weapons of mass destruction out of Iraq and into Syria, following a natural disaster in northwestern Syria on June 4, 2002. "[W]hen Syrian president Bashar al-Assad asked for help from Jordan and Iraq, Saddam knew what he would do." Sada writes. "For him, the disaster in Syria was a gift, and there, posing as shipments of supplies and equipment sent from Iraq to aid the relief effort, were Iraq's WMDs." The author confirmed these details with one of the pilots of the 747 jets that were gutted on the inside in order to store the WMDs, before being flown from Iraq to Syria.Sada has much more to say in the book, the first substantive, reliable account of how Saddam made fools of the international community, U.S. liberal politicians and the media establishment who were determined to create the self-fulfilling prophecy that there were no WMDs in Iraq. We know that that these groups and individuals did it for political gain -- it hasn't worked so far -- instead of using their common sense and pointing the finger at the real enemy.Sada's book, while adding crucial details on how Saddam got rid of his WMDs, was no news flash to Cybercast News Service. Please read our own comprehensive account, reported by Scott Wheeler on Oct. 4, 2004, of Saddam's procurement of weapons of mass destruction as well as his extensive links to al Qaeda.

It Is A Hate Crime

Why isn't this guy being charged with a hate crime. He attacked these students with a SUV. He attempted to kill them because they are Americans. And I love the part of allah being the co counsel! Hope allah has time in between locating virgins and booz.

CHAPEL HILL -- The UNC-Chapel Hill graduate charged with injuring nine people when he drove an SUV down a crowded campus walkway politely told a judge Monday he plans to represent himself, with the help of Allah.
Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, 22, was taken into Orange County District Court chained and in an orange jumpsuit and flanked by sheriff's deputies. Calm and with a constant closed-lip smile, he answered Judge Pat DeVine's questions of whether he understood the day's proceedings with "Yes, Ma'am"s.
"I'm thankful you're here to give me this trial and to learn more about the will of Allah," he told the judge in court.
District Attorney Jim Woodall read off each of the 18 charges, naming the nine people hit by the rented 2006 Jeep Cherokee on Friday. Six of them were treated for minor injuries at UNC Hospitals, and three refused treatment, according to university officials.
When asked by reporters outside the courthouse whether he intended to kill his targets, Taheri-azar said, "Yes."
A U.S. citizen born in Iran, Taheri-azar faces charges of attempted first-degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury for each of the nine people hit. DeVine kept bail at $5.5 million and asked the public defender's office to work with Taheri-azar until the court felt comfortable that he was competent enough to represent himself.
Taheri-azar will stay at Raleigh's Central Prison for safekeeping, DeVine said, after court officials determined he was unstable and a danger to himself and others. Court documents said Taheri-azar told a UNC-CH police detective that "people all over the world are being killed in war and now it is the people in the United States['] turn to be killed." Police say he also told them he intended to kill people when he drove into The Pit, a campus gathering spot.
Taheri-azar grew up in the Charlotte area, attending public school for 13 years until he graduated from South Mecklenburg High School in 2001.
UNC-CH senior Dave Van Atta, who shared a dormitory suite his freshman year with Taheri-azar, described him as a serious student, a hospital volunteer and a Muslim who became deeply committed to his religion relatively recently.
The two met up again for lunch in Durham last spring and talked about religion for two hours after Van Atta expressed his own atheism. "He was pretty devout," Van Atta recalled.
"It was as if he had just found religion," Van Atta said. Taheri-azar had studied the Quran, the Muslim holy book, and knew it well. "He was really at peace with himself when I talked with him last."
Taheri-azar graduated in December with a double major in psychology and philosophy and had recently started working at Jimmy John's, a Franklin Street sub shop.
Recording of 911 call
On Monday, UNC-CH released a recording of the 911 call Taheri-azar made after he left campus Friday.
"I just hit several people with a vehicle," he told the dispatcher. "I don't have any weapons or anything on me; you can come and arrest me now."
Taheri-azar said he left the Jeep running but didn't want to get back in because he didn't want police to think he was trying to run away.
In his call, Taheri-azar said he left an explanation for his actions in a one-page letter on his bed.
"Really, it's to punish the government of the United States for their actions around the world," he told the dispatcher.
After his arrest, police evacuated Taheri-azar's Carrboro apartment building before searching it with the State Bureau of Investigation's bomb squad, but no explosives were found.
Inside the unlocked and empty apartment Saturday, a GoArmy packet with enlistment information lay on the bed in a front bedroom thought to be Taheri-azar's. A packet, "Questionnaire for National Security Positions," had been marked with a highlighter and included questions such as, "What is your nationality?"
A blank photocopy of a "Reference Form" for a handgun permit with the Orange County Sheriff's Office was in the trash.
Among the books lined up against the wall on the floor were the Quran, books by Nelson Mandela and Cornel West and "Endgame: The Blueprint for Victory in the War on Terror."

There Goes Our Dollar

When reading this article I would advise one to be seated next to a cooler full of beer. The financial burden of this problem is infinite and the potential health risk are deadly. And many politicians, no matter what their part membership refuse to step up.

© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com
Cristobal Silverio emigrated illegally from Mexico to Stockton, Calif., in 1997 to work as a fruit picker.
He brought with him his wife, Felipa, and three children, 19, 12 and 8 – all illegals. When Felipa gave birth to her fourth child, daughter Flor, the family had what is referred to as an "anchor baby" – an American citizen by birth who provided the entire Silverio clan a ticket to remain in the U.S. permanently.
But Flor was born premature, spent three months in the neonatal incubator and cost the San Joaquin Hospital more than $300,000. Meanwhile, oldest daughter Lourdes married an illegal alien gave birth to a daughter, too. Her name is Esmeralda. And Felipa had yet another child, Cristian.
The two Silverio anchor babies generate $1,000 per month in public welfare funding for the family. Flor gets $600 a month for asthma. Healthy Cristian gets $400. While the Silverios earned $18,000 last year picking fruit, they picked up another $12,000 for their two "anchor babies."
While President Bush says the U.S. needs more "cheap labor" from south of the border to do jobs Americans aren't willing to do, the case of the Silverios shows there are indeed uncalculated costs involved in the importation of such labor – public support and uninsured medical costs.
In fact, the increasing number of illegal aliens coming into the United States is forcing the closure of hospitals, spreading previously vanquished diseases and threatening to destroy America's prized health-care system, says a report in the spring issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.
"The influx of illegal aliens has serious hidden medical consequences," writes Madeleine Pelner Cosman, author of the report. "We judge reality primarily by what we see. But what we do not see can be more dangerous, more expensive, and more deadly than what is seen."
According to her study, 84 California hospitals are closing their doors as a direct result of the rising number of illegal aliens and their non-reimbursed tax on the system.
"Anchor babies," the author writes, "born to illegal aliens instantly qualify as citizens for welfare benefits and have caused enormous rises in Medicaid costs and stipends under Supplemental Security Income and Disability Income."
In addition, the report says, "many illegal aliens harbor fatal diseases that American medicine fought and vanquished long ago, such as drug-resistant tuberculosis, malaria, leprosy, plague, polio, dengue, and Chagas disease."
While politicians often mention there are 43 million without health insurance in this country, the report estimates that at least 25 percent of those are illegal immigrants. The figure could be as high as 50 percent.
Not being insured does not mean they don't get medical care.
Under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act of 1985, hospitals are obligated to treat the uninsured without reimbursement.
"Government imposes viciously stiff fines and penalties on any physician and any hospital refusing to treat any patient that a zealous prosecutor deems an emergency patient, even though the hospital or physician screened and declared the patient's illness or injury non-emergency," says the report. "But government pays neither hospital nor physician for treatments. In addition to the fiscal attack on medical facilities and personnel, EMTALA is a handy truncheon with which to pummel politically unpopular physicians by falsely accusing them of violating EMTALA."
According to the report, between 1993 and 2003, 60 California hospitals closed because half their services became unpaid. Another 24 California hospitals verge on closure, the author writes.
"American hospitals welcome 'anchor babies,'" says the report. "Illegal alien women come to the hospital in labor and drop their little anchors, each of whom pulls its illegal alien mother, father, and siblings into permanent residency simply by being born within our borders. Anchor babies are citizens, and instantly qualify for public welfare aid: Between 300,000 and 350,000 anchor babies annually become citizens because of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and the State wherein they reside."
Among the organizations directing illegal aliens into America's medical systems, according to the report, are the Ford Foundation-funded Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, the National Immigration Law Center, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the American Bar Association's Commission on Immigration Policy, Practice, and Pro Bono, the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the National Council of La Raza, George Soros's Open Society Institute, the Migration Policy Institute, the National Network for Immigration and Refugee Rights and the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Because drug addiction and alcoholism are classified as diseases and disabilities, the fiscal toll on the health-care system rises.
When Linda Torres was arrested in Bakersfield, Calif., with about $8,500 in small bills in a sack, the police originally thought it was stolen money, explained the report. It was her Social Security lump sum for her disability -- heroin addiction.
"Today, legal immigrants must demonstrate that they are free of communicable diseases and drug addiction to qualify for lawful permanent residency green cards," writes Cosman, a medical lawyer, who formerly taught medical students at the City University of New York. "Illegal aliens simply cross our borders medically unexamined, hiding in their bodies any number of communicable diseases."
Many illegals entering this country have tuberculosis, according to the report.
"That disease had largely disappeared from America, thanks to excellent hygiene and powerful modern drugs such as isoniazid and rifampin," says the report. "TB's swift, deadly return now is lethal for about 60 percent of those infected because of new Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis. Until recently MDR-TB was endemic to Mexico. This Mycobacterium tuberculosis is resistant to at least two major anti-tubercular drugs. Ordinary TB usually is cured in six months with four drugs that cost about $2,000. MDR-TB takes 24 months with many expensive drugs that cost around $250,000 with toxic side effects. Each illegal with MDR-TB coughs and infects 10 to 30 people, who will not show symptoms immediately. Latent disease explodes later.
TB was virtually absent in Virginia until in 2002, when it spiked a 17 percent increase, but Prince William County, just south of Washington, D.C., had a much larger rise of 188 percent. Public health officials blamed immigrants. In 2001 the Indiana School of Medicine studied an outbreak of MDR-TB, and traced it to Mexican illegal aliens. The Queens, New York, health department attributed 81 percent of new TB cases in 2001 to immigrants. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ascribed 42 percent of all new TB cases to 'foreign born' people who have up to eight times higher incidences apparently, 66 percent of all TB cases coming to America originate in Mexico, the Philippines and Vietnam."
Other health threats from illegals include, according to the report:
Chagas disease, also called American trypanosomiasis or "kissing bug disease," is transmitted by the reduviid bug, which prefers to bite the lips and face. The protozoan parasite that it carries, Trypanosoma cruzi, infects 18 million people annually in Latin America and causes 50,000 deaths. The disease also infiltrates America's blood supply. Chagas affects blood transfusions and transplanted organs. No cure exists. Hundreds of blood recipients may be silently infected.
Leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, was so rare in America that in 40 years only 900 people were afflicted. Suddenly, in the past three years America has more than 7,000 cases of leprosy. Leprosy now is endemic to northeastern states because illegal aliens and other immigrants brought leprosy from India, Brazil, the Caribbean and Mexico.
Dengue fever is exceptionally rare in America, though common in Ecuador, Peru, Vietnam, Thailand, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Mexico. Recently, according to the report, there was a virulent outbreak of dengue fever in Webb County, Texas, which borders Mexico. Though dengue is usually not a fatal disease, dengue hemorrhagic fever routinely kills.
Polio was eradicated from America, but now reappears in illegal immigrants as do intestinal parasites, says the report.
Malaria was obliterated, but now is re-emerging in Texas.
The Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons report includes a strong prescription for protecting the health of Americans:
Closing America's borders with fences, high-tech security devices and troops.
Rescinding the U.S. citizenship of "anchor babies."
Punishing the aiding and abetting of illegal aliens as a crime.
An end to amnesty programs.

Monday, March 06, 2006

Seal Both Borders

What border can we control. If my name was Mohammed I would tunnel through the Canadian border. Better fishing!

Third border tunnel defendant pleads guilty
By GENE JOHNSONAP LEGAL AFFAIRS WRITER
SEATTLE -- The last of three men charged with digging a sophisticated drug-smuggling tunnel under the U.S.-Canadian border pleaded guilty on Friday, two days after a Senate bill was introduced to make cross-border tunneling punishable by 20 years in prison.
Timothy Woo faces at least five years in prison and a maximum fine of $2 million when he is sentenced for conspiracy to smuggle marijuana, as do Francis Devandra Raj and Jonathan Valenzuela, who previously entered guilty pleas.
All three are from Surrey, British Columbia. They were arrested last July, shortly after they finished the 360-foot tunnel just north of Lynden - the first tunnel discovered along the U.S.-Canadian border. It ran from the living room of a home on the U.S. side to a boarded-up Quonset hut on the Canadian side.
Border guards noticed construction materials being brought into the hut, and loads of dirt coming out, and investigators used the Patriot Act's provision for "sneak-and-peek" search warrants to examine the tunnel and set up cameras to monitor it.
The investigators allowed three marijuana-running trips to take place in the tunnel in hopes of learning more about the suspects and whether they were involved in a wider drug ring. In each case the defendants were tailed as they left the tunnel.
On Wednesday, U.S. Sens. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash; Jon Kyl, R-Ariz.; and Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., introduced a bill that would make financing or building a cross-border tunnel punishable by 20 years in prison. Though it is illegal now to avoid examination at the border, tunneling is not specifically a crime.

"This is an issue of national security," Cantwell said. "We need to keep drugs out of our communities and terrorists out of our country."
Since Sept. 11, 2001, 35 border tunnels have been discovered in the United States - all but one on the Mexican border, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.
"There's always a concern that this is a harbinger of future events," U.S. Attorney John McKay said Friday. "We have to stay vigilant."
McKay said he could not comment specifically on the proposed legislation.
However, he said creating harsh penalties for tunnel financing and construction could actually hinder the efforts of law enforcement. Canadian authorities were extremely reluctant to allow the drug smugglers to make runs through the tunnel for fear that they might get away. U.S. investigators shared that concern, but convinced the Canadians it was essential for building the case against the three suspects and for conducting a broader investigation.
If tunnel-building itself carries a 20-year sentence, Canadian authorities could argue that American prosecutors don't so much need to verify what suspects are using the tunnel for, McKay suggested.
Cantwell spokeswoman Charla Neuman said the legislation is designed to give investigators more options.
"You can still convince the Canadians that monitoring is necessary," Neuman said. "And say the Canadians don't agree. At least you can still go after the criminals for something."
The investigators have not determined who financed the tunnel's construction, estimated to have cost more than $20,000.
---
Gene Johnson has covered courts and legal affairs for the AP since 2000

Keep Them Out

Since we know where most of our enimies originate from, we should not accept students from those places. Case in point:

HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. -- A suspect who is accused of hitting students with a sport utility vehicle at the University of North Carolina made his first court appearance Monday.
Mohammad Taheri-azar, a 2005 UNC-Chapel Hill graduate, smiled and waved before his hearing Monday. Taheri-azar told the courtroom that he was "thankful for the opportunity to spread the will of Allah."

As he left court, Taheri-Azar told reporters, "the truth is my lawyer." When asked if he was trying to kill people, he said yes.

Taheri-Azar was appointed a public defender in court. A young woman believed to be Taheri-Azar's sister did not comment on the case as she left to get into her car.

In court, Taheri-azar did not deny driving a rented silver Jeep Grand Cherokee into The Pit, a central area on the UNC-CH campus around noon Friday. Six people were taken to UNC Hospitals with non-critical injuries, and three people were treated at the scene.

Campus police said Taheri-azar, a 2005 UNC-Chapel Hill graduate, admitted to them Friday that he acted to "avenge the death of Muslims around the world." The Federal Bureau of Investigation is also investigating the incident from Friday.

Investigators believe he acted alone and they don't know of any groups in which he associates. Search warrants showing what investigators found inside his apartment have not yet been released.

The Raleigh Islamic Center and UNC's Muslim Student Association condemn Taheri-azar's actions.

Taheri-azar spent most of his life in the Charlotte area. Officials with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school system confirmed that he graduated from South Mecklenburg High School in 2001.

On Friday, authorities searched the SUV that Taheri-azar rented as well as his apartment and his personal vehicle.

Taheri-azar remains in Central Prison under a $5.5 million bond. He is charged with nine counts of attempted first-degree murder and nine counts of assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury with intent to kill.

Reporter: Kelcey Carlson Photographer: Richard Adkins OnLine Producer: Kamal Wallace
Copyright 2006 by WRAL.com.