* NOTE: A very important issue for all concerned with the WOT and Illegal Immigration
WASHINGTON, DC, United States (UPI) -- By the end of this year, the U.S. will have spent almost half a trillion dollars on Iraq since the 2003 invasion. This could easily double by the time the U.S. successfully nurtures a new Iraqi democracy to viability including returning basic services such as water, electricity and transport even to pre-war levels. To paraphrase the late great Senator Everett Dirksen of Illinois, that is getting to be 'real money.'
Meanwhile, as we 'rebuild' Iraq, what is happening here to our own society and its infrastructure?
~IMPORTANT SNIP
In Los Angeles, 95 percent of outstanding homicide warrants are for illegal aliens. The lethal 18th Street Gang has an estimated 20,000 members, over half illegal aliens, according to a ranking member of the LAPD, speaking not for attribution. The LA-based MS-13 (Mara Salvatrucha), whose membership was originally limited to street-tough Salvadorans, now numbers 50,000 (10,000 in LA alone). These gangs thrive where infrastructure decays.
This criminal imprint stretches from coast to coast and is present in every major city. MS-13 arose from the defeated Marxist FMLN in El Salvador and now has links with the Cosa Nostra. FBI counterintelligence agents worry about al Qaida infiltration through Central America. MS-13 has an estimated 300,000 members in Mexico and Central America. Interestingly, its MO is to redistribute the fruits of its crimes to a network of corner stores owned and operated by Middle Eastern and Asian immigrants that sell at heavily discounted prices and causes them to think they steal from the rich to give to the poor, uncynically pirating the Robin Hood sobriquet.
With one out of four illegals caught crossing the 1,940-mile border with Mexico, the net illegal influx into the United States is between three and four million each and every year. So 20 million illegals now in the U.S. is probably a safer bet than the 12 million figure bandied about Congress. All of this adds huge costs to the nation, especially for healthcare. Pregnant women who deliver 'anchor' babies shortly after eluding border patrols have an instant U.S. citizen in the family. The 14th Amendment stipulates anyone born in the U.S. is a U.S. citizen. Anchor strains on emergency facilities have bankrupted scores of hospitals in the Border States.
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/northamerica/article_1151225.php/Iraq_vs._U.S._decay
Arab TV Station Put on U.S. Terror List
By MARC PERELMAN
March 31, 2006
In its latest effort to step up the pressure on Iran, the Bush administration last week designated Al Manar — a satellite television station controlled by Tehran's Lebanese proxy Hezbollah — as a terrorist entity. The move also signals Washington's growing impatience with Hezbollah's reluctance to disarm, as mandated by the United Nations Security Council.
http://www.forward.com/articles/7592
well... I dunno about your neck of the woods... but there's one on every corner in the Houston area.