Did they tell Michelle about the “xenophobic” attacks in South Africa?

Yesterday Michelle Obama and the girls (literally wrapped in the South African flag) arrived in South Africa to get a first hand look and to pay tribute to the legacy of Nelson Mandela, here.

Saying that throwing off the white oppressors was President Obama’s first political cause, they paid homage to Mandela.

“After leaving here, she proceeded to make a brief courtesy call on former president Mandela,” said Achmat Dangor, the head of the foundation, calling the first lady “a lovely woman without any airs”.

Their visit added to the symbolism surrounding Obama’s journey, with America’s first black family in the White House meeting South Africa’s first black president.

President Barack Obama has called the anti-apartheid struggle his first political cause, and US officials say he has had periodic telephone contact with Mandela, who led the struggle against white-minority rule.

I bet they never told Michelle about the black on black and black on Asian crimes against immigrants to South Africa, here, just days before her arrival.  But, of course that wouldn’t fit into the media (and socialist) narrative about the “rainbow” nation.

Several Somali-owned shops in the South African town of Rothenberg have been attacked by local gangs, looting the properties and stealing cash, witnesses said Saturday.

Dahir Mohamed, a Somali trader and merchant, said that at least 10 shops were looted while three of them were set on fire after all the valuables and cash were taken.

“Fortunately, no Somali refugee was killed or hurt during Friday’s looting related incidents” Mohamed told Radio Mogadishu on Saturday morning, saying that all Somali shop owners and workers fled, fearing being killed or burned alive in their businesses.

He estimated that at least $2 million was taken. The shop owners called local police, Mohamed said, but did not receive any response.

He said that a Chinese businessman whose shop came under attack received an urgent response from the police. China has a diplomatic mission in South Africa while Somalia does not, Mohamed noted.

It is the second such attack in less than month. On May 11, more than 50 Somali-owned shops in the South African city of Port Elizabeth were destroyed and looted by local residents.

Type South Africa into our search function for lots more posts on the “xenophobic” South African majority population.

US Conference of Catholic Bishops push new refugee bill too

Yesterday, I told you about Lutherans pushing a new refugee bill, today it’s the Catholics.  But, you see, if they don’t keep the refugees coming they will collapse financially—those lobby groups, the social justice gang, are nothing if they don’t have taxpayer funding.

From Catholic Culture:

The executive director of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Migration and Refugee Services is urging lawmakers to the support the Refugee Protection Act, which was recently introduced in the Senate.

“Without US leadership, the situation for the world’s 15 million refugees would be much worse,” said Johnny Young, who served as US ambassador to Sierra Leone (1989-92), Togo (1994-97), Bahrain (1997-2001), and Slovenia (2001-04). “A large number of refugees rescued by our nation are themselves victims of terror and are in need of protection from such threats.

One commenter chastised the Bishops for blurring the distinction between illegal aliens and refugees.  But what the commenter doesn’t know is that the USCCB and its various affiliates are also supporting illegal immigration and open borders.  No sense making a distinction when there isn’t one!

From unum:

It would be helpful if Mr. Young and the bishops would distinguish between their positions on refugees, those fleeing persecution, and illegal immigrants, those merely seeking to cross national borders for other reasons. By blurring the distinction between refugees and illegal immigrants, the USCCB is undermining the efforts of civil authorities to protect national borders. These are the same civil authorities that are supported by Church teaching.

‘unum’ might want to check out a couple of links:  here on the USCCB behind the ‘amnesty’ march in DC,  here on the USCCB at my other blog, here (the Religious Left Exposed) and here is an interesting report on how “progressive Marxists” have infiltrated the Catholic Church.

It’s time for good Lutherans and good Catholics to begin questioning their so-called “leadership!”

Lutheran Immigration will trot refugees to Washington tomorrow to lobby….

….for more goodies from the taxpayer!

I wonder who is paying all the airfare and hotel bills?  Could it be the US taxpayer (again)?

Here is the whole press release from the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services.*  (Sorry no time today to give you my thoughts on this.)

In honor of World Refugee Day, former refugees advocate on behalf of those in need of protection

WASHINGTON, June 20, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — In honor of World Refugee Day, a delegation of former refugees from across the country will gather this Wednesday, June 22 at the Nation’s capital to call on Congress and the Administration to remember the plight of the millions on the run from violence and persecution worldwide.

(Logo:  http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110620/DC22416LOGO )

The delegation will urge members of Congress to pass the Refugee Protection Act of 2011. Introduced last week by Senator Leahy (D-VT) and Representative Lofgren (D-CA-16), this legislation would ensure that the United States continues the deeply-rooted tradition of protecting refugees, asylum seekers, children and other vulnerable newcomers. [It is all about bringing in more refugees and getting more money for it---ed]

“The U.S. refugee program is a critical component of our nation’s foreign policy and humanitarian response to the millions of vulnerable migrants worldwide who cannot return home,” said LIRS President and CEO Linda Hartke. “As the United States celebrates the 60th anniversary of the Refugee Convention, this year is a particularly opportune time to renew and improve the U.S. commitment to people fleeing persecution. There are no better voices to advocate for this renewal than former refugees who have experienced the healing, welcome, and protection of the U.S. resettlement program and are now community leaders.”

The Refugee Protection Act of 2011 would:

• Help preserve family unity for children separated from their parents
• Eliminate the unnecessary one-year filing deadline for asylum seekers to file their asylum applications
• Update the U.S. refugee resettlement program and direct a study on its effectiveness at helping refugees achieve self-sufficiency.

(For more information on the Refugee Protection Act of 2011 click here.)

The delegation, comprised of former refugees from Eritrea, Liberia, Sudan, Cuba, Sierra Leone and Afghanistan, will be meeting with the Administration and members of Congress from 12:00pm-5pm. Audiovisual media of the visits will be available.

About Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service

LIRS welcomes refugees and migrants on behalf of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod and the Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. LIRS is nationally recognized for its leadership advocating with and on behalf of refugees, asylum seekers, unaccompanied children, immigrants in detention, families fractured by migration and other vulnerable populations, and for providing services to migrants through over 60 grassroots legal and social service partners across the United States.

Press Contact: Fabio Lomelino, Assistant Director for Media Relations, 410-230-2721, 443-478-6022.

* LIRS is one of the top federal government refugee contractors.  We have written much about them in recent years, please use our search function for more.  Here is just one recent post about LIRS putting refugees in slum apartments.

Readers:   Send this post to your Senators and Representatives so they know about LIRS!

Canada’s commitment to refugee protection waning (gee, I wonder why)

So says Canadian refugee activist and executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees, Janet Dench, in response to the re-emergence of a bill to get at the problem of human smuggling—a reflection of a much enhanced concern among Canadians to slow the open door policies of former Canadian governments.  Bottomline, this story (this bill)  just highlights the growing angst western citizens have about what they see as a flood of needy and often unwilling or unable to assimilate third world immigrants to their neighborhoods.  The Canadian Council, by the way, is just one more NGO political activist group.

From the Ottawa Citizen:

One worlders always point to the “international legal obligations.“  But what about a country’s right to protect its sovereignty?

This week, the Conservatives made good on one of their election promises: to bring back Bill C-49, and to bring it back virtually unchanged.

The Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada’s Immigration System Act was first introduced in October, but didn’t make it to second reading before Parliament was dissolved for the spring election. At the time, what Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney called “strong but fair” remedies to reduce the number of people landing on Canada’s shores to claim refugee status were harshly criticized by opposition MPs and refugee advocates, who denounced the bill as an attack on refugee rights.

In particular, critics say the bill -now known as C-4 -contravenes the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and Canada’s obligations under the UN Convention on Refugees.

“It’s difficult to understand why the government would be proposing to bring this legislation back without change when it has been so widely condemned by legal experts as clearly in violation of our Charter and clearly in violation of international standards of human rights,” says Janet Dench, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees. “There’s no ambiguity about this. It does not conform to our international legal obligations.”

Preventing abuse of a generous immigration system!

“Canadians gave us a strong mandate to prevent the abuse of our generous immigration system,” Kenney said on re-introducing the bill Thursday. “Canadians have told us this abuse of our generosity is a real problem that must be stopped.”

Refugee advocates say it goes too far, and that the detention without judicial review for a year contravenes the Charter right -which applies to refugee claimants -to see a judge within 24 hours.

“The government describes it as being anti-smuggler, but the people who would suffer most are the refugees,” says Dench. “They would be detained for up to a year, and even those accepted as refugees would be held in suspended animation for five years without any right to travel, to reunify with family or get on with their lives.”  [In fact, the prospect of detention might well discourage the whole business of human smuggling---ed]

We are being taken for a ride and the refugee lobby is the driver!

Those objections [go back to the story, here, for those] don’t hold water with immigration system critics such as Martin Collacott, a former ambassador to Sri Lanka and one of the principals behind the new Centre for Immigration Policy Reform. Collacott sees Bill C-4 as a balanced effort to get at a real problem, and he’d like to see more of it.

“The problem is the people who use the services of smugglers are doing an end-run on the Canadian immigration system,” says Collacott. “We’re being taken for a ride and we’ve allowed it to happen because of a fairly active refugee lobby that argues we should keep our doors wide open.”

Dench says Canada’s commitment to refugee protection seems to be waning.

Readers, especially Canadian readers, check out the Centre for Immigration Policy Reform here.  Be sure to see this recent commentary:

A mawkish view of immigration overlooks the facts
By Patrick Grady and Herbert Grubel, Vancouver Sun
June 6, 2011

Related story perhaps:   According to CBC News, here, the City of Ottawa is putting in place a new plan to try to integrate immigrants (they know they have a problem!).

For more on refugee problems in Canada, visit our category on Canada, here, where we have 68 posts archived.

Tennessee refugee agency running out of your money on eve of World Refugee Day

World Refugee Day is tomorrow in case you didn’t catch those expensive-looking advertisements from the UNHCR on TV.

It’s a useful news hook for a story about Bridge Resettlement Services in Tennessee and a charity event they are putting on because they are running out of taxpayer money as the ponzi scheme that is refugee resettlement collapses.

What do I mean by that?  The agencies,  like Bridge (a subcontractor of a big kahoona federal contractor–Church World Service) are paid by the head to resettle refugees and when the flow is slowed as it is right now, and they still have previously resettled refugees to care for (while new money isn’t coming in) the ponzi scheme collapses.  Remember how Bernie Madoff paid off his older clients with the new clients money, but never really invested anything, well that is sort of how this works.

So here is the story from Metro Pulse in Knoxville:

Since 1982, the unusual organization, which combines federal grants with mostly church-based volunteer efforts, has resettled hundreds of approved refugees in the Knoxville area. Most who are granted asylum by the U.S. government are victims of war or severe oppression. The majority of the immigrants Bridge has worked with lately are Iraqis, but the organization has also established colonies of Burmese, Rwandans, Ethiopians, Cubans, and others. Knoxville has recently welcomed a significant population of refugees from the tiny, extremely poor African nation of Burundi.

Paid by the head?  Yes! You see, they say so right here:

Bridge’s federal grant money is tied to the number of refugees allocated to Knoxville. That number had been growing until recently, but because of a new security protocol instituted this year, the paperwork involved in approving refugees has slowed—and so, temporarily, has the organization’s revenue. Bridge got only 14 refugees to process this past April, just under a third as many as arrived the previous April, and therefore much less federal funding allocated. Though Bridge has fewer incoming refugees this summer, they’re still dealing with the settlers they’ve taken on. They still have administrative costs to keep up with, and need to make up for what they believe to be a temporary gap.

When the refugee program was first debated, passed Congress and signed into law (Ted Kennedy/Joe Biden/Jimmy Carter) in 1980 it was envisioned that these non-profit groups would be in a public-private partnership with governement, but as it is freely admitted below, Bridge gets 95% of its funding from you!

Jennifer Cornwell is director of the organization, based on Middlebrook Pike in West Knoxville. It employs a staff of eight but relies heavily on as many as 100 local volunteers, who teach English or help with critical transportation. Local churches help sponsor some refugee families, Cornwell says, but about 95 percent of their funding comes from the federal refugee-resettlement programs.

So next time you think, aren’t these church folks so nice to do this, remember you foot the bill!

Founded in 1982, Bridge works with both the government and Church World Service and Episcopal Migration Ministries. Local churches involved also include Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian congregations.

Bridge:  we especially like Iraqis!

Decisions on who comes to Knoxville are made by federal refugee-resettlement programs, and are based on factors including cost of living and employment opportunities, but especially on the populations already here. Knoxville is already home to a large enough population of Iraqis that new refugees can make connections with them and find their way around; with Bridge’s help, 153 more Iraqis joined them last year.

Filing a lawsuit and blocking the FBI

We know how much Bridge likes Iraqis!  One of the earliest posts I wrote at RRW in 2007 was about how Bridge joined a lawsuit with CAIR and the ACLU to stop the FBI from interviewing some Iraqis the feds were concerned about, here.    In light of what just happened in neighboring Kentucky (Iraqi refugee terror suspects arrested) wouldn’t you like to know the feds were interviewing Iraqis from time to time?

And, come to think of it, I wonder if they used your money for the lawsuit?

Bridge’s financial position

Have a look at some of Bridge’s finances by checking out their most recent Form 990 (2009) here.

They had $687,085 in gross income for the year.

Of that, $641,801 came from federal taxpayers (government grants).

Other contributions in their public-private partnership amounted to $39,781 (about 6%).

They had salaries of $268,769 and benefits of $69,737, board compensation $51,497 and payroll taxes at $27,942 which comes to a total of $417,945 in salaries and benefits.  They spent $10,339 on conferences, conventions and meetings and a whopping $32,022 on travel.   And, there is a bunch of other stuff!   Looks like we are approaching a half a million $ just keeping their office open—sure doesn’t look like there is much left for the refugees!

Here is an idea, get more volunteers for the office, find more sponsors for refugees, forget conventions/meetings and travel.  And, tell me, why does the board need compensation? Isn’t this supposed to be charitable work?

In honor of Fathers Day: Food stamp fraudster Dads….

…..just doing it for the children.  And, what do you know! they are all named Mohammed!   

This is so funny, Baron at Gates of Vienna writing in a post entitled, “Culturally enriched food stamp fraud” refers to a story about a Somali Muslim immigrant food stamp scam having a “Mohammed coeficient” of 100% because LOL! everyone involved is named Mohammed (or a variation of the spelling of the name of their prophet).*

Read Gates of Vienna’s special in “The International Cultural Enrichment News!” where Baron Bodissey has more revelations about a food stamp scam from Michigan that we first reported here last month.  Such a good Dad!  And, isn’t diversity just grand!  Read the whole story at Gates of Vienna.

Another Mohammad fraudster!

Coincidentally, just in time for Fathers Day, we have news from O’Fallon, Illinois about another Mohammad (and such a good Dad) going to jail for food stamp fraud too—this one totaling $1.5 million dollars.  This Mohammad is Jordanian and he is worried about his family if he gets deported after serving a measly two years in jail.

From the News Democrat:

An O’Fallon man who managed a Washington Park convenience store will serve two years and nine months in prison for a food-stamps-for-cash scam that cost the government $1.5 million.

Rami Mohammad, 33, a Jordanian citizen who entered the United States in 2004, received the sentence Thursday in federal court in East St. Louis. Mohammad was the manager of the Quick Stop store in Washington Park.

After receiving reports about the store being involved in food-stamp fraud, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Office of the Inspector General began an undercover investigation.

The investigation showed that people were going into the store and conducting transactions with food stamps — which involves the use of a card similar to a credit card or debit card, rather than actual paper stamps — but the customers weren’t carrying any groceries when they exited the store.

Mohammad told agents he was accepting prepayment for items that he had to specially order. But he was caught on audio and video engaging in a cash-back scheme in which Mohammad took the value from people’s food-stamp cards and gave them smaller amounts of cash in return.

Steve Wigginton, U.S. attorney for the southern district of Illinois, said the food-stamp program was defrauded of more than $1.5 million.

He will only do two years in jail and then possibly be deported.  He will be ordered to pay restitution but he likely has long ago spent the money, or even more likely he sent your tax dollars out of the country (so many food stamp scammers are found to have done this!).

The court also ordered Mohammad to pay restitution, though it was unclear whether he’ll be able to make any repayment. In addition, the court informed Mohammad that he’ll likely be deported after he finishes his sentence.

But, waahhhhh!, don’t send us back to Jordan!  There is lousy health care in Jordan and the schools stink too!

Mohammad’s wife testified at his sentencing Thursday, saying she doesn’t want him to be deported because health care isn’t as good in Jordan as it is in the United States, and their children would have to go to inferior schools in Jordan. [OMG-ed]

Happy Fathers Day!

* Here is one post from 2009 where I noted the common thread in the scams—Mohammads are everywhere in these stories!  After all, we are infidels and in Islam it’s just hunky-dory to rip off infidels.  Type ‘food stamp fraud’ into our search function for dozens more stories like this one!

Comment worth noting: Brits to stop “insensitive” DNA testing of African asylum claimants

From time to time we receive comments that merit attention on page one and this is one such comment.

Received from the “Opinionator” to this post from yesterday about how Somalis and others cheat their way into the UK.

It’s bad enough the people of the UK (and particularly England) are being trampled by incoming “refugees” and “asylees” and illegal and legal immigrants – now their traitorous government has decided that they – once again- cannot cull the cheats and liars (and we all know there are many) from the rest of the herd on non-British looking to avail themselves of the (heavily taxed) taxpayer benefits. This is particularly egregious considering the publicized Somali re-unification fraud in the USA (and covered at RRW):

UK Drops DNA test for Refugees and Asylum Seekers*

Tests are “unreliable” – Really? As unreliable as the “word” of thousands (if not more) fraudsters?

“Refugee Council chief executive Donna Covey said she welcomed the decision to scrap the DNA tests.She said the tests highlighted the insensitive attitudes of the U.K. Border Agency to refugees and asylum seekers.”

But what about the “insensitivity” shown to the immigrant beleaguered British citizens and taxpayers? Once again they are given short shrift.

Opinionator!  What are you thinking!  Only immigrants have feelings!  Everyone knows that Westerners are not entitled to sensitivity.  After all, we are history’s exploiters; it’s payback time and we dare not speak up.

* What the test sought to determine was whether the person seeking asylum was really from a country that is in turmoil because many, from places like Kenya, shouldn’t even be seeking asylum when their government is stable.

Ethiopian arrested in No. Virginia this morning in possible terror plot

Update June 24th:  Read New English Review for an update on the Marine charged in a jihadist plot, here.

This is a breaking story in the Washington, DC area today.

Update:  Alleged terror plotter a former Marine, here.  (At 22, he sure got in and out of the Marines fast?)

From MYFoxDC:

ARLINGTON, Va. – A man was in custody Friday after a major security alert outside the Pentagon.

The incident began when a man — believed to be a naturalized US citizen who came to the US from Ethiopia — was found in the nearby Arlington National Cemetery overnight Thursday. The man was arrested at the scene.
US Park Police then searched for the man’s vehicle. A short time later, a car was located near the Pentagon.

Several roads near the Pentagon were blocked off as law enforcement agencies including the FBI, the US Park Police, and the Pentagon Police rushed to the scene. A Pentagon Police spokesman said that an explosives team was also called in to investigate the vehicle.

Authorities reportedly found al Qaeda-related statements, a backpack initially believed to contain ammonium nitrate, and spent 9mm shells at the scene, ABC’s “Good Morning America” reported.

A notebook containing words including “al Qaeda” and Taliban” was found at the scene, FOX News Channel reported.

ABC News is reporting that the man’s name is Yonathan Melaku, 22 of Alexandria, VA.

If you thought all Ethiopians were Christians and therefore not likely to be terrorists, then you are wrong.  Ethiopia is approximately 34% Muslim, here.  And, I was interested to see that the Oromo who are now arriving in meatpacking towns like Garden City, Kansas are Muslim.

If you are a new reader, the Ethiopian Community Development Council located in Arlington, VA is one of the top federal refugee contractors and responsible for many Ethiopian immigrants in Northern Virginia.    As a matter of fact, I once heard they were operating in Maryland and ran into some sort of problem and no longer resettle refugees in Maryland.

Melaku is likely a former refugee or asylee.   Just a reminder that Open Borders activists are moaning about increased security screening slowing the flow of refugees to American.  Earlier this month we had two Iraqi refugees arrested on terror charges in Kentucky, here.

In addition, we recently told you about another Ethiopian former refugee on trial for murder in Northern Virginia here.

Somali ‘how-to’ guide on cheating one’s way into the UK; unrelated (?) London hotel bomb plot?

Reporter Kassim Mohammed writing at the Nairobi Star gives us a peek into how a Somali who wishes to get to the UK and ask for asylum (because it’s supposedly easier there to be granted asylum than, in say, the Netherlands) can buy a fake passport and be in London in a flash.

Readers should know that when seeking asylum, the asylum seeker is supposed to request asylum in the first country in which he or she arrives.

So, for instance those Somalis who travel across the world with many stops (including Cuba, South American and Central American countries and Mexico) and arrive on our US border and ask for asylum are really not eligible for asylum.  But, some cheating American asylum lawyer is waiting to help them get into the US anyway!  See one of many posts I’ve written on Somalis and the US borders, here.

This article from the Nairobi Star explains that for Somalis or other Muslim illegal aliens who pass through the Netherlands they do not want to request asylum there and thus cheat the system and buy a phony passport to move on to England.

From the Nairobi Star (published at AllAfrica.com)

The UN says you must keep your Somalis! No sending them back to Africa!

Somalia is mired in a seemingly unending armed conflict between the Transitional Federal Government and Al Shabaab fighters. Mortar and rocket fire that the two warring factions exchange lead to casualties and the common man bears the brunt.

Taking note of this grim reality, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has issued guidelines requesting host countries not to return any Somali seeking asylum to Southern and Central Somalia.

[....]

Under the European Union’s Dublin II regulations, the country where a person first entered the EU is generally held responsible for examining that person’s asylum claim.

This it appears is great on paper. Some of the Somali refugees who hear of the fate of their countrymen living on the streets opt out of the asylum process.

So instead of asking for asylum in the Netherlands, here is how they move on to London!

Ali Mohamed, 25, came to Rotterdam, The Netherlands, from Italy in April and decided not identify himself to authorities but use unorthodox means to get his way to the United Kingdom. “I heard that the Netherlands is not a good place to seek asylum. I don’t want to live on the streets. I will try my luck in London,” Ali said.

Ali was informed of Dutch passports for sale in Den Haag (The Hague). In the presence of the Star reporter, Ali was told by an Ethiopian man in the Dutch administrative capital to bring a passport size photograph to identify a passport that resembles him. Within five days, Ali managed to pocket a Dutch passport for 1,000 Euros (Sh126,000).

“I called several of my relatives in Canada and Norway who each sent me some money and I managed to raise the amount. I know it’s a bad thing but I am not planning to harm anyone, I just want a better life since my home country is uninhabitable,” Ali remarks while keenly looking at the photo attached to the passport.

Ali will now have to send back the passport after his arrival in his final destination- London. He went through Callais, France, and crossed the border into the United Kingdom. Immigration officials on both sides of the border didn’t notice any abnormally.

Keeping his promise to inform the Star on his progress of seeking asylum, Ali called after 17 days. “I am so happy. I have been accepted as a refugee here in the UK and all is well. I have also managed to send back the passport to the person who sold it to me. I hope it reaches him safely.”

Read it all.

Changing the subject—sort of!

Today we learned that there is a Somali terror plot to create a Mumbai-style attack on a London hotel.

Just today we learned that the now dead mastermind of the embassy bombing in Kenya, killed in Somalia a few days ago, had on him a plan to create a Mumbai-style attack on a London hotel.

From Fox News:

Federal authorities are warning hotels in major U.S. cities to be vigilant after intelligence recently obtained in Somalia shows Al Qaeda was planning to launch a “Mumbai-style” attack on an upscale hotel in London, England, Fox News has learned exclusively.

The intelligence came from computer accessories and other materials gathered at the checkpoint in Mogadishu where Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, the Al Qaeda operative who masterminded the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in East Africa, was killed Saturday, according to sources.

Al Qaeda was working on what one senior U.S. intelligence official described as an “aspirational” – but possibly operational – plot to target the Ritz Carlton hotel in London. As part of the plot, operatives would stay in strategically chosen rooms on the first floor of the hotel, and then they would set their rooms ablaze in hopes of trapping guests on the floors above.

But you can’t send them back—the UN says so!

Idaho: Truck used for refugee vegetable project vandalized

A kind of “hate-crime?”

From Fox12.Idaho:

They call her ‘Big Green,’ but this 1965 custom Ford pickup lost much of her luster sometime on Tuesday night.

Owners of the once-beautiful truck say the windows and hood were smashed by vandals who may have been targeting a non-profit organization that teaches immigrant refugees how to farm in Boise.

Just who did it, hasn’t been caught.

The truck made its debut last week, delivering fresh produce in Boise, part of a program that teaches refugees to farm sponsored by an organization called “Create Common Good.”

Tyler Smith drives the truck, and says his heart sunk when he saw the vandalism early Tuesday morning.

“In my mind this is kind of a hate-crime, you know, like somebody didn’t like what we were doing,” Smith said.

Smith quickly reported the vandalism to police, who say they suspect the actions were done using some sort of a metal stake or pole.

The estimated damage to the custom truck is in excess of $1,000.

“Create Common Good” says they hope it isn’t sending a message of intolerance.

Tyler Smith says he hopes the vandalism was a random act, and not meant to send a message of hatred or intolerance to Boise’s refugee community.

Create Common Good currently employees a handful of refugees, and has trained roughly 200 others at its community garden site this year.

Organizers then teach them English and actively try to find them jobs.

Smith says many of the refugees are from war-torn countries, and more than a few have expressed disbelief that a culture of hatred or intolerance could exist in Boise.

Perhaps “Create Common Good” wants to set an example of how tolerance should work.

I guess we will just have to wait and see who is responsible, but this story gives me an opportunity to tell you about this relatively new grant program that doles nearly a million tax dollars out each year from Washington to teach refugees how to grow fruits and vegetables and then put their government-subsidized produce into the local farm economy.

It’s called the Refugee Agricultural Partnership Program (RAPP)

From the 2008 Office of Refugee Resettlement annual report to Congress you can see a list of the grantees for FY2008.

The report (page 40) says in addition to teaching refugees how to grow produce, the program puts an emphasis on improved access to Food Stamps and other welfare assistance:

Corollary to refugee families growing familiar and healthier foods has been the additional emphasis on nutrition education and improved access to USDAFood & Nutrition Service programs such as SNAP, WIC and Seniors Coupons. Under the leadership and support of the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service, the use of farmers markets for accessing fresh produce and as a market outlet for refugee farmers has been promoted. [I think they are allowing farmers markets to take food stamps---boy, will that be an opportunity for fraud, convenience stores are bad enough!---ed]

I wrote a post in 2010 on the same topic here and asked the Food Stamp question then as well.

Here is a list for 2011 of the recipients of the RAPP grants.   Note that the recipient of the federal grant in Boise, Idaho is not ‘Create Common Good’ but is the Mountain States Group which must be subcontracting out to ‘Create Common Good’ (CCG) because I can’t find any tax information on CCG, but I can for Mountain States. [Update:  be sure to read comments to this post because reader 'Bob' tells us that Create Common Good is not the recipient of federal tax dollars.]   Readers, this is a very common practice—this business of collecting federal tax dollars at one point in the non-profit (quasi-government agency) chain and passing it along a chain of organizations making it more difficult for citizens to follow the money trail.

For a complete list of Idaho refugee partners, go here.

I’m not making excuses or even suggesting that any local (American) person in Idaho had any involvement with the vandalism (which is very wrong whoever did it), but I want readers to know that what local residents know is that some group of immigrants is getting money from Washington to, in this case, compete with them in their struggle to find work and survive in this economy.  The practice destabilizes communities.

Anyway, back to Mountain States Group, their feel-good project, and your money.

Check out their form 990 here for 2007-2008. (There are other years available, but I didn’t want to get too deep into the math, this year makes my point since ORR has released the 2008 report to Congress).

In 2008, Mountain States Group received $6,980,863 in government grants and $4,171,123 in government fees and contracts out of a total revenue stream of $11,794,982.  This isn’t a non-profit group, it is essentially an arm of the federal government and state government with 95% of its funds coming from taxpayers—but as a private non-profit group it enjoys the benefit of not being scrutinized by Congress.

Model for the World?

A model for the world says the farmer-girl and First Luddite herself, Michelle Obama:

“It’s a model for the nation, for the world”

First Lady, Michelle Obama upon visiting on April 15, 2010, the New Roots Community
Farm in San Diego developed by RAPP grantee, the San Diego
International Rescue Committee