Day: November 11, 2009

Lou Dobbs leaves CNN

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update November 12th:  Immigration Daily is gloating and suggesting if Lou Dobbs is out, amnesty is in.  I wouldn’t be in such a hurry to make that prediction.  As CNN dies, Dobbs may find a more powerful gig elsewhere.

Outspoken immigration critic and likely the only independent thinker at CNN has announced he is finished there.  It is not clear what he will do next, but it is clear that CNN will continue to sink further in the ratings.   From the NY Times:

Lou Dobbs, the longtime CNN anchor whose anti-immigration views have made him a TV lightning rod, said Wednesday that he is leaving the cable news channel effective immediately.

“Some leaders in the media, politics and business have been urging me to go beyond my role here at CNN and engage in constructive problem-solving,” Mr. Dobbs said just after 7 p.m., suggesting that he would remain involved in the civic discourse, but perhaps not on television.

“I’m considering a number of options and directions,” Mr. Dobbs added.

Wednesday’s program will be his last on CNN, one of his employees said earlier in the evening.

We previously told you about attempts by the Southern Poverty Law Center to get him fired, here.  And, more recently we mentioned the shooting at his NJ home, here.

Move along, nothing to see in welcoming Ft. Morgan, CO

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I had to laugh when I saw this article (Morgan ahead of others in refugee resettlement) yesterday from Ft. Morgan, CO all about how great everything is with the booming Muslim population in that “welcoming” town.  If readers did not know that a refugee woman was murdered there a week ago today, one would think this just sounds idyllic.

In some ways, Fort Morgan is ahead of other cities that are dealing with an unexpected influx of refugees.

Recently, Spring Institute for Intercultural Learning Director of Integration Strategies Susan Downs-Karkos and English Language Training Project Director Burna Dunn came to Fort Morgan to talk with people from the school district, OneMorgan County and other agencies that are dealing with the challenges of the East African refugees who have moved to the community.

They also talked to people in Greeley and communities in Nebraska, South Dakota, Kansas and Texas, on behalf of the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement, to find out how schools and other agencies are doing with their unplanned new residents.

All of these towns have meat or poultry packing plants, which offer relatively well-paying jobs for those with basic skills and little knowledge of English, Dunn said.

Overall, the representatives heard some promising things from Fort Morgan, Downs-Karkos said.

There are some ways in which Fort Morgan stands out compared to other communities. [other than being the only town with a murdered Somali]

Perhaps the biggest difference between Fort Morgan and the other cities is that it has Lutheran Family Services of Colorado case management services in the city, she said.

In most states, these kinds of services are only available in the big urban centers, and it is outstanding that LFS and the Colorado Refugee Services Program have been so responsive to the needs in Fort Morgan, Downs-Karkos said.

These Colorado offices have worked to put resources into communities to help both the refugees and the communities to deal with this move, she said.

As for the ‘shout out’ to Lutheran Family Services of Colorado, I would like to know which came first.  Did the resettlement agency set up shop and bring the refugees to Ft. Morgan, or did they have insider knowledge that Cargill was going to be luring refugee labor and the agency followed the refugees?   Does anyone know?  We do know that Lutheran Family Services is a sponsor of the new Ethnic Community Based Organization in Greeley the East African Community of Colorado run coincidentally by some Somalis by the name of Abdi (both the murdered woman and the murder suspect share that name).

I would have so much more respect for mainstream media reporting if this article at least acknowledged that a refugee was murdered under very suspicious circumstances last week.  It wouldn’t have taken too many lines, but at least the problems should be listed along with the glossy good news.

Likewise since the same reporter wrote the story, he could have slipped in a line from his soccer team article AND  mentioned the fact that Somali teens were banned from the local library.   This is why so many people are getting their news elsewhere—-stories like this one are just too good to be true and readers know they are being spun!

American Somali terror recruiter may have been arrested in the Netherlands

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Although the FBI isn’t confirming it, a key person wanted in the Somali missing youth case that we have been following for a year is under arrest in the Netherlands reports the Minneapolis Star Tribune.  He was believed to be the recruiter and financier of the “youths” (former refugees*) who went to Africa to join the Jihad.   The still unnamed suspect was caught at an asylum center—what a surprise!  Hat tip: an ever-watchful friend from Tennessee

A 43-year-old Somali man from Minneapolis was arrested this week in the Netherlands for allegedly financing the recruitment of up to 20 young Somali men from Minnesota to train and fight with terrorists in their homeland.

The arrest appears to be the most significant development yet in one of the most far-reaching counterterrorism investigations since 9/11.

The identity of the man, who was arrested Sunday at an asylum-seeker’s center 45 miles northeast of Amsterdam, was not released. But Special Agent E.K. Wilson of the Minneapolis FBI office confirmed Tuesday that the man was arrested in connection with the ongoing counterterrorism investigation that began here when young men began disappearing in 2007.

“We are aware of this individual and of this arrest. And it is tied to our ongoing Minneapolis investigation,” Wilson said. “We are and have been working closely with Dutch authorities through our legal attaché office in Brussels and coordinating with the Department of Justice Office of International Affairs.”

Dutch prosecutors said in a statement that the man lived in Minneapolis before leaving the United States in November 2008 and arrived in the Netherlands about one month later.

The statement said American authorities asked for the man’s arrest and are seeking to have him extradited. Wilson said he could not confirm or deny that.

According to the Dutch statement, U.S. prosecutors suspect the man of bankrolling the purchase of weapons for Islamic extremists and helping other Somalis travel to Somalia in 2007 and 2008.

[…..] 

At the heart of the federal investigation has been the question of who recruited the men and financed their return to their homeland to fight.

Wilson would not comment on the significance of Sunday’s arrest. But it is apparently the first to involve someone in an alleged leadership role.

Read the whole Star Tribune story, it’s a good summary of where the case stands now.

* The US State Department has admitted over 80,000 Somali refugees to the US in the last 25 years and then last year had to suspend family reunification because widespread immigration fraud was revealed through DNA testing.  That specific program has not yet been reopened, but thousands of Somalis continue to be resettled as I write this.