I hear every day from small business owners throughout North Carolina that they have fallen victim to forces pretty much outside of their control.

The use of violence, rape, murders, and other atrocities that these groups commit against citizens in these areas is something that we all look at in a very negative way.

There is also a situation where if there is a violation of an immigration status that there's fear that people who are deported back to the Congo will be murdered when they arrive.

I want to congratulate Admiral Stavridis on the rescue of Keith Stansell, Thomas Howes, and Mark Gonsalves.

If there is such a stealing of the oil, though, there has to be a distribution network set up to deal with it.

Obviously, I think if you can give the farmers something else to grow and actually bring in a little bit of money it would help them in the short term and long term.

I think part of looking at the internal stability is ensuring the population has an advancing economic capacity and an advancing political representation in the state.

From what I understand, President Karzai's term ends May 21 and the constitution calls for an election 30 to 60 days before May 21.

I do think that sustained robust assistance for Pakistan's going to be very important for us to help maintain stability in that country.

In Afghanistan, I think most of us know that it's probably the largest world producer of opium.

We need a mechanism with Federal leadership to do that.