Chevron raises dividend to $1 from 90 cents

SAN RAMON, Calif. (AP) -- Chevron Corp. on Wednesday raised its quarterly dividend to $1 from 90 cents per share.

The dividend is payable June 10 to shareholders of record on May 17.

Chevron shares rose 80 cents to close at $118.28.

The second largest U.S. oil and gas company is scheduled to report first-quarter results Friday.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/chevron-raises-dividend-1-90-212944835.html

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Brain biology tied to social reorientation during entry to adolescence

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

A specific region of the brain is in play when children consider their identity and social status as they transition into adolescence -- that often-turbulent time of reaching puberty and entering middle school, says a University of Oregon psychologist.

In a study of 27 neurologically typical children who underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at ages 10 and 13, activity in the brain's ventromedial prefrontal cortex increased dramatically when the subjects responded to questions about how they view themselves.

The findings, published in the April 24 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, confirm previous findings that specific brain networks support self-evaluations in the growing brain, but, more importantly, provide evidence that basic biology may well drive some of these changes, says Jennifer H. Pfeifer, professor of psychology and director of the psychology department's Developmental Social Neuroscience Lab.

"This is a longitudinal fMRI study, which is still relatively uncommon," Pfeifer said. "It suggests a link between neural responses during self-evaluative processing in the social domain, and pubertal development. This provides a rare piece of empirical evidence in humans, rather than animal models, that supports the common theory that adolescents are biologically driven to go through a social reorientation."

Participants were scanned for about seven minutes at each visit. They responded to a series of attributes tied to social or academic domains -- social ones such as "I am popular" or "I wish I had more friends" and academic ones such as "I like to read just for fun" or "Writing is so boring." Social and academic evaluations were made about both the self and a familiar fictional character, Harry Potter.

In previous research, Pfeifer had found that a more dorsal region of the medial prefrontal cortex was more responsive in 10-year-old children during self-evaluations, when they were compared to adults. The new study, she said, provides a more detailed picture of how the brain supports self-development by looking at change within individuals.

The fMRI analyses found it was primarily the social self-evaluations that triggered significant increases over time in blood-oxygen levels, which fMRI detects, in the ventral medial prefrontal cortex. Additionally, these increases were strongest in children who experienced the most pubertal development over the three-year study period, for both girls and boys. Increases during academic self-evaluations were at best marginal. Whole-brain analyses found no other areas of the brain had significant increases or decreases in activity related to pubertal development.

"Neural changes in the social domain were more robust," Pfeifer said. "Increased responses in this one region of the brain from age 10 to 13 were very evident in social self-evaluations, but not academic ones. This pattern is consistent with the enormous importance that most children entering adolescence place on their peer relationships and social status, compared to the relatively diminished value often associated with academics during this transition."

In youth with autism spectrum disorders, this specialized response in ventral medial prefrontal cortex is missing, she added, citing a paper she co-authored in the February 2013 issue of the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders and a complementary study led by Michael V. Lombardo, University of Cambridge, in the February 2010 issue of the journal Brain. The absence of this typical effect, Pfeifer said, might be related to the challenges these individuals often face in both self-understanding and social relations.

"Dr. Pfeifer's research examining self-evaluations during adolescence adds significantly to the intricate puzzle of this turbulent age period," said Kimberly Andrews Espy, vice president for research and innovation and dean of the graduate school. "Researchers at the University of Oregon are piecing together how both biology and the environment dynamically and interactively support healthy social development."

###

University of Oregon: http://uonews.uoregon.edu

Thanks to University of Oregon for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127882/Brain_biology_tied_to_social_reorientation_during_entry_to_adolescence

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Superintendent Voss: Evolution or Revolution?

Yesterday after school we had the staff roll out of the new Mac books for our high school staff. With this activity, we moved one step closer to the student roll out of the 1-1 project for students in grades 9-12 in January. As the faculty was opening up their computers and going through the steps of setting up their computers with network access, email, and other personal preferences I was impressed with how 'high tech' we had become. Mr. Lewis and Mr. Murray have provided key leadership in the process and demonstrated with ease some of the features of the new technology, including the servers that have been purchased to manage the devices (with the click of a mouse), the monitoring capabilities, and the abilities they had to install software remotely. All the while, Mr. Dieken was lobbying me for the next piece of software or hardware that would improve the ability of the teachers to flip instruction and ultimately have positive effects on the students' learning experience. I was impressed.

This really got me to thinking about how far we have come in education. I thought about how much has changed in just these last three years, and then I got to thinking about how much has changed since my career began. Then that morphed into what I can remember from my own school experience. Where we are now compared to where we were when I was a student is pretty mind boggling!

So, I had to begin by relying on memories that were some 30 plus years ago. It is a little fuzzy but I think the year was around 1981, which would have put me in about 4th grade. Our school had just made an investment in our very first computer. It was an early Apple model and was located in the school library. I really can't remember what it was used for, but do remember that as students we were able to use it on a limited basis. For what I can't even remember. Around the same time, the public library also got a computer. We could reserve time on the computer in half hour increments, and I can remember playing very rudimentary and archaic versions of 'video games'. Most of them consisted of responding to a line of text with a another line of text. Graphics didn't really exist yet, and if they did they were rudimentary. Our current students would find those early computers quite humorous, and in fact probably wouldn't even consider them computers at all. Basically, the computers we had access to in 1981 were more novelty than anything.

By the time I got to high school in 1986, you would think that computers had proliferated the environment. That was certainly not the case. In fact, I learned how to keyboard in high school on an electric typewriter. It kind of looked like this (same color and everything):

Yeah, that was quite the experience. A whole room of students learning to load the paper into the machine and type like crazy; click, click, click, click, DING! click, click, click, click, click DING!

If I remember correctly, our high school got it's first computer lab sometime before I graduated. Since this was well before the time where schools employed technology coordinators or computer teachers, much of what was occurring was experimental, 'flying by the seat of our pants' type of instruction. There may have been some rudimentary computer programming classes, but they weren't something that interested me all that much so can't really remember a lot about it.?

The early 1990s the world really began to change for me when I went to college. At my college, typewriters were finally replaced with computer labs. This is still before the time of Internet so we didn't know that we were on the precipice of a huge change. I remember how excited I was to be able to type and not have to worry about changing paper and the margins getting messed up. Oh, and no more changing the ribbons in the typewriters! Huge advances in technology for the college student of my day. Never mind that the printing quality was horrible and it took a very long time to print out a paper, but hey we were really moving forward! Around my junior year a buddy was able to buy a computer so my days of using the computer lab were in the rear view mirror. I remember staying up late during finals week to type up a final paper, save it to a floppy disc and then run it over to the computer lab for printing. By the time I graduated from college in 1995, computers were becoming more and more mainstream. The Internet was still pretty new, and email was used primarily people with a higher pay grade than me.?

I entered the world of work in 1995 and was one of the lucky ones to have a teaching job lined up by the time I graduated. In that first job, we had a computer on a cart that was shared with all the teachers in my hallway. There were a total of 6 of us in that wing with one computer. To me it wasn't that big of a deal because I didn't have a lot of use for a computer at that point. The school had a computer lab that had recently been installed but the school wasn't wired for the Internet. I do remember that the school board was having discussions about that, but it wouldn't come before I left for greener pastures.

That was in 1998. In my new position I had my very own computer, and every teacher in the school had their very own email account! This is when communication between parents and teachers really started to take off. I can remember getting a few emails a day and thinking this was a pretty efficient way of communicating with people. The Internet was starting to hit its stride too, I can remember some of the very early iterations of websites--which was well before the time of web video, flash, and E-Commerce was pretty new.

My first assignment in school administration was in 2004, and I was assigned my first laptop computer. Wireless technology was just becoming popular (and more predictable), so that was a huge step forward. We didn't have a wireless network in the school, so I was tethered to a network cable for a couple of years before getting a small wireless router set up in the outer office. I can remember how convenient it was to be able to work in my office and then pack up to go home and be able to continue my work seamlessly. The board also thought it was important to have a cellphone, so I had one of those too. Again, I thought that was pretty cool, but it was before Smart phones became popular. I could text, but it was very cumbersome. At the time it sure didn't seem to be that cumbersome. Toward the end of my tenure wireless technology really started to stabilize so one of my final projects before leaving was to have the wireless network installed.?

You pretty much know the story from that point forward. Printing is becoming less frequent. In a couple of minutes I will click 'publish' and this will go out to you on the Internet. Some of you will get this as an email, others may see it on my blog, and others will get it from our school website. There is even a population that will read it in the newspaper. In 1990, that probably would have been quite a feet to circulate this publication through so many venues. Now, in 2013 once I publish it goes out simultaneously to all the aforementioned media, and is available worldwide.

I still have a computer on my desk and a laptop to lug back and forth between office and home, but I wonder how much longer that will be the case. These days I am able to answer email and respond to questions with my Smart phone. I can search the Internet, call up a document from my computer, or respond to a Tweet from a student all from the same device.

The 1-1 project launch for students is just a few months away. I have likened the decision to implement this initiative into our district as the most important decision we will make for this generation of students. Others have compared to being as revolutionary to schools as the chalkboard once was. As quickly as things are moving these days, I wonder if in ten years we will look back on this time with a slight smile and shake of the head and think, "I can't believe how far we have come since the 1-1 project was such a big deal."

Source: http://superintendentvoss.blogspot.com/2013/04/evolution-or-revolution.html

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Immigration Act: Dream Or Nightmare? (Powerlineblog)

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Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/301389239?client_source=feed&format=rss

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A look at immigrant patients deported by hospitals

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) ? Over the last five years, American hospitals have sent at least 600 immigrants who were in the U.S. illegally back to their home countries to avoid paying for long-term care after serious illness or injury.

The Center for Social Justice at Seton Hall University has documented "medical repatriation" cases in 15 states involving patients from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Lithuania, Mexico, the Philippines and South Korea.

Here's a look at some of the most dramatic examples from a report issued in December:

___

Quelino Ojeda Jimenez was working atop a building at Chicago's Midway Airport in 2010 when he fell, suffering injuries that left him nearly quadriplegic and reliant on a ventilator.

Advocate Christ Medical Center cared for Jimenez for four months, absorbing more than $650,000 in costs, according to a 2011 Chicago Tribune story.

Three days before Christmas that year, the hospital put him aboard a medical flight and sent him to Mexico, even though his family protested. Crying and unable to speak, Jimenez could do nothing to prevent his removal.

The receiving hospital in Mexico lacked rehabilitation services and could not afford new filters for his ventilator. After suffering two heart attacks and a septic infection, Jimenez died on Jan. 2, 2012.

___

Luis Alberto Jimenez was working as a landscaper in Florida when the car he was in was struck by a drunk driver in February 2000.

Jimenez, then 35, suffered brain damage and other injuries and was treated at Martin Memorial Medical Center in Stuart, Fla., until June, when he was transferred to a nursing home.

The following January, he was readmitted to the hospital with an infection that doctors feared could be fatal. He stayed at the hospital for a year because no other long-term care provider would take him.

The hospital eventually filed a lawsuit in state court seeking permission to transport him to a hospital in his native Guatemala. A judge approved the flight in June 2003, and Jimenez was flown to Guatemala before the court could rule on an appeal filed by his legal guardian.

In mid-2004, the Florida District Court of Appeals overturned the lower court's order, declaring that state courts do not have the authority to permit deportations, which are regulated by federal immigration law. But by then Jimenez had been returned home, bedridden and suffering from seizures, to live with his elderly mother in a remote area of Guatemala.

___

Barbara Latasiewicz was working as a housekeeper in the Chicago area in 2009 when she had a stroke while scrubbing a bathtub. The Polish woman was paralyzed on her left side and needed around-the-clock care.

Adventist La Grange Memorial Hospital tried to find her long-term care, but 30 facilities refused to take her because she was undocumented. Latasiewicz had overstayed a temporary visa after arriving in the U.S. in 1990.

The hospital allowed her to stay without insurance or any other way to pay for 2? years at a cost of more than $1.4 million.

In early 2012, arrangements were made to transfer her to a stroke-specialty unit in Poland. She refused to consent to the transfer, which would permanently separate her from her son and grandchildren. The hospital obtained a judge's order allowing her transfer to Poland.

A March 1 story in the Chicago Tribune says the 60-year-old woman cried while sitting in the airport awaiting a flight out, knowing she would probably never return to the U.S., which had been her home for more than 20 years.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/bbd825583c8542898e6fa7d440b9febc/Article_2013-04-23-US-Hospital-Deportations-Immigrant-Stories/id-e1f4bebc9ddc432f9dbc7b4032c73ddc

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Bomb suspect influenced by mysterious radical

WASHINGTON (AP) ? In the years before the Boston Marathon bombings, Tamerlan Tsarnaev fell under the influence of a new friend, a Muslim convert who steered the religiously apathetic young man toward a strict strain of Islam, family members said.

Under the tutelage of a friend known to the Tsarnaev family only as Misha, Tamerlan gave up boxing and stopped studying music, his family said. He began opposing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He turned to websites and literature claiming that the CIA was behind the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and Jews controlled the world.

"Somehow, he just took his brain," said Tamerlan's uncle, Ruslan Tsarni, who recalled conversations with Tamerlan's worried father about Misha's influence. Efforts over several days by The Associated Press to identify and interview Misha have been unsuccessful.

Tamerlan's relationship with Misha could be a clue in understanding the motives behind his religious transformation and, ultimately, the attack itself. Two U.S. officials say he had no tie to terrorist groups.

Throughout his religious makeover, Tamerlan maintained a strong influence over his siblings, including Dzhokhar, who investigators say carried out the deadly attack by his older brother's side, killing three and injuring 264 people.

"They all loved Tamerlan. He was the eldest one and he, in many ways, was the role model for his sisters and his brother," said Elmirza Khozhugov, 26, the ex-husband of Tamerlan's sister, Ailina. "You could always hear his younger brother and sisters say, 'Tamerlan said this,' and 'Tamerlan said that.' Dzhokhar loved him. He would do whatever Tamerlan would say.

"Even my ex-wife loved him so much and respected him so much," Khozhugov said. "I'd have arguments with her and if Tamerlan took my side, she would agree: 'OK, if Tamerlan said it.'"

Khozhugov said he was close to Tamerlan when he was married and they kept in touch for a while but drifted apart in the past two years or so. He spoke to the AP from his home in Almaty, Kazakhstan. A family member in the United States provided the contact information.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed in a police shootout Friday. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was charged Monday with using a weapon of mass destruction to kill, and he could face the death penalty if convicted.

"Of course I was shocked and surprised that he was Suspect No. 1," Khozhugov said, recalling the days after the bombing when the FBI identified Tamerlan as the primary suspect. "But after a few hours of thinking about it, I thought it could be possible that he did it."

Based on preliminary written interviews with Dzhokar in his hospital bed, U.S. officials believe the brothers were motivated by their religious views. It has not been clear, however, what those views were.

As authorities try to piece together that information, they are touching on a question asked after so many terrorist plots: What turns someone into a terrorist?

The brothers emigrated in 2002 or 2003 from Dagestan, a Russian republic that has become an epicenter of the Islamic insurgency that spilled over from the region of Chechnya.

They were raised in a home that followed Sunni Islam, the religion's largest sect. They were not regulars at the mosque and rarely discussed religion, Khozhugov said.

Then, in 2008 or 2009, Tamerlan met Misha, a slightly older, heavyset bald man with a long reddish beard. Khozhugov didn't know where they'd met but believed they attended a Boston-area mosque together. Misha was an Armenian native and a convert to Islam and quickly began influencing his new friend, family members said.

Once, Khozhugov said, Misha came to the family home outside Boston and sat in the kitchen, chatting with Tamerlan for hours.

"Misha was telling him what is Islam, what is good in Islam, what is bad in Islam," said Khozhugov, who said he was present for the conversation. "This is the best religion and that's it. Mohammed said this and Mohammed said that."

The conversation continued until Tamerlan's father, Anzor, came home from work.

"It was late, like midnight," Khozhugov said. "His father comes in and says, 'Why is Misha here so late and still in our house?' He asked it politely. Tamerlan was so much into the conversation he didn't listen."

Khozhugov said Tamerlan's mother, Zubeidat, told him not to worry.

"'Don't interrupt them,'" Khozhugov recalled the mother saying. "'They're talking about religion and good things. Misha is teaching him to be good and nice.'"

As time went on, Tamerlan and his father argued about the young man's new beliefs.

"When Misha would start talking, Tamerlan would stop talking and listen. It upset his father because Tamerlan wouldn't listen to him as much," Khozhugov said. "He would listen to this guy from the mosque who was preaching to him."

Anzor became so concerned that he called his brother, worried about Misha's effects.

"I heard about nobody else but this convert," Tsarni said. "The seed for changing his views was planted right there in Cambridge."

It was not immediately clear whether the FBI has spoken to Misha or was attempting to.

Tsarnaev became an ardent reader of jihadist websites and extremist propaganda, two U.S. officials said. He read Inspire magazine, an English-language online publication produced by al-Qaida's Yemen affiliate.

Tamerlan loved music and, a few years ago, he sent Khozhugov a song he'd composed in English and Russian. He said he was about to start music school.

Six weeks later, the two men spoke on the phone. Khozhugov asked how school was going.

"I quit," Tamerlan said.

"Why did you quit?" Khozhugov asked. "You just started."

"Music is not really supported in Islam," he replied.

"Who told you that?"

"Misha said it's not really good to create music. It's not really good to listen to music," Tamerlan said, according to Khozhugov.

Tamerlan took an interest in Infowars, a conspiracy theory website. Khozhugov said Tamerlan was interested in finding a copy of the book "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," the classic anti-Semitic hoax, first published in Russia in 1903, that claims a Jewish plot to take over the world.

"He never said he hated America or he hated the Jews," Khozhugov said. "But he was fairly aggressive toward the policies of the U.S. toward countries with Muslim populations. He disliked the wars."

One of the brothers' neighbors, Albrecht Ammon, recently recalled an encounter in which Tamerlan argued about U.S. foreign policy, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and religion.

Ammon said Tamerlan described the Bible as a "cheap copy" of the Quran, used to justify wars with other countries.

"He had nothing against the American people," Ammon said. "He had something against the American government."

Khozhugov said Tamerlan did not know much about Islam beyond what he found online or what he heard from Misha.

"Misha was important," he said. "Tamerlan was searching for something. He was searching for something out there."

___

Associated Press writers Lara Jakes and Eileen Sullivan contributed to this report.

___

AP's Washington investigative team can be reached at DCinvestigations(at)ap.org

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/bomb-suspect-influenced-mysterious-radical-202945456--politics.html

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From outsiders to bombing suspects in Boston

FILE - This combination of undated file photos shows Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, left, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19. The FBI says the two brothers are the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing, and are also responsible for killing an MIT police officer, critically injuring a transit officer in a firefight and throwing explosive devices at police during a getaway attempt in a long night of violence that left Tamerlan dead and Dzhokhar captured, late Friday, April 19, 2013. The ethnic Chechen brothers lived in Dagestan, which borders the Chechnya region in southern Russia. They lived near Boston and had been in the U.S. for about a decade, one of their uncles reported said. Since Monday, Boston has experienced five days of fear, beginning with the marathon bombing attack, an intense manhunt and much uncertainty ending in the death of one suspect and the capture of the other. (AP Photo/The Lowell Sun & Robin Young, File)

FILE - This combination of undated file photos shows Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, left, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19. The FBI says the two brothers are the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing, and are also responsible for killing an MIT police officer, critically injuring a transit officer in a firefight and throwing explosive devices at police during a getaway attempt in a long night of violence that left Tamerlan dead and Dzhokhar captured, late Friday, April 19, 2013. The ethnic Chechen brothers lived in Dagestan, which borders the Chechnya region in southern Russia. They lived near Boston and had been in the U.S. for about a decade, one of their uncles reported said. Since Monday, Boston has experienced five days of fear, beginning with the marathon bombing attack, an intense manhunt and much uncertainty ending in the death of one suspect and the capture of the other. (AP Photo/The Lowell Sun & Robin Young, File)

Police keep watch near the scene where Boston Marathon bomb suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was captured last Friday, hiding in a backyard boat. Tsarnaev, 19, was charged on Monday with carrying out the bombing with his older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, who died last week in a gunbattle. Tsarnaev could get the death penalty. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev sought to embrace American lives after emigrating from Russia ? joining a boxing club, winning a scholarship and even seeking U.S. citizenship. But their uncle last week angrily called them "losers" who failed to feel settled even after a decade of living in the United States.

The disparity between the brothers' struggle to assimilate in the U.S. and their alleged bombing of the Boston Marathon reflects what counterterror experts describe as a classic pattern of young first- or second-generation immigrants striking out after struggling to fit in. The U.S. has long been worried about people in America who are not tied to any designated terrorist group but who are motivated by ideologies that lead them to commit violent acts. Some are motivated by radical religious interpretations; others feel ostracized by their communities.

Three U.S. officials involved in the investigation said the brothers had no links to any terrorist groups. After interrogating Dzhokhar Tsarnaev on Monday, U.S. officials have concluded, based on a preliminary interrogation and other evidence, that they were motivated by their faith_apparently an anti-American, radical version of Islam. Another official called them aspiring jihadists. All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed in a police shootout Friday. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was charged Monday with using a weapon of mass destruction to kill, and he could face the death penalty if convicted.

Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican briefed on the investigation, described the two brothers as "a couple of individuals who become radicalized using Internet sources," but said it was too early to say they had no contact with foreign groups.

The FBI briefed the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday. The session was closed, but members spoke to reporters after it was over.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev was an ardent reader of jihadist websites and extremist propaganda, two of the officials said. He frequently looked at extremist sites, including Inspire magazine, an English-language online publication produced by al-Qaida's Yemen affiliate. The magazine has endorsed lone-wolf terror attacks.

The psychological aspects of radicalization have been studied for years, and while there are some similarities among terrorism cases, there is not a single profile of a violent extremist in the U.S.

Complicating the challenge is that the threat often is rooted in an ideology protected by the Constitution.

Violent extremists can feel caught between two worlds ? the one their families left behind to seek better opportunities, and the other in which they feel trapped.

On the Russian social networking site Vkontakte, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev described his world view as "Islam" but his personal goals as "career and money" ? a far more capitalistic goal than Muslim teachings that wealth ultimately belongs to God.

"There's a sort of weird identity crisis," said Kamran Bokhari, a Toronto-based expert on jihadism and radicalization for the global intelligence company Stratfor. "In many ways, these people are radicalized of extreme religious persuasions in the West that's not even reflective of what's back home. So they're sort of frozen in time, where they're rejecting the reality in front of them."

The brothers emigrated in 2002 or 2003 from Dagestan, a Russian republic that has become an epicenter of the Islamic insurgency that spilled over from the region of Chechnya.

It's still not clear what investigators believe motivated Tamerlan and Dzhokhar to attack.

The brothers' uncle, Ruslan Tsarni, vehemently dismissed any suggestion that the bombings, which killed three and wounded at least 180, were motivated by religious views. He called the men "losers" who felt "hatred to those who were able to settle themselves."

"Anything else to do with religion, with Islam ? it's a fraud, it's a fake," Tsarni told reporters. He said someone possibly "radicalized them, but not my brother who just moved back to Russia, who spent his life bringing bread to the table."

Tsarni also told reporters he hadn't spoken to his nephews in months.

One of the brothers' neighbors, Albrecht Ammon, recalled an encounter in which the older brother argued with him about U.S. foreign policy, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and religion.

Ammon said Tamerlan described the Bible as a "cheap copy" of the Quran, used to justify wars with other countries.

"He had nothing against the American people," Ammon told The Associated Press. "He had something against the American government."

Dzhokhar, on the other hand, was "real cool," Ammon said. "A chill guy."

The cases of homegrown and first-generation terror suspects in the U.S. are few, but the U.S. intelligence community has long been concerned about such potential attackers, particularly the threat posed by people like the Tsarnaev brothers who have no formal terror ties.

"And what makes them especially worrisome is that they're really difficult for us to detect and, therefore, to disrupt," Matt Olsen, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said in June 2011 about homegrown violent extremists.

The U.S. intelligence director's office has declined to provide official government data on homegrown terrorists, or comment on the Tsarnaev brothers and the investigation into the bombings.

But an August 2011 White House policy paper on countering and preventing violent extremism in the U.S. said that while the numbers remain limited, "violent extremists prey on the disenchantment and alienation that discrimination creates, and they have a vested interest in anti-Muslim sentiment."

Kenneth Wainstein, who served as the White House homeland security adviser and a top Justice Department lawyer under President George W. Bush, said homegrown and newly immigrated militants develop their extreme views over time and are often borne out of sense of isolation. It's a problem that has not been as prevalent in the United States as in Europe, which has a larger number of ethnic and nationalist divisions.

"But I think we have seen, over the last few years, some pretty clear and sobering examples of people inspired by overseas terror groups and terror propaganda," Wainstein said Friday, before Dzhokhar was captured. "They fit more in the category of where you have people who are radicalized here without any apparent connection overseas. A kid can go into his room get radicalized on the Internet without direct connect with anyone overseas, or even without going down the street to the radical preacher. That makes it very hard to detect that person, and poses a significant problem for the intelligence community and law enforcement."

Investigators also are looking at the six months Tamerlan Tsarnaev spent last year in his ancestral homeland in the predominantly Muslim provinces of Dagestan and Chechnya to see whether he was radicalized by the militants in the area who have waged a low-level insurgency against Russian security forces for years.

While there, he regularly attended a mosque and spent time learning to read the Quran, but "did not fit into the Muslim life," said his aunt, Patimat Suleimanova.

She said he seemed more American than Chechen.

___

Associated Press writers Pete Yost and Kimberly Dozier in Washington and Arsen Mollayev, in Makhachkala, Russia, contributed to this report.

___

Follow Lara Jakes on Twitter at https://twitter.com/larajakesAP and Eileen Sullivan at https://twitter.com/esullivanap

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-04-23-US-Boston-Marathon-Homegrown-Threats/id-cbd104b84b0f4504a9c1116aab4c9132

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