Nice little fruit stand you've got here...Hate to see anything happen to it...

From the LA Times:

Among the allegations now under investigation is that at least six soldiers from the [California National Guard 1st Battalion of the 184th Infantry Regiment] took part in a scheme to extort money from Iraqi shopkeepers, apparently in exchange for protection from insurgents.

The payments allegedly exceeded $30,000, two sources said, and were made in U.S. currency, according to one member of the battalion who has been briefed on the investigation. Another soldier said the scheme allegedly was carried out during night patrols in the Baghdad area.

Admittedly, small potatoes compared to their commander-in-chief's extorting the American public into paying billions of dollars to Halliburton, Bechtel and others to "protect" us from Saddam Hussein giving weapons he didn't have to terrorists he didn't know, which of course would have resulted in mushroom clouds over Poughkeepsie and Peoria. Still, one more answer to the question "Why do they hate us?"