"The first people I would have to kill are my two housemates, to secure the entire apartment for myself as my personal torture and killing chamber," Rodger wrote in a 141-page manifesto that detailed his plans.
Rodger also wrote that he would lure people into the apartment and kill them before an "ultimate showdown in the streets of Isla Vista."
He planned to "killed all of the sorority girls at the Alpha Phi House" and then drive through the streets of the bustling beach town spraying people with bullets and running over others with his car, the manifesto said.
Veronica Elizabeth Weiss, 19, and Katherine Breann Cooper, 22, were both shot and killed outside the Alpha Phi sorority house near the UCSB campus, officials said Saturday night.
Christopher Ross Michael-Martinez, 20, was killed outside the IV Deli Market. "His death has left our family lost and broken," his father, Richard Martinez said Saturday.
Thirteen others were injured. One was in serious condition at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital.
Alexander Mattera, 23, said that before the rampage ended, his friend Chris Johnson was shot in front of a pizza place as he was leaving an improv comedy show.
"He walked into these random guys' house bleeding," Mattera said.
Mattera was nearly struck by Rodger as well. He was sitting at a bonfire with friends when at least one bullet flew past his head. The friends ran for cover when they heard the gunfire. "We heard so many gunshots," Mattera said. "I thought they were firecrackers."
May 25, 2014: Ryan Hunter-Reay celebrates winning the 98th running of the Indianapolis 500 IndyCar auto race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Indianapolis.AP
May 25, 2014: Ryan Hunter-Reay celebrates after crossing the finish line take the checkered flag in front of Helio Castroneves, of Brazil, to win the 98th running of the Indianapolis 500 IndyCar auto race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Indianapolis.AP
INDIANAPOLIS – The finish was worth the wait for Ryan Hunter-Reay, who used a series of daredevil moves to deny Helio Castroneves a chance at history.
Hunter-Reay became the first American since 2006 to win the Indianapolis 500, passing Castroneves at the Yard of Bricks as the two bright yellow cars raced wheel-to-wheel under the white flag in a thrilling final lap. As Hunter-Reay surged ahead down the backstretch, Castroneves took one final look coming out of Turn 4 but couldn't pull off the pass.
Hunter-Reay won by 0.060 seconds -- the second closest finish in race history since Al Unser Jr. beat Scott Goodyear by 0.043 seconds in 1992.
"I'm a proud American boy, that's for sure," Hunter-Reay said in Victory Lane. "I've watched this race since I was sitting in diapers on the floor in front of the TV. This is American history, this race, this is American tradition."
Castroneves, trying to become the fourth driver to win a record fourth Indianapolis 500, settled for second. He was devastated by the defeat and needed several moments to compose himself, slumped in his car, head down and helmet on, before he was ready to speak. The Brazilian said a caution with 10 laps to go that caused a red flag so track workers could clean up debris and make repairs to the track wall broke his rhythm.
"It was a great fight," he smiled. "I tell you what, I was having a great time. Unfortunately second. It's good, but second sucks, you know what I mean?"
Marco Andretti finished third and Carlos Munoz was fourth as Andretti Autosport had three cars in the top four, as well as the winner.
Kurt Busch, also in a Honda for Andretti, was sixth in his first race of the day. He left immediately after the race to fly to North Carolina for Sunday night's NASCAR Sprint Cup race, where he was expected to run 600 miles in his bid to become just the second driver to complete 1,100 miles in one day.
Three other drivers made the attempt, but only Tony Stewart in 2001 completed The Double. Stewart was sixth at Indy and third at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
"All in all, I'm very pleased. I cannot believe the execution of this team," Busch said before hustling away to a helicopter ride to his waiting plane. "I tried to enjoy it. My throat's real dry because I was smiling the whole time and the fresh air was coming in my mouth."
Marco Andretti appeared to have a shot at the win, but never could mix it up with Hunter-Reay and Castroneves as the two leaders swapped position four times in the final five laps.
"Ryan's just been a huge part of our team, a great guy, a friend," said Michael Andretti, who won for the third time as a team owner and watched his son finish third. "To have him get a win here is awesome, he deserves it, he deserves to have his face on that trophy. If it couldn't be Marco, he's the next guy I wanted."
A year ago, Hunter-Reay was passed for the lead with three laps remaining and went on to finish third as the race finished under caution. He was leading Sunday and had control of the race until Townsend Bell's crash brought out the red flag. Hunter-Reay figured his chances were over.
"I can't get a break," he lamented on his team radio.
But after swapping the lead with Castroneves three times, including a dramatic inside move in Turn 3, Hunter-Reay made the final and decisive pass as the two cars took the white flag.
"At the end of the day there's stupid and bravery, and I think we were right there on the edge, both of us," said Castroneves. "I'm glad we both come out in a good way. I'm sad it did not come out the way I wanted."
WASHINGTON — During a surprise trip to Afghanistan on Sunday, President Obama thanked US troops for their service during a decade of war, saying that their sacrifices had ensured the country would never again be used as a base for terrorist attacks against the United States.
"I thank you as your commander in chief because you inspire me," Obama told about 3,000 troops in a hangar at Bagram Air Field after landing in the country early Sunday morning. "I'm here to say thank you. And I'm here to say how proud I am of you."
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The trip was unannounced, and Obama slipped out of the White House secretly Saturday evening ahead of Memorial Day. Country music singer Brad Paisley traveled on Air Force One with Obama to Afghanistan and performed for about an hour before the president spoke.
Obama chose not to meet with Hamid Karzai, the departing president of Afghanistan, and did not travel to Kabul, the country's capital. But he vowed that he would work with whomever wins the presidential runoff election scheduled for June 14: Abdullah Abdullah or Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai.
White House officials said the trip was intended as a visit with troops, not as an opportunity for the two presidents to meet. They said US officials offered Karzai the opportunity to meet Obama at the Bagram Air Field, but they said they were not surprised that it did not happen.
In his remarks to the troops, Obama made clear that he still intends to keep a small military force in Afghanistan beyond 2014 despite longstanding resistance to an enduring US presence from Karzai.
Obama's comments indicated that he may have ruled out the idea of a complete withdrawal of all US forces when the NATO-led combat mission ends this year.
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"Once Afghanistan has sworn in its new president, I'm hopeful we will sign a bilateral security agreement that lets us move forward," Obama said. "And with that bilateral security agreement, assuming it is signed, we can plan for a limited military presence in Afghanistan beyond 2014."
Obama vowed that "we are going to make sure that Afghanistan can never again — ever — be used to launch a terrorist attack against our country."
''America's commitment to the people of Afghanistan will endure,'' the president said.
Obama got his biggest applause from the troops when he praised them for making sure that "America's war in Afghanistan will come to a responsible end." The crowd also roared with approval when the president said he frequently tells corporate leaders, "If you want somebody who can get the job done, hire a vet."
Obama did not make any major policy announcements in his remarks to the troops. He is expected to wait until he returns to the United States to offer his latest foreign policy and national security vision, during a speech that he is scheduled to give at the US Military Academy graduation on Wednesday.
Obama has said all US combat troops will have left Afghanistan by the end of this year. US officials hope to leave a small contingent of forces beyond the 2014 withdrawal deadline for the international security force in Afghanistan, to allow for more training of Afghan forces and continuing counterterrorism operations.
The visit to Afghanistan comes as Obama prepares to draw the second of two wars to an official close, making good on a promise that he made as a candidate to pull the United States out of such conflicts.
Ukraine's Eurobonds rose for a 10th day as investors anticipated billionaire Petro Poroshenko's presidential election victory will help resolve the conflict with Russia. The hryvnia and stocks rallied.
The yield on the dollar note due 2017 fell two basis points to 10.27 percent, the lowest since April 4. The hryvnia advanced 0.4 percent to 11.9 per dollar by 11:05 a.m. in Kiev.
Poroshenko received 53.8 percent of yesterday's vote with 50.1 percent of ballots counted, according to the Election Commission, and is set to gain the simple majority needed to avoid a runoff. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who doesn't recognize the government in Kiev, has pledged to work with the winner. Poroshenko said he will visit eastern regions to end fighting with separatists that hampered voting yesterday.
"We see all of this as very positive, especially given President Putin stated on Friday that he is looking to recognize and work with the new leadership," Simon Quijano-Evans, a London-based analyst at Commerzbank AG, wrote in an e-mailed report today.
Kernel Holding SA, Ukraine's biggest company traded on the Warsaw bourse, jumped as much as 8 percent to 29 zloty, the most since April 22. The Ukrainian Equities Index (UX) rose 4.5 percent to 1,228.96, the highest in two years.
To contact the reporter on this story: Andras Gergely in Budapest at agergely@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Wojciech Moskwa at wmoskwa@bloomberg.net Chris Kirkham, Alex Nicholson
GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — Rescue teams are searching for three people reported missing after a large mudslide struck in western Colorado's Mesa County.
The slide hit Sunday in a remote area near the town of Collbran, about 40 miles east of Grand Junction.
Rescuers raced to the scene when it was reported around 6 p.m. MDT, but eased operations after nightfall, Mesa County Sheriff's spokeswoman Lisa McCammon said.
There's "not a lot of activity tonight," she said. The "slide area is very unstable." She said a daylight search was safer.
The department estimated the slide is about 4 miles long, 2 miles wide and about 250 feet deep in many places.
"This slide is unbelievably big," Mesa County Lt. Phil Stratton said.
The department said crews were searching for three residents of the Collbran area after they were reported missing in the slide area, situated near Salt Creek road and Vega Reservoir.
The site is in a rural part of the county and there were no reports of any structures damaged or major roads affected, McCammon said.
The sheriff's office said that the person who reported the slide at about 6:15 p.m. "described hearing a noise that sounded much like a freight train."
A unified incident command has been established between Plateau Valley Fire Department and the Mesa sheriff, to handle the slide and search for the people possibly caught in it.
Authorities say the heavy rains that fell over the weekend contributed to the slide.
The avalanche occurred about two months after a massive mudslide hit the Washington state community of Oso on March 22, killing 43 people.
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European stock markets pushed higher Monday, largely brushing off strong gains for antiausterity parties in the European Parliamentary elections over the weekend, with economists and strategists saying that investors had already priced in a solid showing for euroskeptics in the lead up to Sunday's vote.
In thin trade, due to a public holiday in the U.K., the Stoxx Europe 600 rose 0.3%, with France CAC-40 up 0.2% and Germany's DAX rising as much as 0.7%.
France's far-right National Frontappeared to score a historic victory as voters delivered a strong rebuke to mainstream parties that many blame for leaving the country's economy in the doldrums. Exit polls showed the National Front, led by firebrand politician Marine Le Pen, garnered an estimated 25% of the vote nationally, with the party achieving as much as 28% in some territories.
In Germany, meanwhile, investors seemingly welcomed provisional results showing a win for Chancellor Angela Merkel's center-right Christian Democrats and Christian Socialists. The euroskeptic AfD, running for the first time in European elections, was seen taking 7%.
Greece's radical-left Syriza party—which opposes the country's international bailout—was poised to win, as was the U.K. Independence Party and the right-wing populist Danish People's Party.
"It looks unclear whether the results of the European Parliament elections will have any meaningful and lasting impact on financial markets beyond the early part of this week," Crédit Agricole strategist Frederik Ducrozet said.
"All in all, the EU/euro-zone governance might be little affected while any repercussions might be felt more on a domestic level where populist parties reached the highest scores," he added.
The euro initially lost some ground on the back of the results, but later strengthened again to $1.3625 against the U.S. dollar in early European trade.
"The surge in popularity from fringe parties may not translate to any imminent shift in policy and, as such, may not much alter market thinking on coming ECB policy," said Citigroup currency strategist Todd Elmer. He added that many investors also looked to have been shorting the euro ahead of the vote.
Elsewhere, as largely expected, Petro Poroshenko declared victory in Ukraine's presidential electionSunday after exit polls showed the pro-Europe chocolate tycoon won more than half the vote. Separatists, however, largely blocked voting in parts of the east.
Later in the morning, markets will be watching a speech by Mario Draghi in Portugal, for further indication of the extent of possible action the ECB might take at its next meeting in June.
In commodities markets, gold was 0.1% higher at $1,293.00, and Brent crude oil traded down 0.6% at $109.97 a barrel.
FILE: May 17, 2014: The Department of Veterans Affairs in Phoenix, Ariz.AP
The Obama administration said Saturday it will allow more veterans to get health care outside Veterans Affairs facilities, following recent revelations about long waits for treatment and purported secret lists that hid backlogs.
The statement was issued by the Department of Veterans Affairs, which said the plan is to expand capacity at VA facilities to increase care, or when not possible increase care in the community through outside facilities.
Officials said VA Secretary Eric Shinseki put the plan into action following President Obama's national TV address Wednesday on the issue and that it was being implemented by Friday under the direction of the Veterans Health Administration.
"VA has redoubled efforts to provide quality care to veterans and has taken steps at national and local levels to ensure timely access to care," the department said Saturday in a statement.
Democratic and Republican lawmakers have pressed for the policy change as the VA confronts the allegations about employees falsifying appointment records to cover up delays in care and about veterans dying while awaiting treatment at VA centers.
A spokesman for Rep. Jeff Miller, chairman of the House Veterans' Affairs Committee, said the Florida Republican was pleased by Shinseki's announcement, but wondered why it took so long. Reports that as many as 40 veterans may have died while awaiting treatment at the Phoenix hospital surfaced more than a month ago.
Miller said in a statement Friday that Shinseki and President Obama were engaged "in an endless discussion regarding allegations, investigations and unreliable internal VA reviews" while "overlooking VA's very real, very deadly and very well-documented delays in care problem."
Miller has pledged to introduce legislation that would give any veteran who is unable to obtain a VA appointment within 30 days of application the option to receive non-VA care at the department's expense.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has called for the VA to allow more veterans to receive medical care at private hospitals. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said this past week that she was open to the idea of medical care at private hospitals. She said it was unacceptable to have a backlog of patients waiting for permission to go to a federally qualified clinic.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Confronting critics of his foreign policy, President Barack Obama will soon outline a strategy for his final years in office that aims to avoid overreach as the second of the two wars he inherited comes to a close.
The president will make the case for that seemingly more limited approach during a commencement address Wednesday at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. The speech will come amid growing frustration in the White House with Republicans and other critics who contend that Obama has weakened America's standing around the world and faltered on problems across the Middle East and in Russia, China and elsewhere.
That criticism has only mounted over the past year following Obama's decision to pull back a military strike in Syria and his inability to stop Russia from annexing territory from Ukraine. A White House official said Obama would specifically address both situations, as well as the status of ongoing nuclear negotiations with Iran.
The president is also expected to discuss how he views shifts in the counterterrorism threat from al-Qaida and other groups, according to the official, who insisted on anonymity to preview the president's speech.
Obama came into office vowing to end the lengthy American-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and seeking to keep a war-weary nation out of unnecessary conflicts. The war in Iraq ended in the closing days of 2011 and the Afghan conflict will formally conclude later this year, though the White House is seeking to keep a smaller contingent of U.S. troops behind to train Afghan forces and conduct counterterrorism missions.
While Obama has followed through on his pledge to end America's wars, some foreign policy analysts argue that he has over-corrected and his aversion to military action makes it harder for the U.S. to levy credible threats that force international foes to change their behavior.
"He's far too risk adverse a president," said Aaron David Miller, a Middle East adviser to Republican and Democratic administrations. "And in a world where no one will lead except America, he has abdicated and surrendered much of the leadership."
The White House official said Obama will argue that the U.S. remains the only nation capable of galvanizing action and will make the case that American power needs to be part of a sustainable international system. He will argue that his foreign policy philosophy is not isolationist, but rather "interventionist and internationalist," according to the official.
The president is expected to expand on remarks he made last month at a news conference in the Philippines, when the extent of his frustration with his critics boiled over. He specifically targeted those who are quick to call for U.S. military action, arguing that they had failed to learn the lessons of the Iraq war.
"Why is it that everybody is so eager to use military force after we've just gone through a decade of war at enormous costs to our troops and to our budget?" he said. "And what is it exactly that these critics think would have been accomplished?"
Yet Obama also cast his approach as one that "avoids errors" by being more limited in scope.
"You hit singles, you hit doubles," he said. "Every once in a while we may be able to hit a home run. "
Ahead of the president's speech, Obama's top advisers have been holding private meetings with congressional lawmakers to address their specific foreign policy concerns. However, the outreach appeared to accomplish little, according to some participants, with a Republican senator calling one meeting "bizarre" and another lawmaker saying the White House refused to provide specific answers to questions.
Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., was among those who participated in the White House meetings. In an interview, he questioned how much Obama's speech can accomplish in shifting the way the White House's foreign policy approach is viewed.
"One of the problems with the White House is that they view speeches as foreign policy," Corker said. "They don't really follow through with much in the way of substance. It's always minimal."
The White House official said Obama will build on his remarks during an early June trip to Europe, where he'll give a speech about the U.S. commitment to the continent while in Poland and meet with Group of Seven leaders in Brussels. Obama's top foreign policy advisers, including Secretary of State John Kerry, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and national security adviser Susan Rice, are also expected to follow the president's address with events of their own, according to the official.
Rodger, 22, a student at Santa Barbara City College, grew up amid affluence and privilege as the son of Peter Rodger, an assistant director of "The Hunger Games" and a highly regarded film photographer in Europe, and the stepson of Soumaya Akaaboune, an actress who appeared in "Green Zone" in 2010 with Matt Damon and stars in the French version of the "Real Housewives" television series.
But in the nine videos and in a 106,000-word autobiography/cri-de-coeur written under his name and mailed through the post office to a Santa Barbara TV station, Rodger emerges as a desperately unhappy young man who pined for his birth mother — from whom he was separated by divorce — despised his stepmother and hated the frequent lavish trips to Europe and Morocco (his stepmother's homeland) that his family's wealth afforded.
And most of all, he hated women. They saw him as weak and uninteresting, he believed. They preferred strong, macho types, not a "supreme gentleman" like himself, he says in one of the videos he posted shortly before the rampage Friday. He died a virgin.
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Rodger was born in 1991 in London, where his father was then based. His mother was a Malaysian woman of Chinese descent who worked as a nurse on film sets, according to the 141-page manifesto.
NBC News has not independently verified the authenticity of the document, but Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown referred to it several times Saturday as helping to establish that Rodger was "disturbed" and "a madman."
Rodger lived a happy live with his parents and a younger sister in England until he was 5 years old, when the family moved to western Los Angeles so his father could pursue career opportunities in Hollywood, according to the manuscript.
Within two years, his parents divorced, it says. Almost immediately, his father introduced him to Akaaboune, the woman who would become his stepmother. He did not like her.
Then came school age, the start of what the writer describes as horribly unpleasant interactions with girls and — as he apparently saw them — their bully boyfriends.
MICHAEL NELSON / EPA
A woman kneels in front of a makeshift memorial Saturday for victims of the deadly shootings Friday night in Isla Vista, Calif.
According to the document written under his name, Rodger had uncomfortable but not dire dealings with girls until he reached sixth grade.
Then, "with puberty, my whole world would change, and my entire life would collapse into utter despair."
By 13, he said, he was known as the "weird kid" at his school. He saw all girls as "mean, cruel, and heartless creatures that took pleasure in my suffering."
At the same time, he was powerfully sexually attracted to them — especially to effervescent blonde girls — which made it all the more "horrible" that other boys teased him for being scared of girls.
Courtesy Weiss family
Veronica Elizabeth Weiss, 19, a student at the University of California, Santa Barbara, was killed in the shootings Friday night in Isla Vista, Calif.
He was intensely jealous of any boy who had a girlfriend, especially those who boasted that they were having sex. As high school went on, he retreated deeper and deeper into the world of multiplayer online role-playing games, his favorite being World of Warcraft, which he would play for hours upon hours, and which he would dream of when he was forced to leave it behind on family trips overseas, according to the manifesto.
At some point, Rodger was diagnosed as having an ultra-high-achieving form of Asperger syndrome, a disorder on the autism spectrum, an attorney for his family said Saturday.
It's important to stress that there has never been any scientific link between Asperger and acts of violence, and there is no claim that Rodger's disorder itself had anything to do with Friday's actions.
But the diagnosis does partly explain why he was in Santa Barbara in the first place.
At the urging of his family, who wanted him to become more independent, Rodger left Los Angeles for Santa Barbara in June 2011 at age 19. He enrolled in Santa Barbara City College and was treated by "multiple" medical and psychiatric specialists, the family's lawyer said Saturday.
Childhood Photo Courtesy Richard Martinez via EPA
A childhood photo of Christopher Ross Michael-Martinez, a student at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who was killed in the shootings Friday night in Isla Vista, Calif.
It didn't work, according to Rodger's videos and the manifesto written under his name. He dropped out and re-enrolled several times and doesn't appear to have declared a major. His isolation grew ever worse as he was rejected by the women at his college and at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
"I'm 22 years old, and I'm still a virgin. I've never even kissed a girl," Rodger says in one of the videos, which he shot while sitting at the wheel of what appears to be the same BMW he is believed to have used to stalk the streets of Isla Vista on Friday night.
"I've been through college for 2½ years — more than that actually — and I'm still a virgin. It has been very torturous," he says. "College is the time when everyone experiences those things such as sex and fun and pleasure. Within those years, I've had to rot in loneliness."
Declaring that life has not been "fair," he complains: "You girls have never been attracted to me. I don't know why you girls aren't attracted to me."
And then he promises: "I will punish you all for it."
ROBYN BECK / AFP - Getty Images
Investigators inspect the suspected gunman's car Saturday after the deadly drive-by shootings Friday night in Isla Vista, Calif.
The manifesto picks up the story from there.
In December 2012, it says, he bought a gun — the first step toward what he grandiosely called "the Day of Retribution," which he planned for November 2013 in Isla Vista. It says he knew he would "die in the process."
"I didn't want to die. I fear death, but death is better than living such a miserable, insignificant life," it says.
The second gun — Rodger was found with three in all on Friday night, along with more than 40 magazines of ammunition — was bought in the spring of last year. About the same time, he came across a website devoted to men who hate women and are unable to persuade them to have sex, where he posted screeds against women.
Under treatment from several counselors in Santa Barbara, the document says, Rodger decided to postpone his murderous plans. He would try to win the Mega Millions lottery — hoping to become a multimillionaire in his own right and win the affections of a woman, any woman, who would sleep with him by the time he turned 22.
It didn't happen. As his 22nd birthday approached last July, he kept losing in the lottery and in attracting women. And everywhere he turned, he felt he was being mocked by every man who walked the streets holding hands with a woman, kissing a woman, even talking about a woman, according to the document written under his name.
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The weekend before he turned 22, he was at a party where he "saw lots of guys walking around with hot blonde girls on their arm," it says.
"It fueled me with rage, as it always had," the author writes. He pretended to shoot the women with his finger, sparking a fight with other men during which Rodger fell and broke his ankle.
The sheriff's office confirmed Saturday that authorities were called to a local hospital last July and investigated an altercation during which Rodger was injured — an altercation it said he instigated.
It was the last straw.
"I gave them all one last chance to accept me, to give me a reason not to hate them," the author writes. "I gave the world too many chances. It was time for Retribution" — which he timed for this spring.
"I moved to Isla Vista with the goal of losing my virginity and attaining the life I desire," the document says.
BETHLEHEM, West Bank—Pope Francis threw his weight behind a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during a visit Sunday, pleading for "an end to this situation that has become increasingly unacceptable."
On the second day of his three-day visit to the region, the pope used his meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to strongly affirm the Vatican's support for an independent Palestine living in...
MICHAEL NELSON / EPA 
Courtesy Weiss family 
Childhood Photo Courtesy Richard Martinez via EPA 
ROBYN BECK / AFP - Getty Images 
