U.S. Rep. Brad Miller, who is in Africa this week as part of an official Congressional trip, opined about his last trip to the continent in his blog recently.

Miller, a Raleigh Democrat, was criticizing GOP presidential candidate John McCain about what it takes to have some foreign relations savvy. Miller, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, visited Nairobi, Kenya, and the Darfur region of Sudan last summer on another official tri.

He recalls his visit to a slum in Nairobi and says such understanding of a region's "music" is vital to understanding foreign relations, Barb Barrett reports.

Miller writes: "The more questions we asked, the more guarded the answers became. Then we walked through the slum. … As our delegation walked through Kibera, we all asked the same question: how can this be a stable society?"