U.S. to Require Passport To Re-Enter Country 1223
The Hobo writes "The CBC is reporting that starting in 2007, most Canadians will require a passport to cross into the United States and by 2008 Americans who crossed freely into Canada will be unable to return to the United States without a passport. The tougher new rules still allow Canadians to cross without being fingerprinted, but every person from any other country will be required to submit to fingerprinting." From the article: "Currently, Canadians and Americans are able to enter the United States with little more identification than a driver's licence or a birth certificate, though a passport has sometimes made it simpler to satisfy immigration officers at the border."
Because passports are never wrong! (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see how we are more "protected" than the current system [house.gov].
What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Mexico, Eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
right on (Score:1, Insightful)
yet another reason (Score:5, Insightful)
come to canada instead [travelcanada.ca] - all of the beauty - none of the ph34r
Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, it's my understanding that a sovereign country can control their borders in any way they see fit. Perhaps there's some sort of rights argument to be made about the americans who need a passport to re-enter their country, although it doesn't seem like a major issue, but Canadians.. heck, I'm a Canadian, and it doesn't really effect our rights. America can do whatever they want with their borders to non-citizens. If they don't want to let us come in, heck, that really is their perogative.
Re:Say goodbye (Score:5, Insightful)
from the beef ban to the tarifs on soft wood, now tightening the border only makes canadians not want to vacation in the US.. or for that matter have anything to do with americans.. which is a shame really.
Think of the children (Score:5, Insightful)
Think of a typical family of four. My own just did this. Say this family wants to go to Disneyland from Canada. As it stands, my parents were able to go with the young'ns without a problem, and none of them have passports. Tourists from Canada are a part of the US economy. Had the passports been required, it would have cost [pptc.gc.ca]: 87 + 87 + 37 + 37, plust GST, which is a total of 265.36$, and that doesn't even include the trouble of finding a guarantor and taking passport photos which cost more than normal photos. This is on top of any other travel costs, likely for a single trip. This will most definitely deter Canadians from visiting and spending money in the US. Not to mention that passports take at least 3 weeks to get, ruling out any sudden decisions to say pick a US ski package to a Canadian one. I personally enjoy taking trips to the US, but this makes it much harder, and I'm certain this scenario will be repeated.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:5, Insightful)
It is telling, however, that Canada and the US, two of the most alike and intertwined countries on the planet, are moving apart, while at the same time the enormously diverse European Union acts in many ways like a single country.
How is this "online"? (Score:3, Insightful)
YRO, IIRC, is "Your Rights Online". And don't say, "Your reading it online, right?" 'Cause that would be "Your Rights, Online".
Used to be freer than that (Score:3, Insightful)
Man, I've been hearing that my whole life (sigh).
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:5, Insightful)
Interstate travel in the US already requires full identification, logged permanently by the government -- that is, if you want to travel at a tolerable speed. Unless you're wealthy enough to afford a personal jet, you can't fly without the equivalent of showing a passport. (see freetotravel.org [freetotravel.org])
This situation is only getting worse. Even interstate buses and trains now usually require ID for ticket purchases.
Give Us Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Huddled Masses (Score:5, Insightful)
"I'm sorry sir, but your papers are not in order.."
Re:right on (Score:2, Insightful)
How do you think our government came up with these crazy ideas?
thanks England.
Re:Say goodbye (Score:1, Insightful)
When I read stuff like this I can't help but hope Canada (and the rest of the world) realizes that there's 49% of us who shake our heads at most of this administration's decisions.
what about when the shoe is on the other foot? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Strange.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Idiotic statements like yours lead me to believe you are uneducated and don't understand the horrors that the Soviets put their citizens through.
Saw this on CNN (Score:2, Insightful)
Seems Reasonable (Score:1, Insightful)
And for those of you who say "What next?! Papers at the state border?" Give me a break this is nowhere near that extreme and you should know it.
Re:Phew! (Score:3, Insightful)
Last time I travelled to Japan I was required to show my passport upon re-entering the United States. Last time I travelled to Europe (more than ten years ago!), same thing.
The deal we had with Canada was a special thing. You don't have any "right" to travel to another country and then re-enter without a passport. In fact, most countries require it - including the United States in every other case (except now with Mexico - and you can bet the DHS is looking at that now too).
This is just closing a loophole in the current immigration system. I don't see why Americans should continue to be able to get away without even owning a passport when practically every other citizen of the civilized world carries one pretty much wherever they go. There's no reason for us to be smug about our backwardness.
Kinder, Safer Nation (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Mexico, Eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:1, Insightful)
Are you sure you're not black, driving through Kentucky? Everyone I've ever seen pulled over on the highway in Kentucky was black.
What does 1984 have to do with anything? (Score:5, Insightful)
After that, then I'll maybe have some time to listen to your lame 1984 analogies -- you paranoid nutcase.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Really folks, get a grip. You're just an anonymous airport with a transit lounge we sit in for an hour. The only difference between transit in Hong Kong or Singapore and LAX is that LAX is full of cunts who want to fingerprint you for no good reason.
Re:Because passports are never wrong! (Score:2, Insightful)
makes sense, putting it in one of the few parts most car users actually know how to change.
The New Berlin Wall (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't a security issue. This is an issue of punishing America's closest allies for following a different political destiny. It's to protect Michiganders and New Hampshirites from being exposed to affordable healthcare, gay rights and decrinminalized marijuana.
Don't think it's true? Look at the ruthless, relentless and sometimes threatening and bellicose criticism of Europe by the right-wing blogosphere, professional pundits, and administration officials like Rumsfeldt. Canada is culturally closer to Europe at this point than the US... and the US will be punishing them for that at every opportunity.
It's a new Berlin wall, to discourage cultural contamination. I can think of nothing more heartbreaking.
SoupIsGood Food
Re:what about when the shoe is on the other foot? (Score:2, Insightful)
> the U.S. apart from choosing to be a communism
> country..
They followed an order from another country to aim armed nuclear missiles at Florida. That earned them a permanent spot on the blacklist. This is bad blood that doesn't expire. You don't aim a nuke at the East Coast and then say you're sorry.
Also, do you have any idea what lengths and what level of massacre Cuba went to while "choosing" to be a communist country? There were a LOT of people who objected to that "choice", and a LOT of them died for their trouble.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:4, Insightful)
right of both exit and entry: So they allow anyone, regardless of nationality, into the country and without checking ID?
difficult to obtain: I (in the USA) can get the form at any post office or AAA office or any of a number of places, along with the photos the require. Sounds like Canada is putting up a barrier to you getting one.
non-free document: Your dirvers license probably wasn't free either. In VA,USA I had to pay $15 for it (lasts 5 years). If I got a regular state ID that would also cost money. Besides, if you can't afford the $87 (Canadian$, not US$), you probably can't afford to go many places.
Re:yet another reason (Score:2, Insightful)
Most people, upon widely agreed interpretation of the facts, agree that millions of jews and many numerous others died in what is termed the Holocaust during World War II by Adolf Hitler's Third Reich in Germany.
Ernst Zundel expressed views contrary to these popularly accepted historical views and as such has been jailed under the pretense that he is a threat to national security.
Do I agree with Ernst? Hell no! However, I still support his right to express his views as long as his views do not turn into actions of violence.
Re:Strange.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Discounting the longer security lines, it's no harder for US citizens to travel internationally than it was before 9/11.
And yes, I speak from experience. Hell, I renewed my passport through the mail in under 3 weeks.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:1, Insightful)
In general, this is not true: sovereign nations cannot just do as they see fit. In this particular case, taking my fingerprints without probable cause and without a specific warrant would seem to violate my rights, as expressed in the Fourth Amendment:
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:4, Insightful)
Supporting stats: http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/top/dst/2004/1 2/balance.html [census.gov]
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:2, Insightful)
Tinfoil Hat Time (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess for me I'm thinking 'about time' vs. 'oh my god I'm violated'. I've had the honor of going to Canada twice now and I took my passport with me both times. I would take my passport anytime I leave the country, and Canada is one of those times.
I think of it being the opposite? Not that Canada is any harder/easier to forge papers in but what if Ahab the Arab is in Canada and actually goes through a border checkpoint instead of walking across a frozen river in the winter. Making them have to forge a few more papers shouldn't be that hard.
They've lost some 'favored nation' type status because of our history together, big deal. We make every other country use a passport to get in and that's not stopped the tourists, hell even getting them killed in florida [fumento.com] doesn't stop em.
Re:Strange.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Your irrational form of persuasion was in the form of "guilt by association [nizkor.org]" which involves the application of a faulty analogy.
You are implying that merely because the United States is becoming slightly stricter with identifying who enters and leaves its' county, that they are somehow turning into the next Soviet Empire.
Another example: "Canada is becoming the next Soviet Union because of the introduction of a strictly government run medicare system"
The analogies one can make are endless.
My personal opinion on this issue is that I don't care if they want my passport, I always have my passport when I leave my country, it's the sane thing to do. If the Americans want my fingerprints though, I'd think twice before going on a vacation there, but I still wouldn't call them the U.S.S.R.!
Actually, i just spent a month in Europe (Score:4, Insightful)
After seeing first hand the memorial to the berlin wall, and the destruction all across east germany (like how none of it was rebuilt during the pre-unification years), i vowed that the next time i heard some fucking _IDIOT_ saying something positive about communisim/socialism, or trying to compare whats happening in the US to what transpired in eastern europe and the soviet union, id be sure and make my token attempt to set them straight.
You sir, are seriously lacking perspective.
My wife and i flew from the US to the EU and back and no cavities were searched. We brought back food items and the customs people were very pleasant and allowed our stuff with no problems. The metal detectors detected metal on my body i didn't realize existed (i.e. in my shoes).
Having crossed the border between canada and the US several times via car, i've always been alarmed at how lax the security was - even though the trunk of my car was searched on a few occasions (i tend to seem suspicious, i guess), i never felt it was unreasonable for the border patrol to try and ascertain if i had a trunk full of bodies or guns or something.
I am all for extremely strong border protections. All are welcome in the US, so long as they play by the rules, which are set and enforced by the sole discretion of the US. I wish we were putting our troops on the mexican border instead of some of the other places they're currently deployed, but thats political suicide (behaving reasonably often is)
Controlling who enters and exits the US is a good idea. You can be sure that what the US is doing - trying to do a marginal job at asking "so, who are you?" is a damn sight less invasive than shooting women in the back, which is how things were handled in some of the regimes you're comparing the US to.
Re:Drivers License? Used to be freer than that (Score:5, Insightful)
I get waved through all the time too. My cousin, on the other hand, has gotten his car ripped apart.
Exactly! Despite all the hand-wringing here, that's what this change is actually all about.
The formal rules for who can come and go haven't changed, what has changed is just the level of proof that a person has to supply in order to come into the country. Previously if a white, accent-free American went to Canada and upon returning said "I'm a citizen", he or she would be pretty much just let in. But if an arab-looking American with an accent went to Canada and upon returning said "I'm a U.S. citizen", do you think he or she would just waltz in? I doubt it. But do you think America really should let any person who says "I'm a U.S. citizen" waltz into the country with little or no proof?
This change "levels the field" by setting common, enforceable criteria for entering the country. If you have a valid U.S. passport or a foreign passport with an appropriate visa, you can come in, regardless of race, accent, or appearance. If you don't, well... I guess you'll be spending the afternoon at the U.S. consulate while they check you out more thoroughly.
P.S. Driver's licenses and birth certificates are essentially "no proof" as the former does not actually indicate citizenship or residency, the latter doesn't have a photo, neither has a standard format, and both are easy to fake.
Seems Reasonable, but isn't (Score:2, Insightful)
You do realize that the number of illegal border crossings on the southern border are 20 times larger than any on the northern border, don't you?
Want to stop illegal crossings? Make the employers go to jail.
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:3, Insightful)
I dunno about that...rights are not 'granted' by the constitution or bill of rights...I think it pretty much says, a right is still a right even if it is not enumerated.
So, unless there is specifically a law or amendment against something, it is a right. So, in that light, yes, rights to privacy, and to travel anonymously are a fundamental right!
Re:The EU (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course it's not (Score:5, Insightful)
The US lacks a citizen ID card like many nations have, so the only real document that works is a passport.
Re:Say goodbye (Score:3, Insightful)
Replace 'Canada' with 'The World' and you're still quite on mark.
Little border towns (Score:5, Insightful)
When I was a small child my family went on a car trip through the canadian rockies. The border guard was one guy in a booth not much larger than a photomat. There wasn't even a barrier gate across the road that lifted out of the way or anything like that, just a stop sign. This was the full extent of the border crossing questions:
guard (seeing family station-wagon): Hello folks, May I ask your purpose in entering Canada?
my Dad: sightseeing camping. (obvious from the car full of supplies).
guard: Are you planning on staying long?
my Dad: just two weeks.
guard: Do you have any guns or fruit? (What an odd combination of of questions)
my Dad - a bag of apples we just bought for lunch later.
guard: If you just bought them it should be okay. We're worried about the spread of fruit flies from further south but if you just bought them in washington they'll be fine.
guard: yup! Welcome to Canada. Have a wonderful trip.
my Dad - Don't you need to see some ID?
guard: I suppose if it will make you feel better.
The re-entry into the US was even more lax - The guard saw the license plates on the car were from the US, and asked, "Let's see - plates from Wisconsin - car packed for a camping trip - Coming back from a vacation I see? Okay - Welcome back, go on through..."
Sigh. Those were friendlier times.
Re:Mexico, Eh? (Score:1, Insightful)
So if your papers aren't "in order", you're not a Real American (TM). Sounds like Fatherland Defense. Show us your papers, please. [papersplease.org]
Re:Will there be in-state checks, too? (Score:1, Insightful)
They don't know anything about Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia either, because if they did, they wouldn't be comparing the US to either country.
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember when I was a kid, I was always told that one of the GREAT things about my country that made us better than the evil communists was that I could travel around my country without having to show my papers, without having to prove who I was, etc.
I was told horror stories of the Soviet Union, about how to go between republics I'd have to show my papers at a checkpoint so they could track who I was and where I was going. I was told how evil this was and how I was lucky to be born in the U.S.A. where we had freedom and liberty and didn't have to show our identification in daily life.
Twenty years later and I have to show my ID whenever I travel. I guess since we don't have the Soviet Union anymore, so we don't have to be better than them.
We live in sad times.
Aren't Canadians taxed enough??! (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhm.. no thanks. I think I'll just stay at home.
very clever... (Score:3, Insightful)
If requiring a passport for entrance in the US is inconvenient because its hard for some people to get passports from their current governments, is it fair to lay all of the blame on the US?
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:3, Insightful)
Not in America, it isn't.
At least not unless they have a good reason to pull you over and question you.
Re:Phew! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Seems Reasonable (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Mexico, Eh? (Score:2, Insightful)
Your point was?
All I'm saying is that all ID is worthless so it might as well be a passport as any other piece of ID. Or not. Either way if the government wants to fuck you they will.
Re:Of course it's not (Score:5, Insightful)
This assumption has more to do with spin doctoring and pointing fingers than actual facts. One glaring fact you've omitted is that the terrorists of 9/11 were granted student and visitor visas by none other than US Immigration. That, my friend, had nothing to do with Canada. Yet somehow the speculation that the terrorists came in through Canada got stuck in people's minds.
Re:Phew! (Score:5, Insightful)
Right...well, perhaps not. But history has been on the side of paperless travel, in particular with regards to Canada. They only began immigration checks on the US-Canada border in the 1950s (I remember reading somewhere that there were riots when this started, it was very controversial.) Since about the 1980s Congress has mandated a passport for Americans travelling from countries from outside of the Western Hemisphere. A lot of that rule still stands...I can go to just about any Carribbean country with my birth certificate, and even my home country of Costa Rica decided to cash in on the tourist dollars and allow Americans to travel there with just a birth certificate. It's possible that, if the US never required Americans to have a passport for re-entry, than neither would have the Japanese for your trips.
On a side note, apparently, the passport was created during World War I as a temporary document intended to prevent spies from crossing european borders. It was not a document viewed well...europeans were horrified by the idea that they would require documentation to go across borders. I'm amused by the bogus reasoning for its creation...it gives me a little satisfaction to know that people were as dumb then as they are now.
There are certainly people stopped from going one way or another on the US-Canadian border, but it still has not been proven that there's an aggregate security increase from documented crossing than without documented crossings. It's possible our time would be better spent doing different types of security checks than documentation checks.
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:3, Insightful)
Bullsh*T, my wife just did it over Christmas. Just tell them you forgot your ID, or lost it a week before. They'll still let you on the plane, you just have to spend a little longer in the security line. I did it once too. I was flying to Washington D.C. about 3 months after 9/11, and my ID fell out of my pocket on the flight out. The airline mailed it back to me, but I still had to get on the flight home. They let me on when I flashed my student ID (although I doubt I could get away with that again- Argenbright were still working security at the airport there even though they had their contract pulled some time before that, so I don't think they cared too much.)
Of course, all of this depends on what your definition of travelling at a reasonable speed is. In my experience, a trip of 500 miles doesn't take much if any longer to drive than it does to fly, once you consider you have to get to the airport, get there and hour and a half early, get a car or get picked up at your destination airport, get from the destination airport to your real destination.... By that point, you're comparing an 8 hour drive with two one hour drives, an hour and a half flight, possibly a layover, another hour and a half in the airport(s).... Flying just doesn't seem worth it if your going somewhere you can drive in a day- either way your day is mostly shot.
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:4, Insightful)
Strip searches and/or full body x-ray exams would be a potentially useful law enforcement tool for airline travel, and would only add a few minutes of inconvience. I still don't want them.
The right (not freedom, right) to travel anonymously is an important part of freedom of religion, speech, and of the press. There are times where having one's whereabouts known can place you at risk from a government which is not behaving lawfully or others (ex-spouce, stalkers, etc.) You can tell a lot about a person by where and what he does. The more power the government has over our daily lives, the more harm a corrupt politician (is that reudndant?) could cause.
Personally, I have a problem with any system that starts with an assumption of guilt. For example, I have no problem with searching a person in a public place because he was behaving in a overtly suspicious manner, or presenting a visible danger to himself or others. I do have a problem with searching everyone, on the assumption that they may be guilty.
The fact of the matter is that everyone is _always_ guilty of something, and accordingly _always_ a suspect for something or other. With our system of laws as convoluted as it is, the day you break no law is the day you don't get out of bed.
Re:Kinder, Safer Nation (Score:5, Insightful)
And it all could have been prevented by steel cockpit doors. Something so simple, that any retard airline should have fixed right away. Instead they come out will all sorts of scare tactics. I can honestly say I am not scared of terrorists. If they come on an airplane, I am tearing the motherfucker a new asshole. No boxcutter is going to scare me. I am more worried about pilots who fly 12 hours in a row, with no sleep. I hate to say it, but maybe if those flights had a couple of people with balls, none of 9/11 would have happened. But Osama was right, he hit us where we are soft, in our decadent self-absorbed, gluttonous, sit_on_our_ass selves. The avarage American knows nothing about our foriegn policy, who we are helping, who we are bombing and killing, who we are supplying guns to. And the avarage American does not give a fuck. So fuck us for being so dumb and self absorbed. At least we have the red necks, whom government can call on in the thousands to go fight.
I think it should be very easy to travel, to have a good time. I would like to see passports done away with, people free to go anywhere they want. If we did not have a fucked up foriegn policy, the Arabs in the middle east would be loving us and wanting to be more like us. But it is hard to admire a wealthy country when they bomb your homeland. We never should have gotten involved in the middle east. The first universities in the world were all in the Middle East. The people who lived in that area welcomed Americans with open arms, wanting nothing but to enjoy our company and share a cup of tea. They did not want to change our culture, or for us to change theirs, but to enjoy our differences.
Before the first war, gas was $0.95 a gallon. Today, gas is over $2.30 a gallon. Tell me again why we are over there, because it ain't security! We need to get rid of the Isrealie lobbyists from our country, they are more of a problem than Mexicans who come here to work 6 or 7 months and go home. But once again, we got them rednecks patroling the boarder keeping us safe. And at the same time making another group of people hate us.
Re:Of course it's not (Score:5, Insightful)
To be fair, it is a huge country. You could stay safely within our borders your whole life and still be very well travelled. In reality though, the type of people who brag about never having left the country have probably never left their home state.
Re:Of course it's not (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't believe that checking passports is much better. After thousands a day get through shouldn't be that hard to slip a counterfit one through. Besides that, the 4,000 mile border (longest international border in the world) is probably not going to be that easy to patrol. Any terrorist can take a nice hike and be in Montana in a few hours. Looks to me like this is another excuse by the US government to make our lives more difficult, make a few bucks on issuing a bunch of passports, and push us to a more totalitarian state.
Re:Of course it's not (Score:5, Insightful)
Then terrorists started coming in through Canada because it was so easy.
Actually according to the head of Interpol, you're full of it [canada.com] and then some. Oh and who's this commie, UN-loving, left wing tree-hugger Nobel guy anyway? Turns out he was "a former law professor at New York University and one-time chief law enforcement officer for the U.S. Treasury Department". He must not have a clue, EH? Of course, another post already mentioned that the 9/11 terrorists had US Immigration visas, but pay no attention to that.
How reliable do you think it is for someone at the border to have to check each and every ID to make sure it matches one of the 50 valid formats that we have?
Actually, quite. If you've ever worked as a Customs/Immigration officer (which I have), you would know that border guards have access to a handly little book that gives minute details and colour pictures of every federal, provincial, territorial, and state-issued ID from North America. So it really isn't that hard to spot a fake card in practice (just ask any 18-year old Michiganian trying to come and drink in Canada with a fake ID).
Oh, I really liked this one too:
Get a passport so we'll know you have a right to come back without further hassle
Can't speak about the US here, but in Commie Canada, all citizens have the right to enter the country as they wish(see paragraph 6.1 [justice.gc.ca]). Let me repeat - it is ILLEGAL for a Canadian citizen to be detained while entering Canada, unless there is an outstanding warrant for their arrest or they are contravening the Customs Act in some manner.
Your comments leave me to believe you were flamebaiting, but I in case you weren't, I had to take a swing at it.
Re:ID? Bullshit. (Score:3, Insightful)
You're male, thus there's no point in strip-searching you / checking body cavities.
Insightful or troll? It is now at the point where I can't tell either.
Fascinating (Score:3, Insightful)
As a US citizen, I am expected to honor the border crossing requirements of all the countries I travel to, including planning ahead for those that require a visa. I'm expected to put up with the nonsense of an Australian customs inspector who wanted to fine me for bringing Australian-produced chocolate back into Australia after a two day side-trip to New Zealand. I'm expected to leave my passport with the train conductor when I travel cross-continent in Europe (can anyone else say "identity theft"?)
So now the US wants to have visitors here produce some ID to show they belong, just like all the countries I visit have demanded from me. "Its an insult to Canadians!" Oh, please. If you don't want to come here, stay home. And if you are a US citizen who travels out of country, get a passport. Problem solved.
Why is this a big deal? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:3, Insightful)
I wonder how this viewpoint isn't more generally expressed by the population of North America.
This continent is becoming a lot like that which we seem to want to avoid.
I wonder if there is a higher level of concern among the tech sector as compared to the general populace?
I wonder if what's next is having obligatory tracking of people. It's already happening with parolees, so when does it begin to happen with more people?
I've expressed my concern at the level of secrecy involved in portable electronics. It's alarming to me that so many devices run code which can't legally be verified to confirm that they perform *only* the tasks we expect.
What *moderate* organizations exist to combat the tricky points of where our society is going? It'd be nice to organize to try to find solutions to the serious governance problems that seem to be brewing.
How do you think we feel? (Score:5, Insightful)
Excuse me, but how do you think we feel about it? Any Americans with two neurons left to rub together to make a spark is saddened by the souring of our relationship with you. And not just you but just about every other country on the planet.
How would you like to be saddled with George Bush and have 52% of your fellows think he's just a great guy? And then try to blame you for their vote because you didn't come up with a better candidate. Try it for a while and see how it feels.
We're watching a country we love descend into ignorance, intolerance and fear.
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:3, Insightful)
However, the privately owned and operated air transport network is required by the US government to ask passengers to show ID. And the equally privately owned and operated rail network is likely to be required soon.
Re:returning americans (Score:2, Insightful)
There's always the catapult.
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:1, Insightful)
Maybe we never were better than them in this regard. Maybe all that stuff you were told as a kid about how bad it is to have to show your papers was propaganda.
Re:what about when the shoe is on the other foot? (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh you've got to love that great American logic eh!
Thanks for speaking up (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Mexico, Eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
God damn that country scares me. Every day they look more and more like Germany in the 30s. Constant surveillance of its citizenry, living in a nice comfy womb of propaganda, secrets, secret police, imprisoning people without trial or accountability, ever increasing unification between the corporations and the goverment, the ever increasing religious rhetoric of the leadership, government rewriting science, I mean fuck. They're scary enough without having all the worlds nukes and a president that can't string his words together.
And the proud American moderators will bring this offensive post to -1 in a heartbeat.
Duck 'n Dive (Score:2, Insightful)
I remember being a kid visiting Canada and walking over one of the bridges into NY State. You know, past the doughnut-munching border security guys that seemed so prevalent in those days. Anyway, I was happily scouting around in the American bush looking for stones (telling myself happily over and over that these were *American* stones I was looking at now), when my Dad saw me and almost had apoplexy.
Needless to say, 21 years later, I now have three passports and regularly travel within and outside of Europe. Things sure have changed since the "auld days". More security. More suspicion. And passports checks at EVERY airport or crossing, no matter if you're an EU citizen or not.
Y'know, part of me can't help but pine for those days when a foreign kid was able to slip into the States. The worst thing about the whole experience was that I only got offered ONE doughnut by one of the border security guards instead of two or more. If I managed to do the same things nowadays, I'm sure I'd be rectally examined, be screened for radiocative material, be slung into a dark corner somewhere while some idiotic US Senator called me a "jewvinyl turr'st" on the world media and generally wait for six months until the diplomatic shitstorm was over.
Slowly, but ever so surely, the world is turning into a more unpleasant place. Blame it on maximising shareholder value and short election cycles. Together - along with lawyers / solicitors / whatever-they-call-themselves-the-results-are-the- same - it's the unholy trinity that is ruining the world around us.
Re:The big secret (Score:5, Insightful)
In particular:
How does that work? If you think of a passport as something you need to enter another country, then if you need to get into the US, then you are by definition coming from another country, so you would have taken your passport when entering that other country in the first place...so you'll still have your passport when you return to try to get into the US, right? Or are people leaving the US with their passports, and leaving their passports abroad when they come back?
As that's not likely :-), I assume it's really because American people don't generally think of Canada as 'another country' like they do with other countries? I mean, it's similar, has a land border, they (mostly) speak the same language, etc.
Or am I missing some other cultural effect?
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because, as George Bush pointed out not long after the Sept 11 2001 attacks, the terrorists have won.
I quote from memory;
"If the terrorists can make us change our way of life then they will have won".
Thanks for stating the obvious, George, but the game is obviously over.
No you couldn't (Score:5, Insightful)
Or, for another example, take China. I've only seen a little bit of China, the bit near Hong Kong. But you get a sense of just how quickly parts of China are growing when you go there.
Re:what about when the shoe is on the other foot? (Score:2, Insightful)
(not 'political prisoners' of the rhetorical sort that the American left likes to spout about. *real* political prisoners, i.e. in Cuba someone like Jesse Jackson would be in solitary confinement)
Re:Of course it's not (Score:5, Insightful)
WTF? The 9/11 terrorists were documented and legally in America as Saudi nationals. They weren't here pretending to be "Americans returning home from Canada".
Re:The big secret (Score:3, Insightful)
God-damned authoritarians removing every last vestige of liberty in this once-free land. Both parties are to blame; very few people actually care for freedom. Bastards.
Re:Economic losses in consequence (Score:3, Insightful)
We have people who tape over there mouths to protest someones dying wish
we have people who think there is such thing as "conservative" and "moderate republican" still.
We have people who think freedom is guns and freedom is fear and the really sad part is people preferr that.
I'd take a little bit of english heritage anyday over the biggotry of GWB's administration
Re:Economic losses in consequence (Score:1, Insightful)
The moment you are on the finger database you open yourself up to the possibility of being mistakenly considered a Terrorist. (And that is really bad as you tend to be guilty unless proven innocent.)
As I understand no two fingerprints are the same. Even from the same finger. Therefore it is up to interpretation as to whether the finger prints match.
Anyone remember the book 1984? Was it just 30 years ahead of it's time?
Re:Economic losses in consequence (Score:2, Insightful)
With a lot of the so called "Anti-Terrorist" legislation Bush and the Neo-Cons (gotta love the name) you can see an underlying thread of low level fascism, from the ability to detain without due process "For the Good Of The Nation" to the idea that America is and should be the One True Leader.
Re:Mod parent up, please (Score:3, Insightful)
Witness the drug market. How many people out there that don't use drugs know someone who uses drugs? How many of you people could pretend to have enough interest in said drugs to learn enough about who they bought them from to file an anonymous tip?
Probably a good half of the population could, with almost no work at all, and the possiblity of a reward. Including many police officers. I know I could, at least three times. (That is, I know three completely different sets of drug users, who I assume do not have the same supplier as they live very far apart.)
How many people actually do that?
Almost no one.
How many people know someone who's a murderer and don't turn them in?
Almost no one. They'd have to be a real good friend or close relative, or you'd have to think the murder was justified in some way.
If it requires a valid passport to get into the US, and people commonly, for whatever reason, need to sneak in without them, there will be a black market up and down the Canadian border within a year. Everyone will know a guy who knows who to get you in touch with, exactly like drugs are now. (Well, everyone who lives near the border will know a guy, I guess. Probably not people in Florida. OTOH, people in Florida probably already know a guy who knows a guy who can get people out of Cuba.)
The only way there won't be a black market is if everyone gets passports, or they start not letting US citizens into Canada without a US passport, so no one has a problem getting back.
hah (Score:4, Insightful)
i'm a red state resident (and by intention) and i voted to the right of the current administration (by european standards)
i just spent a month in germany and iceland, including 2 weeks of schooling in the german language.
I for the life of me cannot understand where the radical left, and those who foam at the mouth with their hatred of the US / the current admnistration come from.. i've yet to hear of a perfect politician but man, i just dont get the fuss. With this in mind, i figured i'd hear it from the horses mouth and come back to the states with some kind of new perspective on life.
Instead what i learned is that at least from the people i spoke with, the violently anti-US and anti-bush fever is fed and spun basically everywhere, and its almost more of a beleif/perspective than anything objective.
After being badgered about it for a while, I tried asking some relatives in iceland why they felt the need to tell me that they hated GWB (i never brought up poltiics, but plenty of people, upon finding i was american, told me they hated Bush, are hoping hillary clinton wins in 08, and that the US government sucks.. all totaly out of context of whatever the conversation was)
What i got was: europeans generally dislike bush for 3 reasons
1) iraq invasion
2) "he's too right wing"
3) "he's too religious"
skipping point 1, i asked about the other two.
regarding point #2, i asked if being "right wing" was intrinsically bad. it apparently isn't. then i pointed out that, compared to europe, the US _is_ right wing, and furthermore, the US was founded by people that either couldn't stand, couldn't survive, or couldn't legally continue to, put up with the bullshit of the governments of europe, so if we dont have the same exact world view, there's a reason for that. I also assured him that some in the US are vastly more "right wing" than GWB, who has really let down some of the red state voters on some issues..
on point 3, well, i asked what the objection was. apparently the president should never use "God" in a speech. Nevermind that our money has "In god we trust" written on it. Nevermind also that in Iceland, the president's house has its own private church on the grounds, and the president is expected to enter that building to pray for the country in times of danger. Or that in Germany, you've got the Christian Democratic party with a huge percentage of power. Yet the US/GWB is seen as beeing "too religious". Riiiiiiight.
I also had a very interesting discussion on the iraq war issue with them, and i wouldn't say that they had a compelling argument, although thats too much flamebait even for slashdot
In any case, I really liked some of the things big government and overregulation gets you (like the munich public transit system, and unrestricted autobahns... only possible with the ridiculous TUV and licensing process in germany).. but after talking with people and finding a lot more heat than light, i was glad to be returning to the US. My wife is exicted about purchasing our first family firearm, since the students we met from dublin told us over and over that they were mortified that someone in the US could have a gun in their home, and that such a person would be insane, and that they'd never even enter a _building_ with resident-owned firearms inside.. fearing for their safety.
Finally, i told the people that were frothy at the mouth about how awful the US government was, that, unlike their countries, if they disliked how the US did things, they could move here, learn english (which most europeans under the age of 40 know quite well anyhow), pay their $75 or whatever it is, vote, and do something to change it.
In any case, I look forward to going back to Germany as often as possible, if for no other reason than the Nurburgring and the unrestricted zones, but one reason i suspect i'll never live there is that getting residency/citizenship in germany is a he
Re:what about when the shoe is on the other foot? (Score:2, Insightful)
Why "Europe" doesn't like GWB. (Score:4, Insightful)
- The man can't do public speaking.
- He contradicts himself frequently
- He lies or is completely out to lunch about the "facts"
...
But of all his faults, his biggest is that he's too brash. The people who criticize him without too much reasoning often do so because they simply dislike the way that he pushes his "ideas" through.I don't dislike him for having ideas (though I don't like the majority of them), and I don't dislike him for being strong. But I do dislike him for the way he uses his power.
I liked Clinton, though to be brutally honest, he did a terrible job on most fronts. But he had a great way of making people feel good about what he was doing (or at least said he was going to do). When he pushed his weight around, it was all behind the scenes. Heck, Clinton was a better republican than either of the Bushes when it comes to cutting government spending and reducing aid programs.
GW just doesn't have finess. Very few of the "radical right" do.
This kind of politics may play well in some parts of the US, or even during spike periods (e.g. around elections and "hot-button" issues...though often on irrelevant issues)...but it often divides that country. And for "foreigners" (like me), it often pits many who would have little-to-no opinion of "Americans" to be rather upset with them.
Re:The New Berlin Wall (Score:3, Insightful)
It's designed to slaughter the tourist economy of Montreal, Niagra Falls and Vancouver, and as an economic sanction against the "blue" states who do the most business with Canada - Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New York, Illinois, Michigan and Washington.
What used to be a pleasant weekend getaway to Niagra now requires monts of advanced planning if you don't already have a passport. Scratch that... with Bush-era budget cuts and exponential demand stemming from needing one to get into and out of Canada, it will take years to get your passport. It will only be slightly less painful than getting a greencard.
Which kills all international tourism. Which helps put up that Berlin Wall.
"So sorry about not being able to attend that conference in Stockholm, Mr. Evolutionary Biologist, but you should have planned ahead and got your passport application in to us three years ago. All this backlog from businessmen desparate to be able to get to clients north of the border, you see. Oh, and you've been mysteriously flagged as a terrorist, which will double the amount of time it takes a passport application to clear. No, we won't tell you why you were flagged or what you need to do to get un-flagged, because the law says we don't have to, you godless scum."
It's an enormous deal, and if you can't see it, it's only becuase you were lied to: it's not "just" tightening up the paperwork. It's closing the longest open border in the world, because Liberal Democracies are the enemy. We cannot be allowed to experience what a truly free nation is like after ours stops being free. With this new passport nonsense, it's =already= less free.
SoupIsGood Food
(n00b. Check my UID.
Once upon a time, behind the iron curtain... (Score:2, Insightful)
We really hated to arrived back from the West, it used to be so much more relaxing to arrive to the West.
We truly admired, that when going to West, we did not face soldiers with machine guns, dogs, nobody searched trough our packages, and pockets.
Then after the fall of Communism, my former "native land" joined the EU. It felt almost surreal to arrive to London, UK and instead of lining up together with Canadian passport holders, I just walked in with flashing the ID card from Hungary.
It's terrifying to see how the world seems to take a 180 degree turn: the USA resembles more and more to the old, hated Communist Empire.
Even the ideology to create this new police state is all too familiar: we have to protect ourselves from the "alien" enemy, which wants to destroy us.
Even by surrendering our freedoms to the state.
Do Americans realize, that Bush's famous "who is not with us, is against us" spin in his speech after 9/11 used to be a corner stone piece of the Communist ideology?
Do Americans realize, that the Fox network sounds more and more like the Communist state propaganda "press" used to sound like?
Do Americans realize, that the economies of the former Communist states were partly destroyed by the ever increasing cost of paranoid self-defence?
Do Americans realize what they loose when they subscribe to state sponzored fear?
I doubt it. For us, raised behind the iron curtain once upon a time, all this sounds way too familiar. We would laugh of this deja vu - if we didn't know it better.