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."
I remember when.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Say goodbye (Score:4, Interesting)
"Goodbye, those funky round flat bacon, hockey teams.."
"Goodbye, to those maple leaf brothers."
The door will go from wide-open to slightly ajar....
(sigh)
Drivers License? Used to be freer than that (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I remember when.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I once went to Canada with three Japanese students who were studying in America. When we got to the Canadian border control, I went inside the office with them in case they had linguistic problems. The official there looked at each of their passports, looked at their visas for the U.S., then stamped that they'd entered Canada.
He looked to me with his hand out as if expecting another passport. I simply answered, "I'm a citizen." He smiled and let us through.
The Americans did check my driver's license on the way back, though.
'Course, this was 15 years ago.....
Re:What's next? Interstate travel? (Score:3, Interesting)
Sometimes I think that this might actually happen.
Consider this: on one of my regular drives, it's not unusual for me to be pulled over, asked for identification, where I was coming from, and where I'm headed to, and if the officer doesn't like my answers (or I decline to answer), I get to wait until they've checked my ID and vehicle information over.
Seriously, having my US Passport is handy (and I'm about as honky-appearing as they come, I feel sorry for the foreign-appearing folks around here)
Where does this happen? No, this isn't the desert Southwest. This is Interstate 91 in Vermont [vnews.com], 100 miles from the US-Canada border.
Re:yet another reason (Score:1, Interesting)
How Canada treated Ernst Zundel should be enough to send a chill down anyone's spine, no matter if you share his extermist views or nor.
The EU (Score:5, Interesting)
Further, I hope Canada reciprocates and requires americans to have valid passports.
"I forgot my passport day" (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, not gonna happen. (Score:3, Interesting)
Not gonna happen.
Re:Think of the children (Score:5, Interesting)
As you say, this will decrease the number of "impulse tourists" who don't otherwise travel abroad, but I doubt this will put a serious dent in the US tourism budget. Those people will probably just deal with the longer line at the border to get the proper tourist card or whatever.
Re:Say goodbye (Score:5, Interesting)
America has ceased to be a country that others might aspire to. Other countries have experienced terrorism for many decades without becoming so draconian, so it's funny that the US, the supposed land of the free, overreacted so dramatically.
It's a crying shame really...
Will this hurt draft dodgers? (Score:3, Interesting)
Please! (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously. They've already shown they'll use whatever loopholes they can find in the Bill of Rights. Like right now, we've got several thousand people incarcerated on the territory of an unfriendly power [cubagov.cu], because it'd be illegal to incarcerate them anywhere else!
US has already become USSR (Score:2, Interesting)
Washington border will be a parking lot (Score:1, Interesting)
The border crossing has no way to process the number of people who cross daily. There is literally no where for people to park while they're filling out forms, and there is not enough staff or lanes to smoothly handle the change. As a local put it, the first day there will be cars parked for 10 miles. Within a week, they will be gone...because no one will be coming to the US.
None of these changes would have stopped the 9/11 terrorists. I am beginning to wonder if the real reason behind the Patriot Act and the draconian changes to our border checkpoints is to create a Fortress America, that has no contact with the outside world. Won't that be a pleasant joy to live in.
Re:passport? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I remember when.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I was up near Canada and decided to go and visit Toronto. So I drove across some bridge (with US Immigration at one end and Canadian Immigration at the other) and rocked up to the office.
I gave the guy my Passport which he checked over and duly stamped. He then tells me: 'You know you can't get back into the USA now, right?'
Apparently there is/was some very peculiar rule whereby if you leave the USA via a different means than you entered (eg. I flew into the USA but exited by car) then your Visa was no longer valid for USA entry.
After a brief panic attack on my part the Canadian Immigration guy called up the Yanks at the other end of the bridge and they discussed it for a few minutes. The Yanks said it should be okay to get back in, which I eventually did at Niagra Falls. The Yank there looked at the Passport and Visa and just waved me through.
I just can't believe the Canadian Immigration guy stamped my Passport and *then* told me the consequences of him doing that.
Re:Boundary Waters (Score:3, Interesting)
Detroit/Windsor border (Score:2, Interesting)
Canadians one up on us! (Score:4, Interesting)
What was interesting about that crossing was what any geek is likely to notice. As you approach the station there are cameras and lights - I'm sure that they use some recognition software and run you license plate before you ever even get close to the guard shack. Then as you pick your lane there are these posts that have a couple of convenient slots that I'm sure are also hiding cameras. The driver and the undersides of the vehicle are photographed as you slowly approach the shack.
On the return trip, the US Customs agent steps out of the shack, writes down your license plate and requests ID from you. He talks to you briefly asking a few simple questions. Didn't take more than a few seconds. But it was all manual! Clearly, at this crossing at least, the Canadians have out-spent us and out-classed us security-wise.
Re:Phew! (Score:2, Interesting)
It's not unusal to hear of someone travelling to Windser on a friday night. It's not unusual for a Canadian to shop at our stores or working next to us.
A 6 month wait is going to have a serous effect on both our economies.
Let's all get our propoiska, comrades! (Score:1, Interesting)
Now, it's being justified by the building of the interstate highway system. In the US.
Internal passports [wikipedia.org] are generally considered a mark of a tyranny.
Kto kogo, tovarish w9ofa?
Also on the CBC: Auditor finds Cdn security weak (Score:2, Interesting)
How fitting. It seems that our passport office is lax with security. How will this affect the US policy?
Full article: Auditor says Canada's security systems still too weak [www.cbc.ca]
well (Score:5, Interesting)
It just shows another clear example of the governments agenda for the future and its all about tracking obviously.
Another invasive thing now they want to be able to use the black boxes in people's car for insurance data purposes in legal cases. Most people aren't even aware that new cars have these devices built in and are recording everything.
what a farce! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:what about when the shoe is on the other foot? (Score:3, Interesting)
Fishbowl has this all backwards. He portrays the Cuban missile batteries as a hostile act, against an innocent USA. Rather it was the predictable counter to a US launched invasion. [wikipedia.org] The CIA, in a case of bad intelligence analysis, hired, trained, planned and equipped a disastrous invasion of Cuba.
Re:Of course it's not (Score:2, Interesting)
The only reason we didn't previously need one for coming from Canada is because it used to be safe to assume people coming through Canada had a good reason to be here....
Then terrorists started coming in through Canada because it was so easy.
Long story short: You want to leave the country? Get a passport so we'll know you have a right to come back without further hassle.
Would bringing your birth certificate, social security card, and state ID allow you to enter, or would they make you stay in Canada for two weeks while you went through all the bureaucracy to get a passport?
No, it won't be enough anymore. Why? Because state ID's are easy to fake. Especially to someone who isn't necessarily a resident of a given state. 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? Personally, I'd rather have one, reliable, reasonably difficult to counterfeit, piece of evidence that's easy to recognize for what it is and easy to spot if it's fake.
They're "restricting" our right of movement! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Little border towns (Score:5, Interesting)
Indeed. I'm reminded of the story of a New Brunswick couple who had their mail stopped for a while. They're Canadian citizens living on Canadian soil, but the only road to their home curves through American territory. One of those sleepy little border communities; they've lived there for over 50 years. In 2003 the American customs agents started "cracking down" on the couple -- in addition to stopping their mail and their newspaper, they also refused permission for any of their family to cross the border to visit them and even threatened to arrest the man for illegally crossing the border. Story #1 [nb.cbc.ca] Story #2 [www.cbc.ca].
One can only dread the kind of hassles people like that will go through now.
Uhhhh ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Shut out from the US and stuck in Canada? I fail to see the downside here. I mean between the high quality beer and weed plus "Hockey Night in Canada" and "The Nature of Things" I'm thinking about retiring there. =)
Re:Think of the children (Score:2, Interesting)
That's because all of your countries are the size of one of our football stadiums.
Re:Of course it's not (Score:4, Interesting)
That's all well and fine, but the fact is that the majority of us Americans lack a passport.
Umm, I'd say the numbers look a lot different when you look at Americans that actually travel internationally.
For those leaving the borders, a passport is a reasonable requirement.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:1, Interesting)
Economic losses in consequence (Score:5, Interesting)
What happened to the USA? It was a free country with ideals, and now it is becoming a tyranny.
This is the first step. (Score:3, Interesting)
"I don't care. It only affects those who have something to hide."
Welcome to Soviet America. Please produce your papers.
Re:Little border towns (Score:3, Interesting)
Imagine what would happen when you had a border like the community of Baarle, where the post office determines the citizenship of a house by the country its *front door* is in. Corners of fields, streets and even houses can all be in different countries. A farmer can plough across three borders all in the same field.
Map: http://ontology.buffalo.edu/smith/baarle.htm [buffalo.edu]
Pics: http://grenzen.150m.com/baarleGB.htm [150m.com]
Well (Score:1, Interesting)
Transit visas (Score:2, Interesting)
Tickets from New York to Bangalore would garner savings on the order of $500-$800, but I'd rather not travel through a country that requires me to have a transit bloody visa simply becuase I'm going to be in their airport lounge for about ~3 hours between flights. Moreover having an Indian passport requires me to go through an Interview at the American Consulate in Toronto just for the Transit visa!(scheduling an interview takes about 3-4weeks during busy seasons)
It's lunacy/paranoia like this that has compelled me to avoid even holidaying in the US in the 3 years that I've been in Canada.
Re:Phew! (Score:2, Interesting)
So the 'loophole' you refer to may be less of an accident and more of a common occurance between friendly countries than you believe.
Re:The New Berlin Wall (Score:3, Interesting)
Heh. Just wait 'til we JOIN the EU and watch their knickers twist, then.
Actually, it's a pretty good idea... unscientific sample, of course, but most of my friends support it. And the funny thing about that is that, through some weird chance, most of us were born in the States but are now either landed immigrants or Canadian citizens. All mighty glad to be here, too.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:1, Interesting)
I had it worse. I was flying from Sao Paulo, Brazil, to Sydney, Australia, with a change of plane in LAX. I had to allow 6 hours for the transit, as LAX doesn't believe in transit lounges between airlines (or something).
So I had to go through immigration to enter the States, walk the 5 minutes to the other terminal, go back through immigration and get on the other plane. For non-US citizens, the LAX immigration queues really suck (usually 2 immigration counters per planeload of people).
"..and how long do you intend to remain in the United States?"
"Umm.. about 4 hours"
LAX has to be my least favourite airport in the world. Unfortunately, almost every flight from Australia to North or Central America passes through there.
Re:Not really a 'rights' issue (Score:3, Interesting)
It's already happening.
--Phil.
What about all of those illegal Mexicans? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Of course it's not (Score:5, Interesting)
I didn't have a passport and thanks to the US's wonderful mail system I didn't have my birth certificate either (something about paying for priority mail to have it take 2 WEEKS). We decided to go anyways. Worse case scenario I had wasted about 7 hours of my life.
Anyhow, we get there and they ask where we are going. We answer Vancouver. They ask why. We tell them we're visiting friends. They ask if we have a gun. We (surprised) say no. They tell us to have a nice trip.
About 3 km up the road I turn to my friend Chris and say "does that mean if we have two gunS we would have rightfully said no?" He laughs and we enjoy Canada.
Four days later and it's time to go home. We get back to the border and the US Border Guard asks for our proof of citizenship and if we have anything to declare. We answer "two liters of gin" as I hand over a drivers license and social security card and my friend hands over a passport. He doesn't even act like he cares... he fills out a little piece of paper and tells us to take it inside. We follow orders and then I realize I'm being forced through immigration. The guy inside takes my ID and runs what I can only assume was a background check. After that he spends about 4 minutes chastising me.
Long story short I got back in. I knew they'd let me in eventually... even if it ment waiting till morning when they could call the state and verify that I was, in fact, born here. What scares me is that, if I read it right, that may not be the case in a few years. What am I supposed to do if I get stuck at the border? I can't work in Canada and I can't get home.
Re:Kinder, Safer Nation (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Of course it's not (Score:2, Interesting)