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No Passport For Britons Refusing Mass Surveillance
Posted by
kdawson
on Sat Mar 10, 2007 04:43 PM
from the and-you-thought-Sweden-was-bad dept.
from the and-you-thought-Sweden-was-bad dept.
UpnAtom writes "People who refuse to give up their bank records, tax records & details of any benefits they've claimed, and the records of their car movements for the last year, or refuse to submit to an interrogation on whether they are the same person that this mountain of data belongs to — will be denied passports from March 26th. The Blair government has already admitted that this and other data will be cross-linked so that the Home Office and other officials can spy on the everyday lives of innocent Britons. Britons were already the most spied upon nation in Western Europe — more so even than Sweden. Data-mining through this unprecedented level of mass-surveillance allows any future British government to leapfrog even countries like China and North Korea."
Related Stories
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Sweden Admits Tapping Citizens' Phones for Decades 273 comments
paulraps writes "Sweden is close to implementing new surveillance legislation that will include the monitoring of emails, telephone calls and keyword searches using advanced pattern analysis. The objective is to detect 'threats such as terrorism, IT attacks or the spread of weapons of mass destruction' but the proposals have divided the country. In a misguided attempt to put people at ease, the government admitted that Sweden has been tapping its citizens' phones for decades anyway."
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No Passport For Britons Refusing Mass Surveillance
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wow (Score:3, Insightful)
Hitler would be proud (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://financialsense.com/ | Last Journal: Saturday April 30 2005, @01:26AM)
j/k
Re:Hitler would be proud (Score:4, Insightful)
(http://www.designsinlight.com)
Re:Hitler would be proud (Score:4, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Friday November 09, @08:13AM)
Why did they bother with WW2, they should have just said to Hitler, we like what you do. Lets unite, no bloodshed, let the industrial complex grow.
I hereby invoke Godwin's law. Come back to me when the Brits start basing their policy on racial purity and blaming the Jews and Slavs for all their problems. What they are doing is scary and I'd be looking to leave the UK if I lived there but the Nazi example is just plain stupid.
Muslims (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Saturday April 01 2006, @09:51PM)
Re:Muslims (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Friday November 09, @08:13AM)
are the new Jews. Give history a little time to repeat itself.
The example is still stupid. Come back to me when an entire political party bases it's platform around hatred of the Muslims. The fear of terrorism is being used to take away our rights. Not the fear of Arabs or the fear of Muslims. So the Nazi example is still stupid.
I can't take anybody seriously that brings up the Nazis in a discussion. Sorry, but Godwin had a point.
Re:Muslims (Score:4, Informative)
Have you heard of The King David Hotel Bombing [wikipedia.org], Irgun [wikipedia.org] or The Stern Gang [wikipedia.org]?
The world changes, but few groups of peoples have particularly pure histories.
Re:Muslims (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Saturday April 01 2006, @09:51PM)
What you're proposing is on one hand, we punish all Muslims for the acts of a few, or the alternative, which is a police state, in which the freedoms the evil people have come to destroy, are eventually taken away by the Government anyway. Try reading 1984 some time, will ya?
Classic Joseph Goebbels Propaganda (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Muslims (Score:5, Insightful)
So far, a few thousand people claiming to be Muslim have committed terrorist acts. There are more citizens of almost every nation on earth who have raped, killed, and tortured their fellow citizens than there are Muslim terrorists. Terrorism is not the problem, authoritarian governments oppressing foreign nations and supporting nations that do the same is the root problem and terrorism is just the symptom. Sure, religious fundamentalism is dangerous, but ultimately it can't be eradicated without massive bloodshed. It just needs to be contained, that's all. Bombing the hell out of countries just acts like natural selection for the worst and strongest terrorists who can survive it, and the collateral damage makes finding new recruits at the orphanage quite easy.
This is news? (Score:5, Interesting)
However, we do have one advantage over North Korea: Blair has less credibility than Kim Il Jong. And unlike most facist governments, they can't get the trains to run on time either.
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://slashdot.org/~anaesthetica/journal/ | Last Journal: Thursday August 30, @01:22PM)
I always thought this was a rather curious statement. What is it about train system efficiency that inculcates a preference for or against fascism in the general populace? For all the people that equate Bush and Hitler, one would think that Amtrak would be in better shape. Perhaps Amtrak's worthlessness is a sign that our political system clearly retains its fundamental vibrancy.
I've never seen a political party base its platform on the railroad time schedule, but I wonder how the tradeoff is justified between transportation regularity and political or civil liberties. Ought liberal governments strive first to reform the train systems such that the fascist option is obviated? Is this our first line of defense against the black shirts?
I suppose it's no coincidence that fascism only arose after the advent and spread of railroad transport throughout the Western world. One wonders if subsequent developments in transportation technology--automobiles, airplanes, segways--have opened up new forms of political and social organization, such that the fascist constituency (those that passionately care about rail transport) have been minimized.
Is the ongoing threat of far right political parties in Europe (the BNP, Le Pen, etc) the reason why Europe's socialist governments sink so much money into subsidizing their rail systems, whereas the United States has no need, and therefore couldn't care a whit about poor Amtrak?
Are there any political theorists out there who can resolve this question?
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think many people believe that Bush or the current British government are facists. The problem is simply that they are moving in that direction, by erasing boundaries such as judicial oversight in order to "git 'er done." The problem with these massive surveilance programs and police powers is that they grease the tracks for an irreparable slide into facism the next time there's a national crisis or an especially power-hungry leader. When it's a crime to report executive overstepping (such as the current national security letters issue), we are all too close.
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://lawpoop.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Friday May 28 2004, @06:51PM)
This might sound kind of silly, but hear me out. I think it's a question of whether society as a whole prioritizes the lives of individuals, or the regular functioning of societal institutions.
Will the train wait for you if you are running two minutes late? Or will it leave exactly on time? What if you are going to visit your sick mother in the hospital? Will the conductor let you on if you run up at the last minute, after the doors have closed, tears in your eyes?
Are the people in charge sticklers for the rules, or will the allow an except for your particular life story and situation? Are we cogs in the machine, to be cast off in the ditch if we are unable to keep up with the machinations of the city? Are we here to support the institutions, or are the institutions here to make our lives easier?
I grew up in the US and got used to reliable infrastructure. I have done a lot of travelling in South American since I was in college, and it has really changed my perspective. Not that I am saying that one is better (I'll get to fascism later), but just observing at this point.
I just got back from Bolivia. In La Paz, any body with a car can put a sign on their windshield and do their own taxi service. Anybody can set down a blanket on the sidewalk and start selling potatoes or trinkets to tourists. Open air markets have fresh meat rotting in the high-altitude sun, and freshly picked vegetables sitting out in the open, dirt still on them. There are no police who are going to stop you, there are no taxes to pay. There *are* registered, licensed taxis, and regular retail shops like we are used to here in the United States. However, official institutions don't have total control over every aspect of life like they do here. Here in the US, you need permission to do wipe your ass, pardon the expression. But in Bolivia, at least, informal 'institutions' exist alongside the official ones.
In La Paz, there are full-size vans that run regular routes as taxi/buses. After 5 O'clock, when people are getting off of work, they will squeeze in as many people as can fit. Everyone is just trying to get home to their families, and nobody is going to throw you off if you are just sitting one butt-cheek on the edge of a seat. I've ridden several times in crowded, swaying full-size buses over dirt roads on mountains. I'm agnostic, but I prayed an awful lot.
Now, of course, there are a lot more deaths due to safety hazards in Bolivia, in traffic and in homes. A lot of people get food poisoning. I think Bolivians are more accepting of the suffering and death in general.
Here in the US, people seem to have what I call a hysteria of action. If something bad happens to anyone , Sometime Must Be Done, so that nobody ever has to suffer ever again. If a child dies in a shooting, all guns everywhere must be registered and locked up. If somebody gets food poisoning, we must institute totally new rules and procedures about handling food. If somebody dies in a car accident, we have to put air-bags on the roofs of all new cars. If somebody dies of a rare, expensive disease, we must establish a new non-profit so that nobody ever need suffer this disease again. If something bad ever manages to happen again, it was because somebody was lazy, not doing their job, and they must be fired. America is a paradise, and if bad things happen, it's somebody's fault for not doing their job.
Anyway, relating this to Nazi-ism, what kind of person throws people into the oven? I believe the same attitude of the person who makes sure that the trains run on time, regardless of who actually needs to go where. They prioritize the machine above the person. All of the death camp guards were just doing their jobs, following orders, doing what they were told. It didn't matter that this prisoner had a life and a family; he needed to be loaded up on the train or suffocated
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Interesting)
(http://www.ime.usp.br/~fr/)
I've lived my whole life in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and while conditions here are nowhere near what you've described, the general population's lack of commitment and accountability eventually gets to your nerves. What impressed me most is this part of your comment:
Here in the US, people seem to have what I call a hysteria of action. If something bad happens to anyone , Sometime Must Be Done, so that nobody ever has to suffer ever again. If a child dies in a shooting, all guns everywhere must be registered and locked up. If somebody gets food poisoning, we must institute totally new rules and procedures about handling food. If somebody dies in a car accident, we have to put air-bags on the roofs of all new cars. If somebody dies of a rare, expensive disease, we must establish a new non-profit so that nobody ever need suffer this disease again. If something bad ever manages to happen again, it was because somebody was lazy, not doing their job, and they must be fired. America is a paradise, and if bad things happen, it's somebody's fault for not doing their job.
I greatly admire The Something Must be Done philosophy. It suggests a degree of discipline that pushes society as a whole to improve itself, act on its problems and not try to excuse itself as a victim of circumstances. It shows people value personal responsibility and back their feelings with real actions. And while in some aspects this may be an idealization, it shows a set of values which are lost on the general Brazilian culture.
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://lawpoop.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Friday May 28 2004, @06:51PM)
"I greatly admire The Something Must be Done philosophy."
I agree. I don't want to eat raw meat that's been sitting out in the sun all day. However, pulling spinach from the shelves *all over the nation* because 10 people died of food poisoning is a severe over-reaction, IMHO. I think there needs to be a healthy balance between "Something must be done" and an acceptance of life.
Yes, your mom has a rare form of cancer. The best that the Mayo clinic can do is give her three months, if you want to spend a million dollars. You know what? Your mom is going to die. The best thing you can do for yourself, psychologically, is mourn and accept it. Not that it's easy to do, but no amount of work and and science will save your parents or you from death. As a society, we could take those millions of dollars spent on rare diseases, and immunize young children. We don't have to undertake hysterical, desperate work at all costs when life presents a problem to you.
Here in the US people are overworked and stressed out, taking anti-depressants because their lives aren't perfect. We don't know how to enjoy the simple, everydayness of life. That doesn't mean that we stop doing any science and research. Life is not a paradise, and pretending that science and engineering will make it so will only lead you to disappointment with life.
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you UKers really cared about it, you'd go into the streets and protest.
You have the power, you elected those people.
Re:This is news? (Score:4, Interesting)
(http://www.spad.co.uk/)
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.spad.co.uk/)
Re:This is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://pjt33.f2g.net/)
Re:This is news? (Score:4, Interesting)
Depends what streets you are talking about. If you mean out of the way streets that the media would not be very interested in, then yes. If you are talking about protesting within a kilometre of Parliament, then no. Protests have effectively been made illegal outside parliament and no satisfactory reason has been given. I suspect the real reason is the million strong anti-war march that occurred. That rattled them and they do not want a repeat performance. You can apply to protest, but they give you all kinds of conditions such as you can only have a small group, your placards can only be so big etc etc. Basically the kind of mass protests we have seen in the past will be no more. Not so long ago, a young woman was arrested for simply reading out the names of dead soldiers outside parliament, so they really are enforcing it.
The other problem is that privacy issues are not really protest material, although they should be. The best we can hope for is lots of negative coverage about it in the press, and other parties coming forward opposed to the measures.
Re:This is news? (Score:4, Interesting)
(http://singularity-ahead.blogspot.com/)
We already are a nation of suspects, being watched. All the recent alarm bells about "sleep walking into a surveillance society" have been too little, too late. The UK is a already a surveillance society, that we slept walked into. Now it's just a matter of degree.
And like Americans and frogs (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:And like Americans and frogs (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.atomjax.com/)
Look, I don't know where you get your french stereotypes, but I've never heard of one sitting in a tub of hot water.
Re:And like Americans and frogs (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:And like Americans and frogs (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:And like Americans and frogs (Score:4, Insightful)
Bollocks. You propose some sort of conspiracy theory. The real reason this is happening now is that the technology (and more importantly the COST) is at the point where it's feasable. There is no way in hell such a system could have been implemented in the 70's or 80's with $800 analog cameras and $3000 computers that could do about 5% of what a modern low end computer does. But now having digital cameras on every street corner at under $100 each, fiber optic or even wireless networks, and clusters of regular $500 computers giving supercomputing power, any city can implement this. No need for conspiracy.
What does the average citizen get from this? (Score:5, Insightful)
It won't reduce terrorist activities.
It won't reduce crime.
All it will do is make it easier for the government to find SOMETHING on you if they ever want to.
Socialism? Bah! (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact please have a look here for how many European nations are run today [usatoday.com].
Re:Socialism? Bah! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What does the average citizen get from this? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:What does the average citizen get from this? (Score:5, Interesting)
No, the best way is to always smile, say "Yes Sir" and do exactly as you please while APEARING to be a common little proliterait. I once knew a janitor who told me that every time he had a kid born he applied for and recieved at least 20 social security cards. The pencil pushers are used to the paperwork and just roboticlly fill in the correct blanks. This way, he had at laset 5 his kid could use, 2 or three he could use, and he could sell the rest. I always thought this fellow a smart man; trading paranoia as a commodity. Spys call it a "legend"; Building up a absolutley solid ID that is totally different from you. I would suggest anyone itnerested in freedom investigate open literature on how this is accomplished. f you are unwilling to stray that far from the matrix, try this: Always lie, always typo, always answer with a smile and a mis-spelled name. such mistakes are expected, forgiven and never result in problems for you but if ENOUGH do it, the monkey wrench colides with the machinery in such a way as to render the whole thing disfunctional,. Do your part to show the insult to individualism and freedom it truely is.
Re:What does the average citizen get from this? (Score:5, Interesting)
(Last Journal: Friday August 17, @08:29AM)
One of the points of this whole exercise is to stop this sort of activity, by using biometric data to ensure that each person has only one identity - their own (whatever that may mean). So if this works, you can say goodbye to that idea...
It is our duty (Score:5, Interesting)
(http://symbolset.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Saturday May 26, @11:53PM)
Re:Europe very different than US (Score:5, Insightful)
What you just presented was not only an example of "well, the US does it too!" but of comparing apples to oranges.
Even though it's a completly worthless counter argument it takes a shot at both the US and Wal*Mart so it get's modded up in the seconds between when the page loaded and when I clicked to see what your reply was.
Re:Europe very different than US (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Saturday February 25 2006, @11:02PM)
That statement is not compatible with the ideals that make America something to be proud of.
P.S. Your anecdotal experience is not the basis for an argument that makes broad generalizations.
Re:Europe very different than US (Score:4, Insightful)
"Sorry, you can't leave." (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.mandible-games.com/)
I wonder if and when the first people will start running smuggling operations out of Britain.
Re:"Sorry, you can't leave." (Score:4, Insightful)
(http://lawpoop.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Friday May 28 2004, @06:51PM)
On the most abstract level, you can argue that this is just another step needed to verify the identity of the person presenting a passport to enter Britain. But personally I'm highly suspicious of this.
Re:"Sorry, you can't leave." (Score:4, Interesting)
(http://idunno.org/)
I'm in the process of applying for an Irish passport, as I was born in Northern Ireland. I won't be renewing my UK passport this time around.
Inconvenience? (Score:4, Insightful)
Are passports issued for life in Britain? I doubt it.
Uh puhleeze (Score:4, Insightful)
(http://www.nodomain.org/)
That's like an american getting views on the democratic party from Fox News.
Daily Mail Watch [bigdaddymerk.co.uk] is a good read, if you've not seen what this 'paper' prints before.
What could they be looking for? (Score:3, Funny)
This sceptred isle (Score:5, Insightful)
Many Americans, I suspect, can relate.
Re:This sceptred isle (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:This sceptred isle (Score:5, Interesting)
What disturbs me most about all this is the failure to learn from past mistakes, and the possibility that it will take more time than it should for the reversal to begin. And of course maybe someday the reversal won't happen. That's when the Republic will be over.
And who is watching those who are watching? (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://threeseas.net/ | Last Journal: Friday January 18 2002, @01:44PM)
It seems to me that real terrorist would want to find suckers to set up, so to keep the public on the edge of terrorism scare, while hiding behind the guise of supporting anti-terrorism.
Remember, remember... (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://www.iphone.org/ | Last Journal: Friday September 07, @01:31PM)
It would be rather ironic if, 230-some years after the Americans decided they'd had enough of being subjects of Parliament and the King, the people of the United Kingdom were the first to overthrow their modern fascist government. Perhaps it might set an example for the rest of us.
I wonder which government would be easier to tackle, given the severe restrictions of firearms in the UK versus the sheer inertia of the US population? Perhaps it should start with the Republican movement in the UK, by getting rid of the monarchists, the fascists, and the authoritarians, and drawing up a true Constitution. That ought to at least buy you another couple of hundred years of relative freedom.
I think the Revolution may be coming sooner, rather than later. Personally, I'd explore the possibility of moving to the UK, but not as a subject, and not without a guaranteed right to bear arms against a tyrannical government.
This world is becoming a truly scary place.
Note to Brits (Score:3, Funny)
We needed the Cold War (Score:5, Insightful)
ID cards are not the problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Overall, national ID cards by themselves don't threaten privacy, inadequate privacy legislation, tolerance of governmental intrusion into privacy, and tolerance of legal abuse of private information threaten privacy.
Curiously, all the fuss raised over national ID card systems usually come from same governments and political groups that then turn around and commit massive invasions of privacy and civil rights. I think they are actually simply using the national ID "debates" to bamboozle and distract people while they quietly realize their real agendas of a total surveillance state.
And they keep using that strategy elsewhere: they keep talking about less intrusive government, privacy rights, and states rights, but then turn around and create legislation that reaches into people's bedrooms and substance use. They keep talking about reducing the size of government, self-reliance, free markets, and fiscal conservatism, but bankrupt the government with bloating the size of the military, create artificial and unjustified monopolies through ill-conceived modifications to the copyright and patent systems, and waste billions on government handouts to their buddies in industry.
The national ID card debates are political strategy by people who don't have your interests at heart. Cut through the crap, participate in the democratic process, and deal with the real issues.
In Soviet Russia - not a troll (Score:4, Informative)
(http://cafepress.com/phototravel?pid=5934485)
In Soviet Russia you were legally obliged to have your passport with you at all times — although many weren't carrying it with them, that could was grounds for involuntary visit to the precinct...
Oh, and no, you could not leave the country with that passport — you needed a different, special one. An impossible one to receive for ordinary citizens, BTW.
Sad to see UK getting a step closer to that, but it is still very far away from it...
and why not? (Score:3, Interesting)
So, yes, the UK looks like it's turning into a surveillance state, but that's an internal matter in the UK, unrelated to either national IDs or the issuance of passports. Requiring background checks in order to travel to other countries is justified and unrelated. UK citizenship does not confer the right to travel to other countries, and other countries who consider the UK background checks unnecessary can still choose to admit you without a passport (like the nations of the EU do, for example).
U.S. instituted you-can't-leave list last January (Score:5, Informative)
(http://slashdot.org/)
what 99% of you fail to realize... (Score:3, Interesting)
(Last Journal: Thursday February 09 2006, @11:05AM)
what you 100% failed to realize (Score:5, Insightful)
Something I once read that is very true even here (Score:4, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Friday August 17, @05:34AM)
A social security system depends on the support of the middle (the worker) class. Not the rich and not the poor but that large majority in the middle.
If they think social security benefits them (directly, because they think they might one day need it themselves, or indirectly because they think it makes a better society for them to live in).
Sweden is a country were, so far, the population clearly believes a strong social security system is to the benefit of all AND therefore continue to support it.
The US is clearly a country were the majority doesn't believe it, and so it has a weak social security system
The point here is NOT a debate about who is right but that wichever system is chosen depends on the majority vote, the middle worker class usually, willing to support it.
I think the same is true of 'privacy'. The simple fact is that no matter how hard some people attempt to shout, a lot of people just don't seem to think it is a big deal.
I think that the privacy/bigbrother level of a country is going to depend on what the middle working class believes is right for them. Not that I am saying they are "right" in anyway.
Goverments, especially goverments that like to be elected will therefore follow the vote of that middle class. They are not going to list to fringe nutcases on either side because fringes don't have enough votes.
There is however a problem, the middle class tends to stay silent, they have better things to do then organize protest rallies or post on forums. A good politician must be able to tell apart a mass of voters from a small group that just happens to make a lof of noise.
From daily experience I just don't see all the much concern about bigbrother in the "common" man. If anything I see a great amount of concern about to much freedom. One in the netherlands at the moment is about TBS (It is a sentence given to a criminal who is consdered mentally ill, apart from a regular prison sentence (fixed maximum time according to human rights laws) the prisoner also has to report for treatment. In theory this only ends AFTER the patient is cured. This could lead, and has, to a person being send to 10 years and then spending the rest of their lives in a mental hospital (this is against human rights as you need to be told the length of your sentence, this is a lifesentence without being told).
So are the people upset about this, that the state can just pro-long the sentence of a human for as long as they can find a shrink to call him mentally ill?
No, in fact, the system is under attack because patients who are let out on leave commit serious crimes and people want them to be locked up permanntly.
You also hear loud voices about traffic camera's, yet the major complaint from real people is about people who speed and other traffic assholes.b Could it be the anti-speed camera is just very loud and the real "middle class" thinks they are a good idea? Some polls suggest this.
We will have to see what the brits think about this, england has regular elections so they can send a signal to the goverment every couple of years.
Will they? Does the man on the street, really care? I think not. He might be wrong in this but that is not the issue, the issue is what the majority will vote for. Doesn't help that england effectivly is a one party country.
You have to remember one thing, england is the place of london, I believe the first the place in the world to have congestion charging (you pay for using the road at peak times). It was widely believed to be political suicide. Until one man dared to introduce it, he succeeded, it worked and the plan has been extended and is going to get a whole new level on top AND he has been relected. Despite ALL the extremely loud fringe groups claiming it was going to be a disaster.
I have learned to stop paying attention to what some people shout and instead am trying to hear what a lot of people are NOT saying. Until the majority says NO to bigbrother it will happen, becau
An interesting thought from an Irish perspective (Score:3, Interesting)
It is a well accepted fact here in Ireland that if the UK introduces mandatory identity cards, the Republic of Ireland would have to follow suit in the interests of maintaining the privileged position we have with respect to travel to the UK. The British are by European standards quite paranoid about border control but, Irish and UK citizens can travel within the UK & Ireland sans passport. This free travel area with the UK is of enormous benefit to the Irish economy, clearly.
Thus if the Blair/Brown government does indeed start to place tough requirements on obtaining a UK passport this means that defacto such a system will be introduced in Ireland, in order to guarantee Ireland can maintain it's privileged access to the UK border
The Irish government would no doubt claim that they *have no choice* and that, of course it's not their fault... it's Tony Blair's fault.... if we, the Irish government don't spy on you to British standards... we might have difficulty traveling to London and Manchester for our stag parties, football games and occasional golfing sessions...
Solution: Grow your hair, buy a log cabin in the mountains and a shot-gun and go wait for *the day* the "Feds" come calling... trying to take your fingerprints for your "biometric" passport.
Re:Don't like it? Leave! Germany wants terrorists! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Don't like it? Leave! Germany wants terrorists! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Is it a time... (Score:3, Funny)
(http://www.how-to-make-a-bomb.eu/ | Last Journal: Monday April 17 2006, @09:30AM)
you are hereby charged under the Prevention of Terrorism Act for conspiring to commit an act of terrorism.
However we at the Anti-Terrorist Department (Motto: "remember, if they're not for you they're against you") had a good laugh at your suggestion of using a train as the delivery method, as it would probably end up derailed on a set of poorly-maintained points in the wrong kind of snow, hence foiling your devious plan. So we'll be letting you off with a warning this time, son.
(Tip from Constable Noggins: "next time think about barrels", he says).
Re:the catch? (Score:3, Informative)
(http://singularity-ahead.blogspot.com/)
One thing to note about getting a UK passport while being a citizen of the US as well - the Passport Agency will send you a little letter before they send your passport out, pointing out that as you're also a citizen of another country you should double check that countries rules. All you have to do is send a little "go ahead" form back (I'm guessing it's so that the Passport Agency can't be blamed if you accidentally loose your other citizenship).
And you have to remember that you can enter the US only on your US passport (I'm not sure if there are any rules when entering the UK)