If you’re traveling to the US from Europe, you can enter without a prearranged visa via the Visa Waiver Program. However, if you plan to do so, then it’s worth noting that US authorities reserve the right to put you in shackles and throw you in a jail for 10 days, based on nothing more than a “hunch”. This is not a theoretical right, it’s one they’ve happily made use of.
In Chicago, the police are asking loyal citizens to report anyone seen using a map or binoculars, or taking photographs. Meanwhile in California, police are stopping drivers who have done nothing wrong in order to compliment their driving and give them $5 gift vouchers. Both of these seem to me to be misguided. The former is obviously nutty; do they really want the 911 dispatchers bothered by some paranoid who just saw someone take a picture of Chicago’s art deco architecture?
Someone has unearthed video footage from 9/11 of BBC news announcing the fall of the WTC7 building, in detail…half an hour before it happened. The reporter announces the fall of the building, adding details like exactly how many floors it has, when it’s still visible in shot. The BBC say that it’s all just an innocent mistake due to confusion. And that their reporter can’t remember who might have told her that WTC7 had fallen.
Today’s news: An authoritative US intelligence report pooling the views of 16 government agencies concludes America’s campaign in Iraq has increased the threat of terrorism. […] The report, Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States, points out the “centrality” of the US invasion of Iraq in fomenting terrorist cells and attacks. One section of the 30-page report, Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement, describes how the American presence in Iraq has helped spread radical Islam by providing a focal point for anti-Americanism.
US air marshals in Vegas have revealed that they have a quota: they have to report at least one suspicious person a month.
An interesting article in NY Magazine discusses conspiracy theories and the secret history of 9/11. As well as mentioning a few of the suspicious facts about what happened that day, it cites a score to categorize just how far along the conspiracy theory path you are: the HOP level. Me, I’m about a Level 3.5. Everyone has to have a theory, and here’s mine: Consider the October surprise conspiracy. Whether that conspiracy is true or not, the Iran-Contra scandal is at the level of documented fact, and it’s hard to deny that the sudden freeing of the hostages immediately after Reagan took office was a vital popularity boost for an otherwise unpopular president.
Here’s a brief run-down of the lowlights from the “REAL ID Act” passed by the House yesterday. Overstaying a visa becomes grounds to deny a driver’s license. There are many, many people who are now legal immigrants who have at some stage overstayed a visa period. Overstayed a student visa by a few days back when you were a student? No license for you! Plus, do you want all those illegal immigrants driving around with no license, no insurance, and without having passed a driving test?
The 9/11 Commission recommended setting up an organization to help safeguard civil liberties. Sure enough the Bush administration has gone ahead and created a President’s Board on Safeguarding Americans’ Civil Liberties. Ignoring for the moment the issue that civil liberties should, constitutionally, be protected for everyone and not just US citizens, I thought it would be interesting to take a look at the people who are being put in charge of safeguarding your freedoms.
Two days after the Sept. 11 attacks, with most of the nation’s air traffic still grounded, a small jet landed at Tampa International Airport, picked up three young Saudi men and left. […] For nearly three years, White House, aviation and law enforcement officials have insisted the flight never took place and have denied published reports and widespread Internet speculation about its purpose. But now, at the request of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, TIA officials have confirmed that the flight did take place and have supplied details.
So, that memo which mentioned that Al Qaeda was in America, planning a terrorist action, probably involving hijacking a plane, probably like the attack on the World Trade Center… Remember how we were told there was no reason to take it seriously? Well, in early 2000 a Muslim spent a ton of money in Atlantic City, then turned himself in to the FBI. He told them that he had been in training, learning to fly a passenger jet.