US fingerprint & photograph all foreign visitors except those on visa waiver

In article , nobody
wrote:

Vareck Bostrom wrote:
Then the agreement seems to be that fundamentalists or extremists are
the problem, and they view any strong representitive of the mainstream
demos as an enemy?

No. democracy has nothing to do with it. That is an excuse used by the US
govermnent (and its loyal terrier Bliar) which has nothing to do with
reality.
It is a PR ploy aimed at the ameican masses to make it look like their
cherished democracy is at stake.

I don't think there's a single American that believes US democracy is at
stake with the middle east. Plenty of us, perhaps, believe that our
economic position or diplomatic position in the mideast is at stack, and
perhaps more of us believe that what is really at stake was preventing a
more dangerous war in 10 or 20 years time.


Arabs couldn't care less how the USA lives inside its own borders. They care
about the USA imposing its values in the middle east.

That's to an extent a valid concern - but to an extent it is not too.
Saudi Arabia goes to lengths to prevent westernization, and as a result
their economy is primarly based on a single industry. Of course, that's
their choice. North Korea is an example of a country that is maintain
its own values in the face of a changing world.

And as I said there is some concern about values. It's difficult for the
American public to look at womens rights in the middle east and not be
tempted to impose values, just as I'm sure Europe looks at the US death
penalty and is tempted to impose values. And perhaps that is an aspect
of international culture and relations we're just going to have to live
with, but yes, there is a desire in that respect to impose values.


Where there is a "not the USA's fault" portion is with
technology/communications. Fundamentalists are aware that the advent of
satellites, television and internet will prevent any isolation and that the
younger crowds will grow up to be more western.

And by the same token, American children are growing up to be more
Asian, Middle Eastern, European or what have you. The flow of
information and culture goes two ways. Particularly in the west coast of
the US there is a facination for Asian culture for some time now, but I
don't think anyone really sees it as a threat to the American Way of
Life. Times change, cultures change. The US has evolved greatly in terms
of culture, economy, religion, and industry since 1776, and it will
continue to do so.


Iran is a good example of this. The 1979 revolution was exactly to return
Iran
to a isolated fundamentalist state and isolate it from the western world. But
the ayatolas couldn't prevent this forever and more and more, young Iranians
are getting contacts with the western world. And more and more, the younger
generation are demanding more open government and democracy. And the process
is moving ever so slowly, but it is happening from within. (and yes, with
some
help from CIA, but it is more subtle).

What happens is that some of the fundamentalists who do not accept this
"evolution" want to revolt against this natural evolution towards a global
village.

The leaders are from the old generation, and they use PR to recruit young
ones
ready to kill themselves for a "good" cause.

The only way to fix this properly is simply to cut off the supply of young
people and let the older fundamentalists die off peacefully. Yes, this takes
time, and during that time, you need to be patient.

What the USA is doing is fueling anger and motivating younger ones to replace
the older ones and spearhead the war against the USA.

Much of that anger is due to imagined wrongs though. The US is, in the
vast majority of cases, just doing its thing - conducting business the
way that other nations do, operating diplomatically the way other
nations do, and trying to stabilize or secure overseas business intrests
and national security the way other nations do. The US is simply much
more effective in many cases, and the US does take a highly unpopular
position w.r.t. Israel and Palestine.


It's not as if the USA doesn't have nations telling it what to do as
well, through international structures and systems. The US wanted to
protect steel lately through tarrifs, yet this was brought down because
other nations (through the body of the WTO) told the US what to do.

Works both ways. It wasn't the other nations who told the USA that steel
tarrifs were illegal, it was the USA who helped setup the WTO in order to
prevent protectionism. Works both ways. If the USA wants other countries to
lift tarrifs so the USA can export more goods, then the USA must do as it
says.

Everything works both ways. The US has supported the WTO as being good
for the world, and the US certainly could have operated differently
after 1945 - US armies were mobilized and battle hardened, the US
industry was mobilized for war, the US economy was nearly 50% of the
entire world economy, the US was a net producer of oil, and the US was
the only country with the atomic bomb. Had the US wanted to make the
rest of the 20th century an "american century" it certainly had the
power to do so around that time, but instead the US contributed to the
construction of the UN, rebuilt Japan into a democracy (which is one of
the leading economic powers of the world now) and so on.


I don't have any argument with that at all, that's completely fine by
me. Other countries should accept that the US has it's own values and
priorities and also accept that if the US decides not to do business
with a country that has values it doesn't like (through means such as
trade sanctions) that other country should except our own values on the
subject.

Correct. But the USA has no business telling other countries not to deal with
country X because the USA doesn't like the leader of X. (Helms Burton comes
to mind).

Sure it does. The US should have absolute authority to decide who it
trades with. If the US doesn't want to trade with Cuba, for example, it
can restrict trade with Cuba. If the US would prefer that no one trade
with Cuba, it should be able to say "we won't trade with anyone who
trades with Cuba" or something to that effect.

Now personally I don't agree with that at all in actual policy, but it
should be considered reasonable that the US decides in all aspects who
to trade with.


Not at all, at least, that's not how I see it. I see the current
administration agressivly pursuing US interests through *completely
legal* means

Wait till Gantnamo kidnapping camp goes to the USA supreme court. And the UN
NEVER sanctioned the unprovoked invasion of Iraq, so that invasion was
illegal. The USA invasion of Iraq had as much legal standing as Iraq's
invasion of Kuwait. Both were unprovoked.

The US had about the same level of authorization that NATO did when
operating in Kosovo. Kosovo did not have specific use-of-force
authorization from the Security Council either, though it did have
warnings of the same type given to Iraq. As the Security Council did not
condem the invasion after the fact (as it did with the Iraqi invasion of
kuwait), the invasion is considered authorized and legal by
international law. The foreign minister of iceland wrote an interesting
piece on the topic of kosovo and nato action the

http://www.mfa.is/interpro/mfa.nsf/pages/mfa0135

Note that nearly every condition that held true for Kosovo action also
held true for the US in Iraq. Note also his comment that the Tanzania
invasion of Uganda was considered legal under international law due to
the lack of a subsequent condemnation by the security council.


And find me the text in any UN resolution that gave any one country the right
to decide if Iraq was in breach or not, and find me the text that says that
invasion of the country was to be the sanction should Iraq be found in
breach.
You won't find this text.

You should really study international law a bit more. International law
is not simply a set of treaties, it is a collection of accepted behaivor
between nations, treaties, and "case history". There is adaquate case
history of similar actions (Kosovo and Uganda) that are considered legal
to defend the US action in Iraq as legal under international "law". Once
again, international law is extremely weak law.


Iraq was cooperating and the UN had made significant progress in getting its
inspectors total and free access to all of Iraq and the inspectors were
reporting significant progress. But the USA didn't want this to happen
because
they had wanted the inspectors to be blocked by Hussein so that the USa could
then push a resolution to invade. When when Hussein cooperated, the USA
realised that the UN would never authorize the invasion, thus the USA acted
illegally, outside of UN mandate.

A UN mandate does not make something legal under international "law".
The UN is not the lord-high-controller of international law. The UN is
simply a collection of nations trying to work together.


No, it just seems that senior US officials have finally done a little
research on North Korean negoation tactics.

Go back and read the 1998 documents at newamericancentury.org web site (the
axis of evil website from Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz). They clearly state
that
the Clinton deal with North Korea (supply of oil in exchange for N Korea
stoppping its nuclear development) shoudl be scrapped the minute the
republicans take power. It took a few months, but Rumsfeld did scrap that
agreement even though it was workling and North Kirea was quiet and
submitting
itself to UN IAEA inspections.

Read it many times.



There is no doubt in my mind at all that the DPRK is a dangerous country
under dangerous leadership, much more so than Iraq or Iran was or is.
They have a very long history of dangerous behaivor throughout the cold
war and on.

Generally dangerous animals don't bite the hand that feed them. But the
second
you cut the feeding, they get angry at you. North Korea is a bankrupt
country
with limited resources but very high pride and ego. The Bush regime gave
Korea
a shot of adrenaline when they cut the oil supply, motivating N Korea to act
like a big bad boy again. They are like a hungry kid who will beg for
attention until it gets fed.

Indeed. But "feeding" them at this point is rewarding poor behaivor.
Note also internally, the North Koreans tell their people that the
Americans are supplying fuel oil to the North Koreans out of fear of
North Korea.


The USA could have simply told China, Japan and South Korea to take care of
their problem child instead of forcing that kid to throw a tamper tantrum,
which played right into the hands of the Bush Regime which needed to show
North Korea as a bad kid in order to be able to use the speeches that had
been
prepared in 1998 by the newamericancentury.org people.

The US is presently working toward 6-power talks in conjunction with
those three states. It is difficult to coordinate the opinion of the
allies however, the Japanese are insisting that a more complete
settlement of the subject of kidnapped Japanese citizens be brought up
in the talks, the North Koreans do not want that to be a topic during
the talks. The Japanese feel that there can not be normal relations
between Japan and the DPRK while this subject is outstanding (and I
agree with them there).


Citizens of territories of the US under the US constitution have US
citizenship. The US has not recognized Iraq as a territory,

But international law has recognized the USA as an occupation force in Iraq

International Law and the UN are NOT one in the same.

and holding the USA responsible for all damages and governance of Iraq. Just
like Iraq was recognized as being responsible for the damages it caused to
Kuwait and forced to pay (although they were pushed back so they were never
recognized as governing authority).

By the UN, not by "international law".


Incidently, who is the chief of state of Canada? If you answered Queen
Elizabeth II can you explain under your logic how Canada is not occupied
by the UK and how Canada does not have its own government?

Canada has its own constitution, government structures and its own head of
state (governor general which is a representative of the queen).

The USA destroyed all government infrastructure of Iraq, including the
parliament buildings, destroyed Iraq's exsiting currency, totally ignored
Iraq's constitution, dismantled its army and police forces and has to rebuild
everything from scratch. The USA had 0 intentions of simply catching Hussein.
They wanted to build a country in the USA's image and use it as a marketing
ploy to show other middle eastern countries how good a USA-controlled Iraq
was
with wealth, democracy, no conflicts, clean streets etc etc.

The US also destroyed all government infastructure in Japan and Germany
during world war II as well (and of course the US was not alone, the UK,
France and Russia were involved as well) and those countries were
rebuilt over a period of years. Just as in Iraq though, the US did not
engage in a war with Japan or Germany for Japan or Germanys good, the US
was acting in its own interest. The fact that things turned out better
for Japan in the long run is fortunate but probably not the reason the
US engaged in that war.

The same holds true, I think, for Iraq.


Any UN applied status only has effect under the UN, which is not really
a soverign body. So, who cares?

The security council has powers. It is the general assembly which doesn't
have
any binding powers.

Even the security council does not have power over international "law".
International Law, as I mentioned, involves case history too.

PTRAVEL writes
One obvious way
for a terrorist or other undesirable to enter the US is for them to
obtain a US passport. If the fingerprints of many US citizens are on
record, this would be more hazardous.

I agree. I don't know alot about this, but I'd assume that some effort has
been put into making US passports extremely difficult to forge or alter.

The obvious way to do this is to kill a US citizen, while outside the
US, and take their passport and any other documents they might be
carrying.

Might another way be to find a US citizen who currently has not applied
for a passport, steal their identity and apply for a passport in their
name?

I wonder if the US has closed the "Day of the Jackal" loophole and
checks whether an applicant for a US passport is deceased?

There was a case in the UK a few days ago where a 9 year old boy was
killed by a hit and run driver. The driver was traced by the police and
turned out to be an Algerian illegal immigrant who was in possession of
a stolen French passport. I don't yet have all the background on this
(eg whether the legitimate owner of the passport reported the theft) but
I wonder if he could have entered the US on this passport?
Unfortunately, it seems he had no problems entering the UK.
--
Simon Elliott
http://www.ctsn.co.uk/

"Simon Elliott" wrote in message
...
PTRAVEL writes
One obvious way
for a terrorist or other undesirable to enter the US is for them to
obtain a US passport. If the fingerprints of many US citizens are on
record, this would be more hazardous.

I agree. I don't know alot about this, but I'd assume that some effort
has
been put into making US passports extremely difficult to forge or alter.

The obvious way to do this is to kill a US citizen, while outside the
US, and take their passport and any other documents they might be
carrying.

The photograph would still have to match. US Passports (and most other
countries) are quite tamper-resistant. It's very clear if a photograph has
been replaced.


Might another way be to find a US citizen who currently has not applied
for a passport, steal their identity and apply for a passport in their
name?

Yes, that would probably be far easier. As I recall, all that's necessary
to obtain a passport is a birth certificate and the whole process can be
done by mail, i.e. no one ever looks to see if the photographs actually look
like the applicant.


I wonder if the US has closed the "Day of the Jackal" loophole and
checks whether an applicant for a US passport is deceased?

I'd bet not, since those kinds of records are not, to my knowledge, easily
accessible on line.


There was a case in the UK a few days ago where a 9 year old boy was
killed by a hit and run driver. The driver was traced by the police and
turned out to be an Algerian illegal immigrant who was in possession of
a stolen French passport. I don't yet have all the background on this
(eg whether the legitimate owner of the passport reported the theft) but
I wonder if he could have entered the US on this passport?

If France hadn't listed the passport as stolen, and it looked enough like
him, probably he could.

Unfortunately, it seems he had no problems entering the UK.

It's a dangerous world out there and, unfortunately, I can't think of
anything, absent onerous totalitarian measures, that will make it safer.

--
Simon Elliott
http://www.ctsn.co.uk/

PTRAVEL wrote:
Might another way be to find a US citizen who currently has not applied
for a passport, steal their identity and apply for a passport in their
name?


Yes, that would probably be far easier. As I recall, all that's necessary
to obtain a passport is a birth certificate and the whole process can be
done by mail, i.e. no one ever looks to see if the photographs actually look
like the applicant.

The "whole" process isn't done by mail.
A first passport requires a personal appearance
http://travel.state.gov/passport_obtain.html



I wonder if the US has closed the "Day of the Jackal" loophole and
checks whether an applicant for a US passport is deceased?


I'd bet not, since those kinds of records are not, to my knowledge, easily
accessible on line.

Sure there are.
Names and SSNs of dead people can be found at
http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/
(Fill out form under "Social Security Death Index"
You don't need to know the SSN, it will return the matches and their SSN.

"Simon Elliott" wrote in message
...
Dick Locke writes
The AP story on this says:

" Foreigners also will be checked as they leave the country as an
extra security measure and to ensure they complied with visa
limitations."

There could actually be an advantage here for law abiding visitors who
want to return to the US. If the new system accurately records the
departure time, it would provide confirmation that visitors had not
overstayed their visa.

I'm shocked to find myself in general agreement with the program
provided they can meet their claims for speed and that they treat
false failures as a learning tool rather than shrugging shoulders and
saying, "Oh well, we're at war."

IMHO the system needs to be 'sold' to visitors. In many countries, one's
fingerprints are only taken when one has dealings with the police. There
are assumptions of criminality. (I gather from posts here that this
isn't always the case in the US.) Immigration procedures are often the
first impression a visitor has of a country, and it makes no sense at
all to **** people off for no good reason.


So you think we should just open our borders to known terrorists? Is yoru
real name bin Laden?

As a system which "keeps honest people honest" it probably has its
merits. But will it have any value beyond that? Some reservations which
come to my mind:

1/ Fingerprints are quite easily changed. Retina scanning equipment is
coming rapidly down in price and would be much harder to fool.

2/ Are fingerprints of all that many serious undesirables on record?

3/ Who will be able to access the data? If I were visiting the US to go
backpacking in Yosemite, I wouldn't be all that bothered about this. But
what about a highly sensitive business trip where I could be covered in
embarrassment (or worse) if anyone found out?

4/ Will the land borders be covered?
--
Simon Elliott
http://www.ctsn.co.uk/








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Mike Dobony writes
IMHO the system needs to be 'sold' to visitors. In many countries, one's
fingerprints are only taken when one has dealings with the police. There
are assumptions of criminality. (I gather from posts here that this
isn't always the case in the US.) Immigration procedures are often the
first impression a visitor has of a country, and it makes no sense at
all to **** people off for no good reason.

So you think we should just open our borders to known terrorists? Is yoru
real name bin Laden?

Your comment doesn't follow at all, even slightly, from what I wrote.
There's a complete logical disconnect. But a surprising number of people
make the same mistake.

Some time ago when I returned from Brazil to LHR, the passengers were
met on the airbridge by an obnoxious customs officer with a dog. This
individual screamed and shouted at passengers and allowed the dog to
sniff at them without explaining what was about to happen.

When I mentioned this to others, a fairly common reaction was: "It's
necessary to check people carefully on flights from Brazil." Of course
it is, but it should be done with the usual low key politeness we expect
from our law enforcement personnel in the UK. Screaming and shouting
does not enhance security.

In the same way, my comment that "IMHO the system needs to be 'sold' to
visitors" is on the other side of the planet from "So you think we
should just open our borders to known terrorists?".
--
Simon Elliott
http://www.ctsn.co.uk/

On Wed, 07 Jan 2004 23:50:35 -0600, Mike Dobony wrote:

So you think we should just open our borders to known terrorists? Is yoru
real name bin Laden?

Competing for the prize for the non-sequitur of the week?

so what - we got sniffed by a dog - a flight from AMS-SEA late last year.
Lots of drugs in AMS (which is what they were looking for)
"Simon Elliott" wrote in message
...
Mike Dobony writes
IMHO the system needs to be 'sold' to visitors. In many countries,
one's
fingerprints are only taken when one has dealings with the police.
There
are assumptions of criminality. (I gather from posts here that this
isn't always the case in the US.) Immigration procedures are often the
first impression a visitor has of a country, and it makes no sense at
all to **** people off for no good reason.

So you think we should just open our borders to known terrorists? Is
yoru
real name bin Laden?

Your comment doesn't follow at all, even slightly, from what I wrote.
There's a complete logical disconnect. But a surprising number of people
make the same mistake.

Some time ago when I returned from Brazil to LHR, the passengers were
met on the airbridge by an obnoxious customs officer with a dog. This
individual screamed and shouted at passengers and allowed the dog to
sniff at them without explaining what was about to happen.

When I mentioned this to others, a fairly common reaction was: "It's
necessary to check people carefully on flights from Brazil." Of course
it is, but it should be done with the usual low key politeness we expect
from our law enforcement personnel in the UK. Screaming and shouting
does not enhance security.

In the same way, my comment that "IMHO the system needs to be 'sold' to
visitors" is on the other side of the planet from "So you think we
should just open our borders to known terrorists?".
--
Simon Elliott
http://www.ctsn.co.uk/

On Wed, 7 Jan 2004 23:50:35 -0600, "Mike Dobony"
wrote:

So you think we should just open our borders to known terrorists? Is yoru
real name bin Laden?

Are you 14 years old? You are showing the same argument skills....

Vareck Bostrom wrote:
The Arab world has no legitimate argument with the US, above arguments
that any nation has with any other nation.

It is your right as an american to believe what you want. But when you have
large buildings destoyed, and your government act like a headless chicken that
is scared ****less, you should perhaps ask yourself if all those
preconceptions are right or not.

The USA's handling of the Israel-Palestine conflict is more than enough reason
for the arab world to have a big beef against the USA. And now, you can add
the illegimate invasion of Iraq to the list of big beefs.

thought that the 9/11 attacks were executed by either Israel or the US

And I have spoken to americans who think that the 9-11 terrorists came from
Canada.

Al Queada is not a rational faction. They are extremist and
fundamentalist, their target selection and choice of targets can't be
considered rational.

They use emotion to recruit and brainwash people. And the USA has provided
plenty of "emotion" to cause enough people to get mad at the USA to jointhose
terrorist movements.

North Korea has engineered events designed to terrorize, I'm sure you're
aware.

Are you aware that Rumsfeld decided to break the peace treaty that Clinton had
reached and this is what precipitated North Korea to restart its nuclear
project, exactly what Rumsfeld had wanted ?

Rumsfeld, in the newamericancentury.org web site had promised back in 1998 to
scrap the deal Clinton had reached.

governments to perform. Fortunately, our governments are more rational
and long-term thinking than we are.

Which is not the case with the current regime in the USA.

could have this viewpoint? Do you honestly believe that there are no
Americans besides the administration that have some support for this
view?

It is hard to know if an american who supports the Bush regime is well
informed or if he supports them because he only watched media outlets that
show the Bush regime's side of the story ?

Now more than ever, the "information society" is critical. Population is
controlled by information released by the government to the media. And rogue
governments such as the Bush regime want orwelian data collection on all their
citizens, and even citizens from outside their own country.

We have foreign soliders stationed on US soil. A Canadian air force
officer is present at NORAD, for example.

they are not "soldiers" in the same sense as americans in middle east. They
may be military, by they are more civil servants, administrators than
soldiers. They coordinate computers and provide a bridge betwene two separate
military organisations.

However, until not too long ago, the yanks id have a military base in Newfoundland.

Back in the 1960s, the USA had Bomarc nuclear missiles stationed north of
montreal and in north bay whose sole purpose was to detonate any soviet planes
before they reached USA territory. (in other words, explode soviet nukes over
canada to protect the USA).