Re: OT - passports required

Seems like a good idea to me:

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Well, it'll mean that a lot more US citizens will have to purchase passports from the Feds (for about $100 a pop, including polariod closeups ) That fee has got to be a ripoff.

Reply to
mack
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We have been very sloppy in the past. Now finally with an administration that is not afraid of it's own shadow, it has taken action. Three cheers for GWB and the Bush administration. I wish we could have him for another term.

Reply to
dbu'

Any person anywhere in the world should be prepared to show a passport upon crossing a border. This is really a non-event for most people. I suppose passage to Canada or Mexico, and back will present new issues for Americans, but most places require a passport to enter, therefore American travellers will have a passport to get back into America.

I don't see any problem for the vast majority of Americans that travel.

Reply to
Jeff Strickland

That should bring out the kooks.

Reply to
Scott in Florida

Ties in a bit, & is a bit tangential:

In '86 I went on a vacation to the UK. This was 3 months after Reagan had bombed Libya, trying to get Ghaddaffi (but got his 2 yr. old daughter instead... anyway), & shortly after a pregnant woman had been caught trying to board a plane at Heathrow - unbeknownst to her, her Middle Eastern bf had planted plastic explosives in her carry-on (some bf... well shot of *that* guy!). Came back home, getting into JFK at 8:30 pm.

No one, & I mean *no one* who worked for the airport/immigration was there, nevermind checking the passports of anyone who got off that plane. We literally just walked into the country, with the most lax security one could possibly imagine. It was a stiflingly hot July night, & we couldn't even find anyone to ask where the nearest available soda was! *No* one was around, at all. Took us a long while, walking around, to find anyone who worked there.

This still ticks me off, 20 years later. Complete lack of security, & in huge contrast to the security we'd just seen at Gatwick (London). Since then witnessed tight security at Gatwick again, & at de Gaulle (maddening airport, IMO, but at least its security's decent!). But it appears the US still manages to continue to lag, hopefully making people feel like it's doing something (and managing to annoy many) by limiting the likes of toothpaste, while neglecting the stuff that matters!

Cathy

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Reply to
Cathy F.

Blame it on the muslim terrorists. The TSB has to respond to threats regardless if it's weak, rumor or real they have no way of really knowing and have to take every crank call ect as a real threat. It's a vastly different world from twenty years ago. Remember also we have some here in the U.S. that seem to think our freedoms are being compromised and yell loudly in protest when they get the shoes checked, but would protest even more loudly if that A/C were one that was a target of terrorism.

Reply to
dbu'

I have my kook goggles on.

Reply to
dbu'

Was going on a cruise this spring - got passports. Took maybe 10 minutes to have county clerk process. (I'd filled out the forms on-line).

IMO, if you can afford to travel, a $100 passport every 10 years isn't too stiff a price. Maybe just maybe we will finally get into the mindset that security might pay some dividends. Ron

Reply to
Ron

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Cathy's story reminds me of what a coworker of mine went thru when she visited the Holy Land years ago. It was only three weeks after the Lod Airport massacre in Israel, and when the plane landed at Lod, the passengers were instructed to come off the plane in groups of four, with handbags held in one hand and their passports held in the other hand. Each group of four passengers was escorted by a pair of Israeli soldiers with Uzis. When they got to customs and immigration, the inspectors wents through this woman's baggage so carefully that at one point the inspector took out a jar of her cold cream, unscrewed the jar's cap, stuck one finger in the cream all the way to the bottom of the jar, and announced to her, "Yes, that's cold cream!"

Reply to
mack

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