Usa Photo/fingerprint I/d
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Usa Photo/fingerprint I/d
Hi
All I want to know is due to the current draconian measures suggested by the USA (supposedly the Land of the Free??) is "When aircrew and cabin crew make regular trips to the USA do they have to be Photographed and Fingerprinted like criminals EVERY TIME they arrive in the USA ???
All I want to know is due to the current draconian measures suggested by the USA (supposedly the Land of the Free??) is "When aircrew and cabin crew make regular trips to the USA do they have to be Photographed and Fingerprinted like criminals EVERY TIME they arrive in the USA ???
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Contact your elected politicians and demand that all visiting Americans be fingerprinted and photographed upon entry to your country, as Brasil had the courage to do. If enough countries rightfully retaliate, then plenty Americans will taste their own medicine and get this idiotic hyper security mania reversed.
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Wouldn't you agree that every country has a right to know of all aliens either visiting or residing in their country? Just for the management of the country at least... health, utilities etc... not to mention security.
How many villains would have been caught if finger printing had been completed at international entry ports in any country? This is not a breach of civil liberties... it is to protect those civil liberties.
How many villains would have been caught if finger printing had been completed at international entry ports in any country? This is not a breach of civil liberties... it is to protect those civil liberties.
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I disagree with those who want retaliation!
Let the US citizens come to us and enjoy our freedom. So they know at least what means hospitality. USA is hurting its own economy if most of the people do not want to spend their holidays there anymore.
So the correct way to answer to this sanctions is to stay away and wait until they do better.
Dani
Let the US citizens come to us and enjoy our freedom. So they know at least what means hospitality. USA is hurting its own economy if most of the people do not want to spend their holidays there anymore.
So the correct way to answer to this sanctions is to stay away and wait until they do better.
Dani
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Alice in wonderland and the looking glass
It seems that most of the objections to the photo and fingerprint requirement are from posters from European countries. I think you have been on the wrong side of Alice’s’ looking glass for too long.
Most European countries are police states and require registration with the police when you move from one place to another. Maybe things have slacked off since the EU was formed but to my knowledge it is easier to move or travel to another country without passports and /or visas. But once in that new country you must register and make yourself known to the police.
You have been living under those conditions for so long that they are second nature. However to an American these conditions are totally alien. I lived in Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands and I worked for a Swiss based company. In each country I had to go through the police registration process in order to live in or work for the respective countries.
When you are issued a US passport you are told to never surrender the passport to anybody other than for entry into a country. In most European countries when you register in a hotel with a foreign passport you must surrender it to the desk clerk that in turn gives it to the police.
You get it back the next day but you wonder what was done to it overnight.
Prior to 911 if you entered into the United States all you had to do was fill out a card given to you by the airline. If you would be staying for any length of time you would fill out an alien registration card. And if staying on a work or study visa you would get the visa from the American embassy or consulate in your home country. The only thing that has changed to effect you directly is that you are photographed and your fingerprint (one finger) is taken by a scanner. The whole process takes less than a minute of your time. Once past that point you can travel to any of the fifty states without having to clear with the police or any other authority and you don’t in most cases have to show your passport. If you are driving in a rental car they will ask for your car license number and also they may ask for your drivers license. That’s it, nothing more. Just a fingerprint and a photo. Compare that to the police states in which you may live and then find fault with the American requirement.
Most European countries are police states and require registration with the police when you move from one place to another. Maybe things have slacked off since the EU was formed but to my knowledge it is easier to move or travel to another country without passports and /or visas. But once in that new country you must register and make yourself known to the police.
You have been living under those conditions for so long that they are second nature. However to an American these conditions are totally alien. I lived in Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands and I worked for a Swiss based company. In each country I had to go through the police registration process in order to live in or work for the respective countries.
When you are issued a US passport you are told to never surrender the passport to anybody other than for entry into a country. In most European countries when you register in a hotel with a foreign passport you must surrender it to the desk clerk that in turn gives it to the police.
You get it back the next day but you wonder what was done to it overnight.
Prior to 911 if you entered into the United States all you had to do was fill out a card given to you by the airline. If you would be staying for any length of time you would fill out an alien registration card. And if staying on a work or study visa you would get the visa from the American embassy or consulate in your home country. The only thing that has changed to effect you directly is that you are photographed and your fingerprint (one finger) is taken by a scanner. The whole process takes less than a minute of your time. Once past that point you can travel to any of the fifty states without having to clear with the police or any other authority and you don’t in most cases have to show your passport. If you are driving in a rental car they will ask for your car license number and also they may ask for your drivers license. That’s it, nothing more. Just a fingerprint and a photo. Compare that to the police states in which you may live and then find fault with the American requirement.
Last edited by Lu Zuckerman; 5th Apr 2004 at 21:29.
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Preposterous impositions...
The compulsory registration of aliens by many European states is a legacy of the second world war that was also enforced in Germany by the occupying powers - led by guess which nation...
In the European Police State that I come from, the people have resisted identification cards for years. British police don't routinely photograph and finger print crime suspects and only handcuff people when they are resisting arrest, not as a matter of normal procedure. Liberties are hard won and easily lost - you have to stick up for them. Even in Britain there are now moves afoot to issue ID cards but any attempt to impose them by law would cause uproar and could bring a government down. Recently the British were reduced to the indignity of putting their photgraphs on Driving Licences, but that was a result of 'Police State' EC regulations and wasn't accepted without a murmur by the British who grumbled over their tea for several days. Jolly British 'Scarlet Pimpernels' are only too happy to provide asylum to Johnny Foreigners fleeing the horrors of continental police states.
The British - especially those dwelling in the Province of Northern Ireland - have been the victims of terrorism for thirty years, much of it financed legally from the United States of America; a country which also provided political asylum to several wanted terrorists for many years, until America also fell victim to international terrorism. Despite that, the British have more or less successfully resisted unneccesary intrusions by The State into their privacy. At the conclusion of the second world war they actually held mass Identity Card burnings in the streets - though they were more circumspect with their ration books.
If you want to visit the real home of the brave and land of the free, try a trip to UK, Lu.
(but do keep irony mode in operation)
In the European Police State that I come from, the people have resisted identification cards for years. British police don't routinely photograph and finger print crime suspects and only handcuff people when they are resisting arrest, not as a matter of normal procedure. Liberties are hard won and easily lost - you have to stick up for them. Even in Britain there are now moves afoot to issue ID cards but any attempt to impose them by law would cause uproar and could bring a government down. Recently the British were reduced to the indignity of putting their photgraphs on Driving Licences, but that was a result of 'Police State' EC regulations and wasn't accepted without a murmur by the British who grumbled over their tea for several days. Jolly British 'Scarlet Pimpernels' are only too happy to provide asylum to Johnny Foreigners fleeing the horrors of continental police states.
The British - especially those dwelling in the Province of Northern Ireland - have been the victims of terrorism for thirty years, much of it financed legally from the United States of America; a country which also provided political asylum to several wanted terrorists for many years, until America also fell victim to international terrorism. Despite that, the British have more or less successfully resisted unneccesary intrusions by The State into their privacy. At the conclusion of the second world war they actually held mass Identity Card burnings in the streets - though they were more circumspect with their ration books.
If you want to visit the real home of the brave and land of the free, try a trip to UK, Lu.
(but do keep irony mode in operation)
Last edited by Blacksheep; 6th Apr 2004 at 03:19.
Blacksheep
I somehow just don't see me getting my panties in a bunch like some here if I was required to be finger printed upon arrival in another country. Just not a big deal unless you have nothing else to bitch about.
Funny, the Irish living in NI have been the victims of terrorism for over 30 years at the hands of thugs aligned with the UK, the UDF, et al.
The Israeli government has in the past named the UK as the largest overseas cash cow for Hamas. Funny, I see the US damned for its support for the IRA, but a similar situation in the UK gets little play.
The real home of the land of the free and home of the brave, and videotaped. Surely that must be what you meant to say isn't it?
Quite interesting that I as as American find my freedoms as I enjoyed them pre 911 no more impinged upon than after. Granted I am not using the computer at the library at research how to blow up a building. I will leave it to you to determine the freedoms I enjoyed in the past are no more.
I somehow just don't see me getting my panties in a bunch like some here if I was required to be finger printed upon arrival in another country. Just not a big deal unless you have nothing else to bitch about.
Funny, the Irish living in NI have been the victims of terrorism for over 30 years at the hands of thugs aligned with the UK, the UDF, et al.
The Israeli government has in the past named the UK as the largest overseas cash cow for Hamas. Funny, I see the US damned for its support for the IRA, but a similar situation in the UK gets little play.
The real home of the land of the free and home of the brave, and videotaped. Surely that must be what you meant to say isn't it?
Quite interesting that I as as American find my freedoms as I enjoyed them pre 911 no more impinged upon than after. Granted I am not using the computer at the library at research how to blow up a building. I will leave it to you to determine the freedoms I enjoyed in the past are no more.
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Havn't read so much garbage in a long time.
First and foremost, let me remind the free and happy Europeans that was it not for the USA, they would all still be living in a European Union. They would even have one language and one flag. The language is German and the flag would have the swastika.
To read a British subject talking about freedom taken away, may I remind him that his country covers more of its cities with cameras and monitoring than any other country in the wortld. Fact!!
To all the other bashers of America, I have only one question - How many of you have applied or would apply if you could for the coveted Green Card, an immigrant's ticket to America. Probably many...
To not understand why the US needs to know who enters the country, only indicates how little some understand about national security. Well, it takes all kinds, even some ignorant ones, to make this world whole.
First and foremost, let me remind the free and happy Europeans that was it not for the USA, they would all still be living in a European Union. They would even have one language and one flag. The language is German and the flag would have the swastika.
To read a British subject talking about freedom taken away, may I remind him that his country covers more of its cities with cameras and monitoring than any other country in the wortld. Fact!!
To all the other bashers of America, I have only one question - How many of you have applied or would apply if you could for the coveted Green Card, an immigrant's ticket to America. Probably many...
To not understand why the US needs to know who enters the country, only indicates how little some understand about national security. Well, it takes all kinds, even some ignorant ones, to make this world whole.
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[Quote] "...to be finger printed upon arrival in another country. Just not a big deal..." [end quote]
You obviously never have been finger printed by US immigration officers...
You get out of your plane after a long flight, tired or excited to be arrived at your destination. The process of taking finger prints may take only a few seconds, but the hunderts of other immigrants before you in the queue may last it a little longer...!
And if the scanner process is not working (which happens all the time), you are forced to slap your finger in that ugly grease box where everyone else already had its fingers (do we talk about spreading deseases already?), and when you look in that camera and don't look the way they want, its another reason to let you wait some more time. I know crews that waited for hours in front of those immigration desks, and they are not just miserable exceptions.
The "police state's" procedure in "old Europe" likewise is best practise: You go quickly through customs, you let the hotel make a photo copy of your passport (that's what they are doing with it, not giving it to the police - they are not interested in it, they are not stupid and know that crews most of the time are no terrorists), while you sleep in your bed.
Let's face the facts: These prohitive immigration procedures are worth nothing (because no terrorist will walk in that way), are planned and executed in a purely schematic way and harm the US economy the most.
Dani
You obviously never have been finger printed by US immigration officers...
You get out of your plane after a long flight, tired or excited to be arrived at your destination. The process of taking finger prints may take only a few seconds, but the hunderts of other immigrants before you in the queue may last it a little longer...!
And if the scanner process is not working (which happens all the time), you are forced to slap your finger in that ugly grease box where everyone else already had its fingers (do we talk about spreading deseases already?), and when you look in that camera and don't look the way they want, its another reason to let you wait some more time. I know crews that waited for hours in front of those immigration desks, and they are not just miserable exceptions.
The "police state's" procedure in "old Europe" likewise is best practise: You go quickly through customs, you let the hotel make a photo copy of your passport (that's what they are doing with it, not giving it to the police - they are not interested in it, they are not stupid and know that crews most of the time are no terrorists), while you sleep in your bed.
Let's face the facts: These prohitive immigration procedures are worth nothing (because no terrorist will walk in that way), are planned and executed in a purely schematic way and harm the US economy the most.
Dani
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As far as I can deduce, most suicide bombers (in their various guises) commit the act only once.
Mostly they are recruited from "normal" families, and from various parts of the world (including the UK a few months ago in Israel), having committed no crime previously. What are fingerprints and a photo going to do? Maybe provide Fox News with an instant image to show the nation rather than the torn body parts that would litter the streets? I hardly imagine Bin Laden stepping off a flight to JFK suddenly thinking "whoops, caught out by the scanner!"
As for American comments on state sponsored terrorism in the Middle East, an awful lot of people query the American relationship with Israel and its apparent double-faced attitude to acts of terror, but that's not for this forum
Mostly they are recruited from "normal" families, and from various parts of the world (including the UK a few months ago in Israel), having committed no crime previously. What are fingerprints and a photo going to do? Maybe provide Fox News with an instant image to show the nation rather than the torn body parts that would litter the streets? I hardly imagine Bin Laden stepping off a flight to JFK suddenly thinking "whoops, caught out by the scanner!"
As for American comments on state sponsored terrorism in the Middle East, an awful lot of people query the American relationship with Israel and its apparent double-faced attitude to acts of terror, but that's not for this forum
Garthy
Suicide bomber may only commit it once but his/her handlers are experts at it. Who is to say all these guys even want to claim the booty of virgins and what ever else is promised.The masterminds of the Madrid bombing didn't die in the train bombings now did they? They planted the bombs and high tailed it out of there. You have to believe they died only as a result of being cornered by the police. They had more bombings planned it appears. I stand to be corrected but I believe the nightclub attack in Bali wasn't a suicide bombing, the original attacks on the WTC were not carried out by suicide bombers either.
If someone thinks that OBL would hop the red eye to America, well, you may need to do a little more thinking. We wouldn't need any fingerprints to ID him. Its his underlings that this is meant to help with.
If you are going to talk of state sponsered terrorism, make sure you bring the offshore funding on both sides in to the equation. You may not like that aspect of it if you reside in the UK.
As to the delays for the process of finger printing, it should be a streamlined for efficiency. It will hopefully, but the delay at the airport doesn't mean the concept is wrong. And to answer your question, as a former member of the military, former government employee, current airline pilot and volunteer baseball coach(background investigation req) I have been fingerprinted by quite a number of agencies.
I'm glad to see so much providence on this board as to terrorist methods. No need to fingerprint anyone as the bad guys have already used the airlines once. They would never think of catching the early morning flight in to the US from your country.
Why waste our money on something the baddies would never use again. I'll pass your reccomendations to the gov.
Suicide bomber may only commit it once but his/her handlers are experts at it. Who is to say all these guys even want to claim the booty of virgins and what ever else is promised.The masterminds of the Madrid bombing didn't die in the train bombings now did they? They planted the bombs and high tailed it out of there. You have to believe they died only as a result of being cornered by the police. They had more bombings planned it appears. I stand to be corrected but I believe the nightclub attack in Bali wasn't a suicide bombing, the original attacks on the WTC were not carried out by suicide bombers either.
If someone thinks that OBL would hop the red eye to America, well, you may need to do a little more thinking. We wouldn't need any fingerprints to ID him. Its his underlings that this is meant to help with.
If you are going to talk of state sponsered terrorism, make sure you bring the offshore funding on both sides in to the equation. You may not like that aspect of it if you reside in the UK.
As to the delays for the process of finger printing, it should be a streamlined for efficiency. It will hopefully, but the delay at the airport doesn't mean the concept is wrong. And to answer your question, as a former member of the military, former government employee, current airline pilot and volunteer baseball coach(background investigation req) I have been fingerprinted by quite a number of agencies.
I'm glad to see so much providence on this board as to terrorist methods. No need to fingerprint anyone as the bad guys have already used the airlines once. They would never think of catching the early morning flight in to the US from your country.
Why waste our money on something the baddies would never use again. I'll pass your reccomendations to the gov.
Last edited by West Coast; 6th Apr 2004 at 14:09.
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Wow so much fun for so little effort!!
Does anyone wonder, like me, how the British intelligence services ever thought up that master stroke of monitoring mobile phone traffic? Catching a terrorist cell before they had even selected their target is pretty cool stuff. Maybe they had lessons from Cubby Broccoli?
As a former miltary man, government employee and expatriate engineer the only people who have any of my prints are the Aliens unit ( I put 'Mars' under Place of Birth on the application form) of the local National Registration section of the Interior Ministry (muslims to a man) and they only have my thumb prints. Nowadays I must always remember to put elastoplasts on my thumbs before committing criminal offences, although the sunglasses and beard on my ID Card mugshot provides a certain amount of cover. So much for civil liberties... The British police have lots of footage of my real mug in their video records and I can well imagine the excitement created in New Scotland Yard's gigantic video monitoring centre when I carried that large brown paper parcel down Oxford Street just a couple of weeks ago. Especially after the video monitor in a St. Albans garden centre recorded me buying that large sack of fertilizer only a few days earlier. I wonder if that had anything to do with the strange waiter in Vega putting sellotape on my empty water glass? Lately I've been thinking of beating my wife into wearing a headscarf just to wind them up a bit more. You can have loadsa fun with a mobile phone too - just dial anyone at random and say a few selected words like 'Osama' 'Mladic' 'Radovan' 'centrifuge' or 'James Hewitt' for example... Since it's just down the road from St Albans I popped into the masjid in Finsbury Park to pick up a copy of one of their popular publications on the benefits of martyrdom. That should be good for fixing up a couple of Special Branch coppers with a few nights in the freezing rain, hiding behing the bushes over the road, eh?
BTW, is irony completely dead west of Rockall?
Does anyone wonder, like me, how the British intelligence services ever thought up that master stroke of monitoring mobile phone traffic? Catching a terrorist cell before they had even selected their target is pretty cool stuff. Maybe they had lessons from Cubby Broccoli?
As a former miltary man, government employee and expatriate engineer the only people who have any of my prints are the Aliens unit ( I put 'Mars' under Place of Birth on the application form) of the local National Registration section of the Interior Ministry (muslims to a man) and they only have my thumb prints. Nowadays I must always remember to put elastoplasts on my thumbs before committing criminal offences, although the sunglasses and beard on my ID Card mugshot provides a certain amount of cover. So much for civil liberties... The British police have lots of footage of my real mug in their video records and I can well imagine the excitement created in New Scotland Yard's gigantic video monitoring centre when I carried that large brown paper parcel down Oxford Street just a couple of weeks ago. Especially after the video monitor in a St. Albans garden centre recorded me buying that large sack of fertilizer only a few days earlier. I wonder if that had anything to do with the strange waiter in Vega putting sellotape on my empty water glass? Lately I've been thinking of beating my wife into wearing a headscarf just to wind them up a bit more. You can have loadsa fun with a mobile phone too - just dial anyone at random and say a few selected words like 'Osama' 'Mladic' 'Radovan' 'centrifuge' or 'James Hewitt' for example... Since it's just down the road from St Albans I popped into the masjid in Finsbury Park to pick up a copy of one of their popular publications on the benefits of martyrdom. That should be good for fixing up a couple of Special Branch coppers with a few nights in the freezing rain, hiding behing the bushes over the road, eh?
BTW, is irony completely dead west of Rockall?
Last edited by Blacksheep; 7th Apr 2004 at 02:21.
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Welcome Big Brother, Welcome To The Future
Curiously, Muhammad Atta's fingerprints and visa would have checked out "OK" to enter the U.S. He had no previous record and wasn't on any immigration "watch list." In fact his "approved" student visa had arrived in the mail at his flight school five months after he had flown his hijacked AA jet into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.
Likewise, citizen Timothy McVeigh's fingerprints or biometric data would have checked out "OK" as well at FBI HQ. McVeigh had no previous record and was a decorated Gulf War 1 veteran before he had decided to blow up the Oklahoma Federal Building with 4000 lbs of fertilizer soaked in kerosine on the back of a rented Ryder truck, much the same modus operanti that Al Qaeda operative Muhammad Salahme had done at the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Subjecting millions of law abiding foreign visitors daily to the demeaning finger-printing, photographing and instant permanent collection of personal data process...all in the name of preventing a handful of terrorists from entering the country "legally" at the border, is a dangerous case of government Big Brother syndrome gone over the top. Beware that the big American government is making all carriers of flights arriving at U.S. ports to fork over passengers' flight itineraries and personal data obtained at airline check-in counters upon embarkation.
The most shocking part is that millions of travelers are willingly surrendering their dignity and personal data to the almighty American government for the privilege of visiting America. Thank you Brasil for standing up and retaliating to America's xenophobia!
...When we all know that none of these extreme "security" measures can read people's minds or motivations, nor prevent real terrorists from crossing miles of porous border of any country.
Likewise, citizen Timothy McVeigh's fingerprints or biometric data would have checked out "OK" as well at FBI HQ. McVeigh had no previous record and was a decorated Gulf War 1 veteran before he had decided to blow up the Oklahoma Federal Building with 4000 lbs of fertilizer soaked in kerosine on the back of a rented Ryder truck, much the same modus operanti that Al Qaeda operative Muhammad Salahme had done at the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Subjecting millions of law abiding foreign visitors daily to the demeaning finger-printing, photographing and instant permanent collection of personal data process...all in the name of preventing a handful of terrorists from entering the country "legally" at the border, is a dangerous case of government Big Brother syndrome gone over the top. Beware that the big American government is making all carriers of flights arriving at U.S. ports to fork over passengers' flight itineraries and personal data obtained at airline check-in counters upon embarkation.
The most shocking part is that millions of travelers are willingly surrendering their dignity and personal data to the almighty American government for the privilege of visiting America. Thank you Brasil for standing up and retaliating to America's xenophobia!
...When we all know that none of these extreme "security" measures can read people's minds or motivations, nor prevent real terrorists from crossing miles of porous border of any country.
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Certainly fingerprinting foreigners doesn't do much for security. Effective covert action would give the US public the impression that nothing is being done. Creating a huge fuss by inconveniencing foreign visitors, despite being totally useless at preventing terrorism, at least gives some sense that the administration is doing something useful to protect the public. A false sense of security. The US remains just as un-protected as it was before 9/11 and it is just a matter of time before the next atrocity occurs. Towards the end of the presidential election campaign would seem a likely time - an attempt to influence the result, as with the Madrid atrocities in Spain - and it will most likely be carried out by people who have been living quietly in the US for several years without arousing any suspicion.
Covert operations are the only effective way of dealing with terrorism. In Britain, as a result of 30 years of terrorism, Big Brother is watching. The movements of individual UK residents can be followed on video wherever they go. Journies are tracked by monitoring which mobile phone antennae the target's phone is linked to. Mobile phone traffic is routinely monitored by GCHQ, and purchases of fertilizer and other chemicals capable of being used to make explosives are recorded and reported. The general public are barely aware of these things around them, but don't imagine that the recent arrests of terrorist suspects were just a case of the police striking it lucky...
Covert operations are the only effective way of dealing with terrorism. In Britain, as a result of 30 years of terrorism, Big Brother is watching. The movements of individual UK residents can be followed on video wherever they go. Journies are tracked by monitoring which mobile phone antennae the target's phone is linked to. Mobile phone traffic is routinely monitored by GCHQ, and purchases of fertilizer and other chemicals capable of being used to make explosives are recorded and reported. The general public are barely aware of these things around them, but don't imagine that the recent arrests of terrorist suspects were just a case of the police striking it lucky...