The main reason I want to visit the US is some of the landscapes. I’d like to see the Grand Canyon, the Painted Desert, Sedona, the Everglades, probably some others too. The parts without Americans don’t look so bad.
I wouldn’t think many tourists to the US come from these countries.
All of those (except Greece) are small islands or groups of small islands, while Greece itself has many islands. They also all (or if not almost all) have nice climates. So of course tourism is far more important to them than to the US, but it still seems to be a big industry for you. But then it is for so many.
If I’ve insulted anyone in this thread, it certainly wasn’t my intention. If so, I apologise to whoever it was. But I’m pretty sure I haven’t been rude to you. But carry on; knock yourself out! : D
Yep, Canada doesn’t get a pass. A buddy of mine was asked to come to Canada by a government (cultural) agency to receive an award. At the airport, he was denied entry due to an old pot bust or DUI (forget which).
His Canadian contact scrambled to attempt to smooth things over, but my buddy is very much a “fuck you” kinda guy in a situation like that.
Or, it’s actually even closer to a situation where someone tweets a slang expression to a friend, and that tweet is picked up and flagged by a poorly trained yahoo in East Bumfuck GA whose first response is to overreact.
No need to bring up yelling on Main Street, or even shouting about bombs while on an airplane. Since they have nothing whatsover to do with the situation under discussion.
I’m unimpressed with the “slang” argument. “Destroy America” is “destroy America”, and if some sub-culture wants to use that as “slang”, then fuck 'em. I don’t want to have to determine whether someone trying to enter the US is using some sort of ridiculous slang or not. It’s a privilege, not a right, to enter a foreign country.
I’ve never heard of that “slang”, and I not some yahoo from Bufuck GA. And the idea that only such a person would be unfamiliar with that type of slang is laughable.
I humbly suggest then, if you feel that your country is in such danger from tweets, that you close the entire border to anyone entering, lay down under your bed and whimper yourself to sleep.
It’s not slang, it’s a quote from the Family guy. And it wasn’t said in public during the flight it was said on twitter to friends.
12 hrs in jail over a worldwide computer sifting of people’s communications. that’s what we’re theoretically talking about. You’d think the rocket scientists using this technology would be able to confirm the quote and it’s innocuous meaning in a timely manner. This from a government which sold assault rifles so they could track them for use in the killing of federal agents.
I’m unimpressed with the TSA’s handling of people, their after-the-fact tactics and most of all their all around failure to stop the weakest breaches in security.
It’s no different than saying fuck off to a couple of kids because you don’t understand their slang. People shouldn’t have to examine every corner of their lives and their innocent interactions to ensure that they aren’t denied the privilege of entering a country for a vacation, which should on principle be an easily obtained one that is denied only for solid reasons.
As a citizen of the United States I expect to be able to take advantage of free travel anywhere as almost on the level of a human right in a globalized world and in furtherance of that principle I expect my country to offer the same courtesy to the rest of the world and not capriciously deny entry to any tourists based on harmless tweets.
Having said that though, the government statement makes me suspect that there were other reasons. If they were caught with illegal drugs, for example, I wouldn’t object to that. But no one should be denied entry to my country, a country that values free expression, for mere expression unless there’s a good reason to believe that there is a solid connection with real danger. Yes, I want my government’s agents to spend their time and money ascertaining whether there is a credible threat because that’s exactly what they are for.
It’s already come to that by the reaction of the TSA. Every new threat starts a new procedure. They aren’t stopping threats from coming in, they’re reacting to threats that already happened instead of looking for people who exhibit the behavior.
I don’t disagree with your general view at all, but let’s be fair to the TSA: this was one egregious balls-up for which that agency was not responsible. It would seem to be the CBP that has its name on this.
It’s not actually that much of a stretch when you’re defending sending tourists away for making two jokes. And stop claiming that they actually talked about destroying America; even if you don’t know it’s slang, it’s pretty bloody obvious that someone doesn’t suggest meeting up for a drink in LA after they’ve destroyed the place, and that was the same tweet.
If it’s so serious that they should be sent away come what may, then their visas should have been denied or revoked.
The other tweet about digging up Marilyn Monroe on Hollywood Boulevard was just bizarre to take as a threat. It’s easy enough to check whether it really is a quote, and, given that Marilyn Monroe isn’t buried on Hollywood Boulevard, and it’s kinda busy there, it’s not exactly going to happen.
If anyone really does want to tweet about destroying America (because we all know serious terrorists use uncoded public messages on a hugely-popular website to make their plans) then now’s the time to do it, because there’ll be so many tweets about this story that any real threats would slip through.
All we know, and I’m not sure we even know this, is that the “destroy America” tweet raised a flag. We don’t know what DHS learned about these two people while they were in custody. All we’ve heard is their side of the story.
a good hoax is one that rides close to the truth. that this particular story, hoax or no, is so very plausible and that the actions of the DHS described is not universally condemned; it is a sad state of affairs, and shows that the damage has already long been done.
Most urban legends have an underlying truth and plausability, but are spun way beyond it. At this time, it appears this story is true, at least as much as we can see. What the kids said in their extensive interview has not been revealed, and could make a difference. It looks like an overreaction by the gummit, but we may not have all the facts.
There could be more to the story; the statement doesn’t say if there is or isn’t. (I doubt it was drugs, though - more than refused entry would have happened then). But this thread is about what we do know and all through this thread you’ve been defending sending them back on the basis of these two tweets.
The TSA was created in a time when the USA was genuinely worried that other 9-11 style attacks were going to occur.
We over-reacted, as is usual for bureaucracies (and heck, for people in general).
The Congress enacted one of the worst pieces of legislation ever crafted since the Reconstruction period, the ill-named PATRIOT ACT.
So now, a full decade after the fall of the Twin Towers, we all have to deal with the results.
The TSA was whipped into existence in a matter of a few weeks. They drew many of their personnel from the folks who handled baggage for the airlines (which is why such service was so horrible in the following months). Many of these people have worked their way up the ladder to positions of responsibility that they are not qualified to have, in my opinion.
There are exceptional people in the TSA, but it is not the top-of-the-line agency it should be.
We constantly hear these kind of stories (grandma stripped searched, et al…) and remarkably we don’t hear this that often about other federal agencies (hmmm… maybe the IRS… but I digress). Perhaps it is because TSA interacts with millions of passengers, but danggit, that should make them THE BEST, not the butt of the planet’s jokemeisters.
I know we need border security. I don’t suggest we disband TSA. But, it needs to be manned (humanned?) by better trained folks. This kind of silliness makes us all look like paranoid fools.
Well, not all of us. Just the folks in the USA.