McCarthy at the border?
[ by Charles Cameron — questions that come too close for comfort ]
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As usual, I’m about the business of comparing and contrasting — this time comparing a question asked of visitors to the US at the Canadian border with the key question asked in the McCarthy era.
The similarity is close enough to serve as food for thought, no?
Carl:
May 9th, 2015 at 9:06 pm
Ugh, what have we become?
Lexington Green:
May 10th, 2015 at 7:24 pm
Both questions are legitimate.
Charles Cameron:
May 10th, 2015 at 9:41 pm
And that’s your legal opinion, Lex? Do you find them both appropriate?
larrydunbar:
May 11th, 2015 at 1:02 am
Does legal opinion find them 9/10’s of the law appropriate? Or, after they are gone, who does the law find appropriate? The KSA?
I think enough resources have been appropriated towards a new Caliphate to give the area a position in favor of, instead of against the Caliphate.
Considering the importance of water instead of oil. The region is turning against KSA, but not against the Sunni population.
So the Sunni hold the area, as ISIS is slowly replaced?
Smells like a Caliphate to me.
zen:
May 11th, 2015 at 2:44 pm
Immigration should be subject to commonsense counterintelligence and counter-terrorism screening. If you are an angry young Muslim man (or woman) from a conflict zone with an affinity for attending mosques with radical preachers and ISIS fanboi flag-waving, you should be denied entry to the United States, period, with no apology. Same reason we kept out (or tried to) Communists, Nazis, war criminals, mafioso and other undesirable aliens who would be a threat to our civil peace
Charles Cameron:
May 11th, 2015 at 4:17 pm
Hi, Zen:
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Do you think that question — “Do you have any relatives or friends who..” — asked at the point of entry, is likely to reveal who is and who isn’t “an angry young Muslim man (or woman) from a conflict zone with an affinity for attending mosques with radical preachers and ISIS fanboi flag-waving”?
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On another note, it seems to me there’s a lot of subjectivity in figuring out who is angry and what is radical, and being overly prohibitive risks angering some who were not otherwise angry, just as not being careful enough risks admitting people who may have mayhem in mind.
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Nuance, no? That question seems like a peculiarly blunt unstrument.
zen:
May 11th, 2015 at 5:13 pm
Hi Charles,
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Generally, such questions are meant to lead, if affirmative, to other questions related to a propensity for violent political behavior or membership in organizations on the State Department terrorism list.
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Of course, no clever agent of the same would answer truthfully, but answering falsely and having this come out later are grounds for deportation. Most of the elderly Nazis who are caught having sought refuge here are not convicted of their crimes but are deported and/or stripped of their citizenship by DOJ for having lied on their immigration paperwork and interviews.
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Some people do answer these questions honestly, remarkably enough. It is a blunt instrument but it is also a question of probability; the US has no shortage of applicants for visas so it makes sense to lean against those whose bios indicate a propensity for mischief of various kinds (drug trafficking, criminal records, human rights violations, gang membership, service in foreign IC orgs and terrorism being the most frequent issues).
T. Greer:
May 11th, 2015 at 5:53 pm
Blunt instruments have their purpose.
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(Emphasis added)