New rule lets feds track Americans leaving country
Civil liberties generally don't disappear in one sweeping motion. They are chipped away, little by little, piece by piece, until we are left with something very different than that which we may have started with. Since 9.11.01, our government has chipped away at our civil liberties in an attempt to "increase security". Just try getting on an airplane these days. It requires everything short of submitting a blood sample. Don't laugh; that could happen before we know it.
Now, the federal government has issued a rule requiring Americans who plan on travelling abroad to submit information. It sets a disturbing precedent, to say the least.
[T]he rule would require U.S. citizens for the first time to reveal their identities and international travel plans.
Passenger information that must be submitted in advance includes name, date of birth, citizenship, gender, passport number and country of residence. International visitors must provide a U.S. visa number and address while in the United States. Resident aliens must provide an "alien registration number."
"It will just be another step to allow immigration officials to know everyone who comes into or goes from the United States as part of an overall strategy to enhance national security," said Chris Bentley, spokesman for the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
"We want to know who is departing the United States, especially temporary visitors," he said. "We want information about everyone seeking admission, to verify who they are."
Civil-liberties advocates, still mulling the new rule, said a series of security measures imposed since the 2001 terrorist attacks have raised concerns about potential government abuse.
"You need to see this in the larger context of vastly expanded government information collection and data-mining," said David L. Sobel, general counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a civil liberties watchdog group.
"We are unfortunately quickly moving to a situation where the government is going to be maintaining a vast database of personal information that is going to be widely accessible to various agencies," Sobel said. "In that environment, you do have to be concerned about potential violations of privacy.
"There's also the question: Is there a real security advantage to this kind of requirement? I'm not sure the case has been made that there is. The 9/11 hijackers did not travel under false identities. I'm not sure how this approach would solve problems that existed prior to the attack."
There was a time when I would laugh at people who would suggest that the government would begin to do things like this. How paranoid can you be, I thought? Perhaps not paranoid enough.
Welcome to Amerika, home of the (suddenly much less) free....
