Well, I am really sorry to hear you both had such trouble flying.
You are probably right that there isn't a lot of checking, like a social security number or anything like address, employment etc (that could easily be checked by the airlines) to separate the people (or aliases) they are looking for from you both. I think it's really scary that they either don't know or don't care to inform the airlines who they are really looking for. You would think that for an agency that claims to be looking for terrorists, having so many false positives is bad if nothing else -- even if we discount all the annoyance they cause to people like you -- because it makes it really easy for frazzled agents at the airport to let the real terrorists pass unchecked because "so many people are just normal decent people anyway" and it makes me think the entire system is seriously and dangerously flawed.
I suppose it won't be any consolation to y'all, but y'all are not alone. News around here a few months ago was that Senator Kennedy was in the no-fly list too. He told the newspapers that it was frustrating, because the people who saw him nearly everyday at the airports still had to go thru all the crap and it took him many weeks to clear his name from the list *and* he knew all the right people to pressure, a-hem, sorry, ask for help. Some newspapers around here ran the news as in "the newest republican thing is to harass Sen. Kennedy by putting his name on the no-fly list" or something to that effect. Maybe it was true, maybe not, but it took him some time and a lot of aggravation to clear it up, so I'm wishing you both good luck with it!
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Date: Sunday, 12 December 2004 11:16 pm (UTC)You are probably right that there isn't a lot of checking, like a social security number or anything like address, employment etc (that could easily be checked by the airlines) to separate the people (or aliases) they are looking for from you both. I think it's really scary that they either don't know or don't care to inform the airlines who they are really looking for. You would think that for an agency that claims to be looking for terrorists, having so many false positives is bad if nothing else -- even if we discount all the annoyance they cause to people like you -- because it makes it really easy for frazzled agents at the airport to let the real terrorists pass unchecked because "so many people are just normal decent people anyway" and it makes me think the entire system is seriously and dangerously flawed.
I suppose it won't be any consolation to y'all, but y'all are not alone. News around here a few months ago was that Senator Kennedy was in the no-fly list too. He told the newspapers that it was frustrating, because the people who saw him nearly everyday at the airports still had to go thru all the crap and it took him many weeks to clear his name from the list *and* he knew all the right people to pressure, a-hem, sorry, ask for help. Some newspapers around here ran the news as in "the newest republican thing is to harass Sen. Kennedy by putting his name on the no-fly list" or something to that effect. Maybe it was true, maybe not, but it took him some time and a lot of aggravation to clear it up, so I'm wishing you both good luck with it!