Wow, Ashcroft's gestapo "arresting, detaining, deporting journalists"

[donsu]

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/artikkel?SearchID=7315676733687&Avis=TO&Dato=20031213&Kategori=OPINION02&Lopenr=112130159&Ref=AR


-snip-

Without notification to foreign media outlets, the immigration and customs people are arresting, detaining, and deporting journalists arriving here without special visas. This is so even when they come from nations whose citizens can stay for up to 90 days without a visa if they are arriving as tourists or on business.

If that threatening form of registration is not enough, members of the press arriving without the visas, which no one told them they needed, are treated like criminals, handcuffed as they’re marched through airports, photographed, fingerprinted, and their DNA taken.

Peter Krobath, chief editor for the Austrian movie magazine Skip, was held overnight in a cold room with 45 others who arrived without the visa. The room had two open toilets, a metal bench, and a concrete bench. He was here to interview movie star Ben Affleck and see the movie Paycheck.

Thomas Sjoerup, a photographer for the Danish paper Ekstra Bladet, was deported after a few hours during which a mugshot, fingerprints, and DNA sample were taken. A French journalist said he and five others from his country were marched across the airport in handcuffs, without belts or laces.
-snip-
------------------------

article goes on to tell how various foreign journalist orgs. are protesting, etc.

but, why are they treating them as criminals? how does this game work?

[SpiralHawk]

1. "All your information are belong to us."

Get used to it. BushCo is just getting warmed up.

I'd bet a nickel none of these "foreign journalists" were good Christians anyway. So what the hey.

[truthspeaker]

2. W T F ?????

Many of these are from nations whose citizens don't need a visa to visit the US and offer reciprocal rights to US citizens. For a long time Americans have had the luxury of walking into Germany, the UK, and many other countries just by showing a passport. This could be a major diplomatic incident, resulting in those countries requiring visas for tourists from the US. What a freakin' fascist.

[Occulus]

3. This is Hitleresque.

I mean, really. "Don't compare Bush to Hitler"....

In a word... (deep, deep breath...)

BULLSHIT!!!!!

This is exactly the kind of thing the Nazis were famous for. The real truth cannot ever get out... foreign media is trying, albeit piecemeal... oh, what ever can we do about it...

I know! Let's arrest 'em illegally and deport them!

Next, they'll be outright disappearing and no one will be wiser because ALL the journalists involved or present will be detained. They'll be marched through a 'public' area- like an airport- without any form of press ID visible, none of their equipment, and you can BET if anyone asks what's going on, they'll be told the prisoners are suspected terrorists. Thus, the War On Terror Is Working meme is born.

This is how it happened in Germany, folks. It can't get much more blatant than this.

Bush really DOES equal a modern, much more subtle, Hitler.

BUSH=HITLER. And I can't say it enough now.

BUSH=HITLER
BUSH=HITLER
BUSH=HITLER

[donsu]

4. and along the same vein

the Key West police have begun fingerprinting and photographing the homeless. and will arrest them if they are found in certain parts of town.

[benfranklin1776]

16. Nothing better for the gendarmes to do?

Fingerprinting and arresting homeless people for "bein in the wrong part of town." Unfrigginbelievable. Such is the state of affairs these days. Probable cause, reasonable suspicion of criminal activity? Obviously such concepts are foreign to
these folks. Time for a remedial course in basic constitution 101. That can be part of the consent decree to settle the lawsuit. Paging the ACLU..........

[tom_paine]

5. First the foreigners, then US

Just wait for it...

[izzie]

6. This is sure to give us good press. How to win friends,

:dunce: :dunce: :dunce:

[Melsky]

7. I'm sure they will go home and write glowing reports

about the united states. This is really sick.

[knight_of_the_star]

8. Good Gods!

And here I thought he couldn't do anything ese to piss off our "allies". That proves me wrong like it is cool. If Bush isn't careful he will have US staring down the barrel of an international trade embargo.

[HereSince1628]

9. It will likely be justified by a report that says credible sources

indicated that terrorists posing as journalists would be entering the country. Of course that information can't be verified because it would reveal sources and methods.

[damnraddem]

14. And, of course, terrorists don't know how to apply for visas, ...

so this will make us safe.

[Nay]

17. Oh, they won't even try to justify it. That way, they are in-your-face

blatant about it, just to cow the populace. Will probably work, too.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. independent journalists are completely screwed

"Freelance journalists and members of independent production companies traveling to the U.S. on assignment must be under contract to a media organization and hold a credential issued by a professional journalistic association."

http://www.usembassy.ie/consulate/media_visas.html

and, from the same site:
"The current waiting time for an appointment for a nonimmigrant visa is approximately two weeks."

So you can't respond to a new story.

All I can think is that they propose to track the journalists, so are demanding their information ahead of time.

[punpirate]

11. Whether tracking them or harassing them...

... the effect is the same--intimidation. Stay out of our country, because it's our news to tell the way we want, not yours....

[Karenina]

12. There are no words...

:kick:

R.I.P. America... :cry:

[damnraddem]

13. Those silly journalists -- don't they know that they need their papers ...

in order before they visit an Iron Curtain country?

Thought the Iron Curtain was gone, didn't you?

[tom_paine]

15. It's now the Televised Curtain of the Amerikan Empire

Which, in it's own way, is MUCH more iron than the Soviet original for it's pernciciousness and advanced Orwellian Marketing Techniques...

[GAspnes]

18. U.S. turns foreign journalists away over visa confusion

Nov. 26, 2003 -- Foreign journalists are being unnecessarily hassled and turned away from the U.S. because of a visa requirement the American Society of Newspaper Editors calls an "obstruction" to newsgathering.

Three journalists from Australia were recently detained at American airports and sent back home for not having an I-visa, a requirement for journalists entering the U.S. Angered by what it says is the government's heavy-handed approach to immigration laws, the ASNE is sending letters to the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees to call on Congress to extend the nation's visa waiver program to members of the foreign press.

"There is nothing new with the I-visa," said Kevin Goldberg, attorney for the ASNE. "I think what is new is that they (U.S. immigration officials) are enforcing it pretty hard."

Natalie Apostolou, an editor for Communications Day Australia, Dan Kaufman, a reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald, and Sue Smethurst, an editor at Australia's New Idea, were each refused entry into the country, in separate incidents, after U.S. immigration officials at American airports noted they did not have I-visas.

The Reporters Committee for a Free Press

[littlejoe]

19. Mel Carnahan for Attorney General!

[Myra]

20. Holy cow.

...

[Armstead]

21. This is revolting

"Don't it always seem to go that you don;t know what you'd got til it's gone."

[tlcandie]

22. Does this mean Greg Palast will no longer be allowed on our shores

unless he's arrested or something? :shrug:

[Oilwellian]

23. Palast is an American

Only British newspapers will print his articles.

[tlcandie]

25. Yes, he is but so was Padille(sp?).....

:shrug: Just wondering since it seems the rules of the game have changed...

[Eric J in MN]

24. Is there a law being applied, and if so, what is it? (nt)

nt

[knight_of_the_star]

33. What law?

This is blatant disregard for the rule of law. I'm sure that the fundies are pleased with the madman in the White House though.

[RBHam]

26. Your papers! Do you have your papers?

Step this way sir. You can have a little talk with Sergeant Gunther. He'll take care of you. Real good care.

[opihimoimoi]

27. Our Tourism from "Furiners" only totals $867 000 000 000per year

Now that it will go down is hardly a guess.

Our Nat Deficiet will get worse.

BushCo is getting worse.

[Blue_Tires]

28. as a reporter

Who spent 14 months trying to find a job, thanks to the bush economy and deregulation allowing media to conglomerate further and squeeze the workforce...

John, please go kill yourself...

Even moreso than Bush, I tried to warn EVERYBODY that this guy was bad news for the A.G. office...I used to live in KS (Lawrence) during his race with Carnahan, and Ashcroft was hated then. I wish I could track down some of my RW colleagues from KU (who defended Ashcroft as a 'godly' man) and ask them how they feel now.

[Kerridwyn]

29. Another article on this topic - LA Weekly

http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/04/open-mikulan.php

Coffee, Tea or Handcuffs?
An Australian journalist gets a taste of Department of Homeland Security hospitality
by Steven Mikulan

Some extracts:

“Oh, you’re a journalist,” he noted. “What are you here for?”

“I’m interviewing Olivia Newton-John,” Smethurst replied.

“That’s nice,” the official said, impressed. “What’s the article about?”

“Breast cancer.”

When Smethurst tells me this, she pauses and adds, “I thought that last question was a little odd, but figured everything’s different now in America and it was fine.” What she didn’t know was that her assignment and travel plans, along with the chicken soup and stroll through Central Park, had been terminated the moment she confirmed she was a journalist. Fourteen hours later, she was escorted by three armed guards onto the 11 p.m. Qantas flight home.

-

At about noon, CBP informed Smethurst she would be denied entrée into the United States: While Australian tourists visiting the United States are visa-waived for 90 days, working journalists need a special I-Visa, which Smethurst had not been aware of and did not possess. She had, after all, flown into LAX on the same passport eight times previously without incident. Now she was being asked to raise her right hand and swear that her answers had been truthful, then was fingerprinted and photographed — every time she comes to America, her swiped passport will bring up this documentation of her rejection. As Smethurst’s inked fingers were rolled onto the government form, she noticed its heading:

“Criminal.”

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/04/open-mikulan.php

[muriel_volestrangler]

31. note how many questions are asked

and even though the answers are harmless, she's denied entry anyway, ie they were never going to let her in. So they build up their Total Information database; even her parents details are in there now.

"Cup of cold tea? Eehhh, you were lucky."

[Moderator]

32. Kerridwyn

Per DU copyright
rules please post
only 4 paragraphs
from the news source.


Thank you.

DU Moderator

[AlienGirl]

30. Why? Because--something is about to happen

Something's about to go down that they don't want the rest of the world to see, that's why.

It's almost time, folks.

Tucker