It seems that every week brings yet another reason to wake up and pray fervently that the U.S. election will come sooner than expected. Now comes another reason to hope that this xenophobic moron we have as a president will be gone before he does any permanent damage to our international relations.
News has come in that the Bush administration is pressing the 27 governments of the European Union to sign up for a range of intrusive and possible illegal new security measures for transatlantic travel, including allowing armed guards on all flights from Europe to America by U.S. airlines.
The demand to put armed air marshals on European flights is part of a travel clampdown by the Bush administration that officials in Brussels described as "blackmail"-- and could see west Europeans and Britons required to have U.S. visas if their governments refuse to cooperate. Bush officials are also demanding that EU states supply personal data on all air passengers overflying the U.S.-- even if they are not landing there-- in order to gain or retain visa-free travel to America.
And within months, the Homeland Security agency will be imposing a new permit system for Europeans flying to the US, compelling all travelers to apply online for permission to enter the country BEFORE booking or buying a ticket, a procedure that will take several days.
The Bush administration is also asking European airlines to provide personal data on family members who are allowed inside the departure area to assist elderly, young or ill passengers-- a demand the airlines reject as absurd, since they typically arrive just hours prior to the flight and no records are kept of their identity anyway.
For the past few months, the EU has been supplying the American authorities with 19 items of information on every traveller flying from the EU to the U.S.-- but the new American demands go well beyond what was agreed under the current system and appear to violate several privacy laws already in effect in many of the EU states.
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