--- begin forwarded text
Resent-Date: Thu, 1 Jun 2000 21:08:51 -0600
Date: Thu, 1 Jun 2000 19:13:34 -0800
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Vin Suprynowicz)
Subject: June 5 column -- government-issued ID
Resent-From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Resent-Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED JUNE 5, 2000
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
Do we really have to show a 'government-issued ID'?
A number of folks have written in, seeking more details on the FAA
security directive I've mentioned, which instructs airline employees to ask
to see a government-issued ID from each passenger boarding a commercial
aircraft -- but which specifically instructs airline employees they may not
refuse to let you board a plane for lack of such ID, since America still
has no "mandatory internal passport."
It was the fine folks at Sovereign Citizens Against Numbering, operating
the "Fight the Fingerprint" web page at
www.networkusa.org/fingerprint.shtml, who sent me the article "Flying
Without Identification," reprinted from the May 1997 edition of Robert
Kelly's "The American's Bulletin" ($50 per year; P.O. Box 3096, Central
Point, OR 97502)
Writing under the pseudonym Betsy Ross, the author, a physician from the
Pacific Northwest who promises to update me on "some follow-up regulations
they've issued since," reported at the time that Northwest Airlines "was
actually instrumental in advancing my education about this issue. I was so
aggravated by the insolent and hostile treatment that their employee gave
me (hopefully former employee, after the blistering letter I sent to the
company president) that I demanded to see a supervisor on the spot.
"I then demanded that he produce the relevant federal regulations RIGHT
NOW, or face personal liability for authorizing an unreasonable search and
seizure, dereliction of duty, fraud, conspiracy, civil rights deprivation
and any other legal buzz words I could think of that moment which would
justify a lawsuit against him personally, as well as his employer.
"Like everyone else, he couldn't show me any statute or regulations. He
even admitted that there are none. However, he did produce a copy of
Security Directive 96-05, which the Federal Aviation Agency issued to all
airlines in August of 1996.
"Its wording is very instructive; it reads as follows:
"IDENTIFY THE PASSENGER --
"A. all passengers who appear to be 18 years of age will present a
government issued picture ID, or two other forms of ID, at least one of
which must be issued by a government authority.
"B. The agent must reconcile the name on the ID and the name on the
ticket -- except as noted below.
"C. If the passenger cannot produce identification, or if it cannot be
reconciled to match the ticket, the passenger becomes a 'selectee.' Clear
all of their luggage as noted in Section 6 below. Clear selectee's checked
and carry-on luggage, and suspicious articles discovered by the questions
asked."
The directive then explains procedures by which luggage may be "cleared"
-- most of which in practice seem to involve placing matching orange
stickers on boarding pass and baggage -- including: "1. Empty the luggage
or item and physically search its contents by a qualified screener, or; 2.
Bag-match -- ensure the bag is not transported on the aircraft if the
passenger does not board."
Ms. Ross writes: "This document apparently goes on for 10 or more pages;
the Northwest supervisor gave me only the first page, which contains the
information printed above. The next time I refused to produce ID and an
agent freaked, I told her, 'Just tap up Sec-Dec 96-5 on your computer, and
go to Paragraph 1, Section C. Designate me as a "selectee," and proceed
accordingly.' "
"She apparently thought I was an FAA undercover employee, because she
said that she was 'tired of you federal guys coming around' and literally
spying on airline agents, 'coercing us into lying to people, and
essentially being the "bag man" for an activity which has no legal
requirement.' I told her I could not agree more.
"Another airline employee later confirmed that FAA agents often engage in
such entrapment activities, to make sure that airline agents parrot the
government party line about state-issued ID.
"I also hit paydirt in a discussion with another, much nicer Northwest
agent on the east coast. In a candid conversation, he told me that FAA
personnel had held training sessions with all airline agents in the fall of
1996. Agents were informed directly by the FAA that they absolutely could
not bar an American citizen from boarding a plane, even if a passenger
refused to produce any identification at all! ... Anyone want to own an
airline, courtesy of a judge? ...
"Yet another agent in the midwest admitted that airline personnel were
deliberately and knowingly coercing people into showing government ID by
saying 'It's the law.' According to him the reality is that the companies
are simply tired of people selling their frequent-flier tickets.
"The airlines wanted to stem this practice by checking everyone's ID, but
knew there would be big problems if they instituted this procedure as a
private corporate policy. It was so much more convenient to say it was
federal law and make the government the scapegoat.
"So this policy meets the airlines' private financial goals, and the
government's goal of ever-increasing social control. If no one complains or
asserts their rights regarding travel, then another freedom is 'poof' gone.
Our children watch this happen, and grow up thinking the state has both the
right to define our identity by issuing documents saying who we are, and
also the right to require us to produce them on demand."
And so, as Buckaroo Banzai used to say: Wherever you go, there you are.
Papers, please?
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas
Review-Journal. His book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom
Movement, 1993-1998," is available at 1-800-244-2224; or via web site
http://www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html.
***
Vin Suprynowicz, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
"The evils of tyranny are rarely seen but by him who resists it." -- John
Hay, 1872
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and
thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series
of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken
* * *
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you have subscribed to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and you wish to unsubscribe,
send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED], from your OLD address, including
the word "unsubscribe" (with no quotation marks) in the "Subject" line.
To subscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED], from your
NEW address, including the word "subscribe" (with no quotation marks)
in the "Subject" line.
All I ask of electronic subscribers is that they not RE-forward my columns
until on or after the embargo date which appears at the top of each, and
that (should they then choose to do so) they copy the columns in their
entirety, preserving the original attribution.
The Vinsends list is maintained by Alan Wendt in Colorado, who may be
reached directly at [EMAIL PROTECTED] The web sites for the Suprynowicz
column are at http://www.infomagic.com/liberty/vinyard.htm, and
http://www.nguworld.com/vindex. The Vinyard is maintained by Michael Voth
in Flagstaff, who may be reached directly at [EMAIL PROTECTED]
--- end forwarded text
--
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED]>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
