How often do you entertain friends from other countries? The latest thing that U.S. immigration does is call people to check out their visitors before they let them into the country. Today a friend of mine has been stopped at border patrol and I was called by an agent of the U.S. border patrol to ask me if I was expecting a visitor, his name, our relationship, how long we have been dating, what he will be doing in the country while he is here, how long he is staying, what he does for a living, what I do for a living and if I am returning to England with him!! And IF I wouldn’t answer the questions they would REFUSE HIM ENTRY!!!
As it happens he comes from an upscale English family and they are upstanding law abiding citizens and strangely enough so is he.
In all the years that my former partner in Camelot came to this country I never received such a phone call. This is what we are dealing with. It is worth knowing that I have found that various airports depending on the city are more “gestapo-like” than others.
Just for the record, the more Eastern cities are much more like Nazis than the Western states. This is worth knowing if you intend to fly in and out of this country and/or have visitors from other countries. If I can avoid it I never fly through New York, Detroit, Pennsylvania or any other Northern cities. One time, when they interrogated Bill Ryan he was stopped in one of those cities. I had warned him not to fly through them… but he wanted to fly at a certain time and day and that is where he had to fly through.
Is this harrassment? I consider it so. In the end I don’t know why they don’t just check into the NSA database where they can learn all they need to know about anyone in a matter of seconds. With that in mind, this type of over zealous behavior on the part of border patrol is an indication of the police state like atmosphere that we are currently dealing with.