Text 750, 103 rader
Skriven 2006-05-28 22:18:58 av Alan Hess
Ärende: on the list
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http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.terrorist28may28,0,272301
2.story

From the Baltimore Sun
My husband is on the government's terrorist watch list


By Sarah O'Brien

May 28, 2006

My husband is not a terrorist.

He's not an ex-convict, a felon or on the lam, and if you don't count the
occasional Post-it notes or paper clips that come home with him from the
office, he's not even a petty thief.

But so far, he's had trouble convincing the government of this.

Every time he flies, regardless of the airline, he gets flagged when he checks
in because he's on our government's terrorist watch list. As it was explained
to us the first time it happened, something about his name, Michael Patrick
O'Brien, creates the need for an airline manager to clear him.

This involves the manager taking a look at my husband and his driver's license
and disappearing into the bowels of the airport. We assume this is where the
manager accesses a secret computer that somehow confirms my husband is actually
just a boringly normal person harboring no nefarious plans.

He's tried in vain to fix the problem. As instructed by a voice at the other
end of an 800 number provided to him by an airline agent, he downloaded and
filled out a government-issued form and attached three notarized forms of
identification: his passport, license and voter registration card.

Although he was irritated that he had to prove his non-terrorist status instead
of the government being required to fix its mistake, he faithfully mailed his
application for innocence and waited for notice of freedom to arrive.
Surprisingly, a response came within a couple of weeks. The Transportation
Security Administration sent him a letter that could only have been written by
a government lawyer. A sentence reads, "Where it has been determined that a
correction to records is warranted, these records have been modified to address
any delay or denial of boarding that you may have experienced as a result of
the watch list screening process."

My husband read the sentence eight times and arrived at the following
conclusion: Thanks to the "is warranted" part of that sentence, the problem
wasn't necessarily fixed.

He was right.

The last time he flew, he was flagged. He called the TSA and was told that
there is a problem in getting the agency's computer records to match the
airlines' records. This is something the government apparently is trying to
fix. But if this goes anything like the government's attempts to "fix" Social
Security or the nation's health care system, my husband could be in the grave
before his name is off the list.

This is more than a minor annoyance. When we recently traveled with our two
young children, the lengthy delay in clearance caused the four of us to be
separated on the plane. As any parent knows, flying with young children is hard
enough without the parents sitting in different areas of the plane and unable
to jointly manage the kids' behavior. To all the nearby passengers who were
annoyed by our kids, I can offer only this: Blame your government.

My husband also can't use self-check-in kiosks. The computer rejects his
request for a boarding pass and he has to check in with a human, who will
temporarily reject him again and make him wait.

The process is also an embarrassment. Inevitably, other passengers inch away
from him when an insensitive airline agent announces that his name is on the
terrorist watch list. He stands there, waiting like a leper, as word passes
among passengers that a potential hijacker is in their midst. Smiling
reassuringly at his fellow flying mates does little to appease their concern.

In addition, he has nearly missed several flights because of the delay in
getting the secret computer to approve his boarding pass.

I'm all for protecting our citizenry from true terrorists. And I suspect the
intent of the watch list is a good one. Maybe it's even prevented wannabe shoe
bombers and the like from getting on a plane filled with innocent people like
my husband.

The problem, though, is that, as with most of the government-sponsored ideas
intended to protect the masses from the threat of terrorists, a line of privacy
and respect has been crossed for a citizen who just wants to live his life
quietly and board planes without problems.

We're not sure whether there's any recourse now, nor are we sure we shouldn't
simply suck up the inevitable delay as part of our patriotic duty in supporting
our country's war against terror.

But frankly, if the government can't even manage to successfully get my
husband's name off the list when it's proved that it didn't belong there in the
first place, how much assurance can our elected leaders give that much thought
is given to whose name gets put on the list?

Sarah O'Brien is a former reporter and editor who lives in Hampstead. Her
e-mail is obrienmsck@adelphia.net.

Copyright + 2006, The Baltimore Sun | Get Sun home delivery

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