It’s not just international business (well, primarily that, but...): last minute tourist deals are going up in smoke, too. But more than that, as you suggest, it leaves the over-hanging sense that the US is simply not a welcoming place, and that’s going to hurt tourism from those who would have bought their tickets months in advance, as well.
I personally don’t welcome this move. Screen more heavily if need be, but I don’t like seeing this sort of action with nations like the UK and Australia with which we have had such long-standing relations.
“I personally don’t welcome this move. Screen more heavily if need be, but I don’t like seeing this sort of action with nations like the UK and Australia with which we have had such long-standing relations.”
This is not about “relations” with allies, it’s about a radical element that is exploiting the weakness of a free and open West.
And to register once for two years of travel into the US is not asking much.
Do you have any idea how many rugriders are in Britain these days? You want them to be able to jump on the next flight to NYC, pay the sleeper clubs tab at CAIR and fly home 8 hours later. No thanks. I don’t like Muslims at all. Them having to give 3 days notice that they want to come here is a great idea.
Just when it seemed that the lower dollar might bring in some foreign tourists to replace the Americans who have stopped traveling, the Bureau Of What Can We F* Up Now has come up with another brilliant plan to drive tourists away.
I would assume that those who have little dealing with international business, tourism, generating and strengthening the global competitiveness of our country abroad through participation in fast-paced, dynamnic worldwide business, so we can beat the pants off our economic rivals and create even more jobs in the USA, will particularly "get it". I agree, there are ways to screen out dastardly islamofascist terrorists, but sometimes the US does does stupid, rash, things across the board as an overreaction, like the whole "kids on milk cartons" fad sweeping the US that actually ended up panicking US kids wholesale. Often we cut off our nose despite just popping a zit on it. This, IMHO, will help further the decline of the US and it's slow, economic self-strangulation, while buttressing other places to become financial centers of the world.
While I am of course strongly against illegal aliens, and also legal immigration if it goes overboard, I am not against legal travel for legitimate business interests for citizens of foreign ally countries nor am I for its slow, bureaucratic asphyxiation by know-nothing, clueless government wonks in the Beltway.