CHECKING IT TWICE DEPT.HERE'S JOHNNIE
Issue of 2002-05-13
Posted 2002-05-06
Posted 2002-05-06
Posted on 05/09/2002 10:31:15 AM PDT by mhking
CHECKING IT TWICE DEPT.If you happened to take the US Airways shuttle from Logan to LaGuardia on March 23rd, you might have been stuck for a good while behind Johnnie Thomas, a seventy-year-old African-American woman at the head of the check-in line. The ticket agent disappeared with Thomas's passport, and did not return for half an hour. When she did, she told Thomas that she was cleared to fly, but that, from now on, each time she checked in US Airways would be required to call the state police, who would call the F.B.I., who would run a check on the date and place of her birth.
"It's not your fault," she told Thomas. "It's just that your name is on the master terrorist list."
Eight days earlier, at LaGuardia, the same thing had happened, and Thomas had laughed it off. (The agent had told her, "You seem like a real nice lady, but please don't come to me the next time you're at LaGuardia.") The second time, though, Thomas was not amused. She had just spent a fine week on Martha's Vineyard with her grandchildren, and was in no mood to argue that she wasn't a terrorist.
March 23rd was a Saturday. On Monday morning, at home in Wayne, New Jersey, Thomas got busy on the telephone, making notes on each call.
She called the F.B.I. office in Paterson. "If you want your name off the list, hire a lawyer," said the man who returned her call. He refused to give his name.
She called the Washington offices of the United States senators from New Jersey and Montana—she spends time each year in Miles City, Montana, where her late husband grew up—but no one offered a quick solution.
She called Denise Hartse, a reporter at the Miles City Star, who put her in touch with the F.B.I.'s counterterrorism specialist in Billings, who suggested that she call the Federal Aviation Administration. The number the phone book gave for the F.A.A. in Bergen County turned out not to be in service.
She called the Transportation Security Administration. Pay dirt! A Mrs. Boyd at the T.S.A. told Johnnie Thomas that she was on an F.B.I. "no fly" list because John Thomas Christopher was one of the aliases used by Christian Michael Longo, who had been arrested on January 13th at a beach camp in the Yucatán and charged with murdering his wife and three children. At the time of his arrest, he had been on the F.B.I.'s Ten Most Wanted list for two days; he is now in jail in Oregon awaiting trial. Longo was born in 1974 and has blue eyes and reddish-blond hair.
O.K., Thomas thought, it's a big, complicated country. Perhaps the T.S.A. could remove her name from the list? No, said Mrs. Boyd. Only the F.B.I. could do that.
Thomas called a friend who had been in the foreign service, who called a colleague, who called an F.B.I. counter- terrorism expert, who said that some entities called the N.I.S.D.B. and the N.G.A.T. (even he did not know what the letters stood for) could maybe "scrub the database" to remove her name. "I have no idea what either of them is," Thomas said. "Mrs. Boyd said maybe I should call the A.C.L.U."
Instead, Thomas called F.B.I. headquarters in Washington, where she was directed to the Fugitive Publicity Unit, which told her to talk to Supervisory Special Agent Rob Haley, in the Criminal Investigative Division. Haley checked with the Oregon F.B.I. and discovered that one airline had indeed been alerted during the manhunt for Longo, but US Airways was not it, so he couldn't say how Thomas's name had ended up on the list. He said he couldn't speak for "the counterterrorism side of the house." He suggested that she call her local F.B.I. office. "That's where I started!" she said. He told her that airline watch lists are generated from many differ- ent sources. He would check further, but he wasn't optimistic that he could get her name removed. "He said to be patient," Thomas said. Mrs. Boyd, meanwhile, informed her that four other law-abiding John Thomases had called to complain.
By this time, Thomas had been making calls for two weeks. On April 13th, she checked in at US Airways at LaGuardia for another trip to the Vineyard. This time, to her surprise, her name had the word "error" next to it on the computer screen. The ticket agent consulted briefly with his supervisor and checked her through. "Obviously, somebody had talked to somebody," Thomas said.
When, four days later, she returned through Logan, her name on the screen carried a new label: "Not allowed to fly." The agent consulted with his supervisor, and Thomas was directed to a back room, where her checked luggage was X-rayed. At the security gate, her carry-on bag was opened. At the ramp, her carry-on bag was opened again, and she stretched her arms wide for the top-to-toe wand.
"Something different happens every time," she said last week. "It's scary. It's surreal—so surreal that I've written a rap song about it. Here's the last verse. It's in the voice of the F.B.I.: 'The identity of the anthraxer is a mystery, that's true / But Mrs. Thomas, give us credit, we did catch you! / Say uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh!' "
Free country, my arse.
More legal extortion.
The FBI needs to be reminded who is the servant and who is the master.
Oh, please - she didn't identify herself that way, that's how the writer pegged her. Writers have pegged me that way. I got no desire to go live in Africa. I ain't never been. I was born in Indiana.
I would lay odds that the woman had never been to Africa either, and I doubt seriously that she was clammoring to go.
Maybe you should be reported ; )
What makes you think they are not the master?
Washington Federal has this great TV commercial where a guy walks into his bank and wants to have a transaction. Lady behind the counter says, "Do you have your account number?"
"Right here."
"Lean forward," she says. As the hapless victim leans forward, she staples a bar code to his head.
"Ow! What the -- ??"
"Speeds you through the line," she says, pointing. Behind the customer is a LOOOOONNNNGGGG line of people waiting in line, all with bar codes on their heads.
Finally in line, he asks the guy in front of him, "What's the hold up?"
Cut to the front of the line, the teller is trying to swipe another customer's head across one of those supermarket readers. The teller mutters, "I hate when these things don't read..."
Are you ready for that, national ID fans? Just think...your government at work!
Not that I am accusing you of being a little too apologetic for Bush's foibles, Southack.....but it did seem eerily familiar.... ;^)
It is truly heartbreaking but the American people will only begin to scream and yell about government atrocities once its too late, too late to even revolt.
Anyone else think we are seeing the beginning of the end of what little freedoms we had left? I personally think, that Dubya and his band have the best intentions… my true fear is when the inevitable occurs.
And the mindless masses elect a DemonRAT, someone like Daschle, Hitlery or worse.
Some may deny it, but it is coming and it will happen. The only question that remains is how fast will the Patriots among us; the true American people realize that the threshold has been crossed and react… and what will the government do once they realize the movement to abolish them has started?
If it was to reach that level, which I doubt it would, most Americans are just too damn stupid, lazy and self absorbed to act. Most are only worried about who won the friggin pole or what the latest WWF goon is doing.
I sickens me to even think about it…
I wouldn't have to even board an airliner to f__k up the entire air travel system.
Ah, we didn't think it could happen...
Ah, we didn't realize two people could have the same name...
Ah, we didn't think at all...
One almost but not quite wonders who dresses these people. Brush your teeth now...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.