Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

F6, i wondered how many American citizens were in exile .. for now i've settled for the story of a 26 year old Muslim American, Yahya Wehelie ..

Exiled on the no-fly list

An American Muslim stranded in Egypt can't board a plane home until he commits the logical impossibility of proving a negative

Jennifer Abel .. guardian.co.uk, Friday 18 June 2010 13.30 BST

The oil geyser in the Gulf of Mexico has brutally driven home the message "We Americans must reduce our dependence on fossil fuels." Yet without gasoline, how can we operate the cars and trucks that make modern American life possible? Easy: just require that all internal combustion engines be replaced by clean-running, environmentally friendly perpetual motion machines.

What's that? Perpetual motion is impossible, and only a tyrant would require people to do what simply can't be done? But I have precedent on my side – requiring the impossible is a cornerstone of our anti-terrorist strategy. Right now there's an American citizen stranded overseas and forbidden from coming home unless he commits the logical impossibility of proving a negative: specifically, that he is not a national security threat.

You've likely heard about America's "no-fly list", one of the US government's many responses to 9/11. It is pretty much what its name suggests: if your name is on it, you can't fly unless you prove to the satisfaction of the TSA or FBI or other authorities that you're trustworthy.

Nobody knows how names get on the list, and there's no way to get names off. There's no due process, or seeing the evidence against you. All it takes is some anonymous bureaucrat who thinks you're a threat, or might be a threat, or never forgave you for refusing to be his prom date back in 1996, and however your name gets on that list, you won't even know it until you try boarding an aeroplane and learn you can't.

In 2004, when the no-fly list was new, this happened to then-Senator Ted Kennedy, not because he personally was under suspicion but because the geniuses behind the list hadn't quite grasped the concept that several people can share the same name. Six years later they still haven't: in January America learned about eight-year-old Mikey Hicks, who's been on the list since age two and gets frisked by scary uniformed grown-ups every time his family goes on vacation. Such is childhood in the Land of the Free.

But the latest no-fly travesty has nothing to do with mistaken identity. In 2008 a Muslim American named Yahya Wehelie, now 26, went to Yemen to study computer science at Lebanese International University. It was his parents' idea; he went slightly adrift after high school, even getting busted for marijuana possession and reckless driving. So his parents thought he should go overseas, study Arabic, maybe meet a nice girl and marry her (all of which he did).

Six weeks ago he tried flying home. When he changed planes in Cairo, FBI agents told him he was on the list, presumably because one of his casual acquaintances in Yemen's small American expat community was Sharif Mobley, the New Jersey man arrested last March on suspicion of terrorism and murder. Wehelie answered all the FBI's questions, and even offered to fly home in handcuffs flanked by air marshals – which would surely negate any threat he might pose to the plane – but they rejected his offer (thus lending credence to my theory that most of the measures imposed after 9/11 have nothing to do with security and everything to do with training Americans to obey authority, no matter how capricious).

The New York Times, which broke the story, noted: "The case also illustrates the daunting challenge, both for people like Mr Wehelie and for their FBI questioners, of proving that they pose no security threat." No kidding. That challenge is not merely "daunting" but impossible; anyone who's taken Logic 101 knows you can't prove a negative. That's why if the government accuses you of being a security threat, it's supposed to be on them to prove you are, because you can't possibly prove you aren't.

Neither can Mr Wehelie, who remains stranded in Egypt with no legal recourse. His passport expires
this September; if he's still in exile when it does, there's no knowing how he'll ever get back home.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/jun/17/no-fly-list-american-muslim-egypt

ps: back to Gulet .. heh .. fwiw, I just sent this note to the W hite House

To President Obama

Mr. President

I am distressed to read the US, under your guidance, is continuing to deprive US citizens (yes, US passport holders) of the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness, without due process of law. This heinous policy of the the Bush administration, is sadly being continued by yours, is patently unconstitutional, and remains a black mark on the name and nature of your country and of your administration.

I refer to the case of the young Somalian, Gulet Mohamed, who while visiting family in Kuwait, was abducted under blindfold, taken to a secret location, and intensively interrogated, including beatings and torture. He has not been charged with any offense, and remains in detention by the Kuwait authorities.

Please, this inhumane and unjust treatment of an American citizen should have no place in an American world. Charge him or let him go.

Thank you for your anticipated consideration of this request. I look forward to hearing from you as regards this matter.

Sincerely