[Peace-discuss] Green party terrorists?

[Ken Urban]

After I ran for city council, my family and I were checked at every gate we went through and had our luggage searched at each gate. They even grabbed Liberty and used a metal detector on her without asking us.  It really may have nothing to do with being Green, but we won't fly after that incident.

Ken

>>> Morton K.Brussel <brussel4 at insightbb.com> 1/8/2004 11:10:27 PM >>>
A solitary incident?

MKB
Green Party on 'No Fly List'?

by Frederick Sweet; Alternet (Original source: Intervention Magazine); 
January 08, 2004

Writing about his no-fly nightmare in the Fairfield County Weekly, art 
dealer Doug Stuber, who had run Ralph Nader's Green Party presidential 
campaign in North Carolina in 2000, was pulled out of a boarding line 
and grounded. He was about to make an important trip to Prague to 
gather artists for Henry James Art in Raleigh, N.C., when he was told 
(with ticket in hand) that he was not allowed to fly out that day.

Asking "why not?" he was told at Raleigh-Durham airport that because of 
the sniper attacks, no Greens were allowed to fly overseas on that day. 
The next morning he returned, and instead of paying $670 round trip, 
was forced into a $2,600 "same day" air fare. But it's what happened to 
Stuber during the next 24 hours that is even more disturbing.

Stuber arrived at the airport at 6 a.m. and his first flight wasn't due 
out until nearly six hours later. He had plenty of time. At exactly 
10:52 in the morning, just before boarding was to begin, he was 
approached by police officer Stanley (the same policeman who ushered 
him out of the airport the day before), who said that he "wanted to 
talk" to him. Stuber went with the police officer, but reminded him 
that no one had said he couldn't fly, and that his flight was about to 
leave.

Officer Stanley took Stuber into a room and questioned him for an hour. 
Around noon, Stanley had introduced him to two Secret Service agents. 
The agents took full eye-open pictures of Stuber with a digital camera. 
Then they asked him details about his family, where he lived, who he 
ever knew, what the Greens are up to, and other questions.

At one point during his interrogation, Stuber asked if they really 
believed the Greens were equal to al Qaeda. Then they showed him a 
Justice Department document that actually shows the Greens as likely 
terrorists * just as likely as al Qaeda members. Stuber was released 
just before 1 PM, so he still had time to catch the later flight.

The agents walked Stuber to the Delta counter and asked that he be 
given tickets for the flight so that he could make his connections. The 
airline official promptly printed tickets, which relieved Stuber, who 
assumed that the Secret Service hadn't stopped him from flying. Wrong! 
By the time Stuber was about to board, officer Stanley once again 
ushered him out the door and told him: "Just go to Greensboro, where 
they don't know you, and be totally quiet about politics, and you can 
make it to Europe that way."

In Greensboro, after Stuber showed his passport he was told that he 
could not fly overseas or domestically. Undeterred, he next traveled an 
hour-and-a-half to Charlotte. In Charlotte, the same thing happened. 
Then Stuber drove three hours to his home after 43 hours of trying to 
catch a flight.

Stuber said he could only conclude that the Greens, whose values 
include nonviolence, social justice, etc., are now labeled terrorists 
by the Ashcroft-led Justice Department.

Questions about how one gets on a no-fly list creates questions about 
how to get off it. This is a classic Catch-22 situation. The 
Transportation Security Agency says it compiles the list from names 
provided by other agencies, but it has no procedure for correcting a 
problem. Aggrieved parties would have to go to the agency that first 
reported their names. But for security reasons, the TSA won't disclose 
which agency put someone on the no-fly list.

Frederick Sweet is Professor of Reproductive Biology in Obstetrics and 
Gynecology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.