Whew, Canada

[kevin_standlee]

I am quite relieved to hear that Cheryl Morgan has made it to Toronto safely, not having been denied boarding to her Heathrow-Toronto flight nor refused entry to Canada for a business trip. At least for now, the fact that a foolish confusion between two US agencies (neither of which will acknowledge the error or make the slightest move toward correcting it) resulted in Cheryl being denied entry to the USA has not also led to her being banned from Canada.

If you think the one shouldn't follow from the other, remember that the USA has asserted the right to unilaterally decide who gets to board flights to Canada, Mexico, and nations of the Caribbean. They did this not by a country-to-country agreement, but by simply telling every airline that flies to the USA that they either do what the USA tells them (even on flights not crossing US airspace at all) or else they'll see their US landing rights revoked. So if British Airways wants to keep serving New York, Chicago, and London, they have to give the USA access to their passenger lists to Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver, and give the USA an unappealable right to veto any passenger on those flights. I wonder what the US reaction would be if the EU insisted that they be given the reciprocal right to determine United, American, and Delta's passenger lists out of US airports to Europe?

I used to consider the USA the "good guys." Not any more. My own country disappoints me in its ongoing insistence — regardless of who is the elected leader — that there is one set of rules for the USA and another for everyone else. And they wonder why we're hated and distrusted by so many people?

Comments

[msconduct.livejournal.com]

Yay Cheryl! What a relief. It's horrifying the way these agencies have your fate in their hands and you're absolutely helpless to do anything about it.

How right you are about two sets of rules. One thing that's struck me as a non-USian in recent years is Americans' unrest at finding that their own government had been bugging them. Not that I blame them, but the idea that it's verboten to bug Americans but perfectly OK to bug anybody else is a little hard to take when you're a potential buggee. As a result of this kind of thing, you're right that there's plenty of hate and distrust towards the US, although I think in general there's also an understanding of the difference between the US government and Americans as people. Sadly, there are exceptions to this, however.

[nojay.livejournal.com]

I flew from Britain to Montreal for the 2009 Worldcon. I could have flown via Newark from my home airport, Edinburgh but I would have had to go through US Customs and Immigration if I did so even though I would never have left airside to transfer to a Montreal flight. I would also have had to preregister with the US State department at my own expense before I got on the plane and I could have been arbitrarily refused "entry" to the US and sent back to the UK at Newark, and remember I was going to Montreal in Canada not visiting the States.

Instead I flew to Charles de Gaulle airport in France and caught a direct flight to Montreal from there without involving the US authorities in my travel plans. Nowadays I couldn't even do that so if Montreal gets the 2017 Worldcon I probably won't attend it. On the other hand if Japan wins their expected 2017 bid then I'd have no problem -- I'm just back from a trip to Japan on a tourist visa and I went through Immigration there at a slow walk (they do take a picture and index fingerprints though which is a little bit more intrusive than it used to be).