Welcome to the US, please be paranoid

Yea I went over on my own in april to miami and as a single guy,boy was I treated like a criminal. and I was followed aound the departure terminal,weird. but in the end if it prevents another load of idiots putting bombs on board and and hijackers. I guess its worth it.
the only thing that confuses me is that we fill out that ESTA form on line and still have to fill out that card thing on the plane. oh well............

I've flown to the USA several times and never had a problem with the landing card. All your Mum had to do was to read the instructions, take care with the answers, and check everything at least three times. The cabin crew always stress the importance of getting this right. Get it wrong and you will be delayed. You also have to have a thick skin and just do what the US officials ask you to do, however mad it seems or rude they are.

When I visited England for the first and only time in 1994, upon arriving at (Gatwick?) ,I was pulled out of line, brought into a secure area and strip-searched by customs officials.Maybe because I look Irish and the IRA had set off a bomb in Victoria Station the day before AND a great deal of their funding used to come from the US. The officials were firm and polite,and I understood and agreed with what they were doing. I definitely felt safer around London and on the plane flight back home. By the way, both Twin Towers were attacked (NOT for the first time), the Pentagon as well, the Capital barely saved on 9/11 alone.

Imagine how much longer the queues would be if the immigration official had to help everyone who made a mistake on the form. And as mentioned, if she struggled with questions like "Are you a terrorist?" then sending her to the room for thickos was the best thing he could have done. I wonder how many others have been sent there twice though.....

"He could have lent her his pen but chose to wave her into the area where the thickos who can't fill forms in end up." - Correct me if I'm wrong, but as your mother seemed to have difficulty filling the form in herself, wouldn't this apply to her as well? I mean, we're brought up in the UK to know that filling in an official form with red pen isn't acceptable, and we also know that every official form needs a signature, so why was your mother having difficulty? Perhaps the whole thing could have been handled more delicately, but asking her to move to another area to fill out the form again was not unreasonable as she would have been holding up a queue otherwise.

I'm a Yank, and I'll be the first to say that our airport security are retards 1st class. They get paid a fortune, by the way. So I wonder why they hire such twits.

The reason they are so paranoid is because it has finally started to dawn on them that everybody hates them. The reason ?? well perhaps the treatment your mother received at the hands of the immigration officer is a clue.......

QUOTE
MikeP - what if Mike P really is called Mike P(something)? Why would you think he is passing himself off as you? You're not the only Mike P(something) on the planet, you know.

Though I suspect you would like to be...!!!
Arrogance is NOT a Virtue 08-Jul-2008 17:56
UNQUOTE

It's a question of Internet courtesy. You might like to look that up in the dictionary. I think arrogance is a virtue!

MikeP - what if Mike P really is called Mike P(something)? Why would you think he is passing himself off as you? You're not the only Mike P(something) on the planet, you know.

Though I suspect you would like to be...!!!

I can't help thinking you have mistaken paranoia for people, (immigration officials) simply being fed up with you. The usual immigration forms only tend to ask for information, much of which is in your head: Name, address, date of birth, occupation, purpose of travel, passport number etc. Not that difficult?
In the end one of them was helpful and was sympathetic, so that's one bad one, one good one. Instead of reflecting on the good one, your inclination was to brand The United States Paranoid based on your this experience and one other experience 3 years previously. I'm not convinced that your extreme conclusion is valid based on this.

"Several of the comments posted here seem to contravene "OUR RULES" in the "Please read this before you post" area. One of these rules states "BE NICE - Messages posted that are offensive either to an individual, group or company, or that contain an excessive number of swear words will be removed. Try to be nice and criticize constructively!". Does this site have a moderator?

It sounds as if Jane and her party were treated unnecessarily unpleasantly. Presumably the form was I-94W Nonimmigrant Visa Waiver Arrival/Departure Form. At the top it states "Type or print legibly with pen in ALL CAPITAL LETTERS. USE ENGLISH". No mention of pen colour. I can see no reason why the form would deter a terrorist, unless it explodes on writing a lie on it.
Mike P 05-May-2008 17:03"

Kindly use your own ID and stop passing yourself as me.
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Several of the comments posted here seem to contravene "OUR RULES" in the "Please read this before you post" area. One of these rules states "BE NICE - Messages posted that are offensive either to an individual, group or company, or that contain an excessive number of swear words will be removed. Try to be nice and criticize constructively!". Does this site have a moderator?

It sounds as if Jane and her party were treated unnecessarily unpleasantly. Presumably the form was I-94W Nonimmigrant Visa Waiver Arrival/Departure Form. At the top it states "Type or print legibly with pen in ALL CAPITAL LETTERS. USE ENGLISH". No mention of pen colour. I can see no reason why the form would deter a terrorist, unless it explodes on writing a lie on it.