Eileen Moskowitz has an item this week about how, in early June, a British reporter was handcuffed, detained, and then deported, drawing criticism from Reporters Without Borders (RWB), an international journalists’ watchdog group.  Moskowitz represents the PEN USA First Amendment Action Committee.

It seems freelance reporter Elena Lappin failed to produce a press visa upon her arrival here at LAX (Los Angeles International Airport) – and this led airport officials to handcuff her and take her to a detention center.  She was subsequently deported.  Reporters Without Borders contends that a dozen other foreign correspondents, including six French reporters, were treated in a similar fashion at the Los Angeles airport.  Lappin told The Los Angeles Times: "I felt subhuman. I was treated like a criminal, handcuffed, fingerprinted and mug shots were taken.  I suddenly had no rights. It was very, very humiliating."

Lappin’s Los Angeles Times article, reprinted many places since, explains it all.  And it has been going around the web.  You can find it here - as the New York Times chose July 4th as the appropriate time to print it.

Moskowitz adds that Reporters Without Borders has also criticized the detention and deportation of two international reporters in New York City.  They think something is up.  A larger crackdown by our guys against the international media in general?  Because they make fun of us?  And because they portray George Bush as in a bit over his head – as an inarticulate bully who seems unable to think things through, unable to say what he means, and who gets angry way too fast?

We’d punish foreign reporters for that, harass them then throw them out on their asses?

Not likely.  We’re not that good at planning.  If we were there’d be power in Baghdad right now and the air-conditioners would actually work, and the locals would be handing us flowers and asking about how to find the sweet love of Jesus.

This was planned?  Probably not.

But it seems one Tala Dowlatshahi, the US representative for Reporters Without Borders, claims that the treatment is “a deliberate restriction of press freedom.”  And he adds that that the reporters’ group has “been gravely concerned about new Homeland Security restrictions, not only on journalists but on other individuals and communities that have been targeted in a country that prides itself on democratic freedoms.”  And too Moskowitz notes the Secretary General of Reporters Without Borders, Robert Menard, personally wrote Tom Ridge about all this.

We’d do something like this?  No.  We’re claiming it’s all about having the right paperwork, and no more than that.  No big deal.

Reactions?

Ric Brown, the News Guy in Atlanta says this (and remember, he was one of the guys who started CNN - so this sort of thing bothers him):

Oh for Christ's sake!  Just when you start thinking the American puppy might turn out to be okay after all, he pees on the living room rug!

First of all, when and if I complain about this sort of thing, everyone may think it's a case of "What do you expect? He's a journalist! He's just looking after his own!"

But most the news-types I know are American, nor foreign, and aren't likely to get targeted with this kind of crap - unless, of course, they're traveling to some third world country.

Why is it so hard for so many of my fellow citizens - I was going to say "especially" my fellow citizens, but I guess maybe not - to understand the concept that the world needs free-range reporters of ALL nationalities to tell us what's going on, and that anyone, anywhere (and maybe especially in America), should find himself in deep doo-doo if he gets in their way?

I must admit from personal experience, this sort of thing DOES go way back before 9/11.  When my wife and I traveled roundtrip by train to Quebec sometime in the 1980s, I was more than a bit shocked as we crossed back into New York to see how nasty the US immigration agents were to anyone who didn't have a US passport.  I just figured it had something to do with the fact that we not only voted in this country but might have filed an official complaint about our own treatment, while we probably wouldn't about anyone else's.  And I reckon that's probably what's going on today.  Still, annoyed as I was at the harassment of the (mostly) Canadians, I couldn't figure out who to complain to!  Even today, I think there probably wasn't anyone who would listen.

But now I think I know what needs to be done!  Someone, preferably someone with an American passport (and probably with an updatable website), needs to publish an SAQ list!  What's an SAQ list, you ask?  Of COURSE you don't know, because I haven't told you yet: "SAQ" stands for "Suspected al Qaeda"!

And how does one make the SAQ list?  To qualify, you need to (a) be a US citizen, preferably a US government employee or prison guard overseeing foreign detainees either at home or abroad, especially those not charged with any wrongdoing, and (b) do something incredibly stupid and/or nasty that makes the United States of America look like a humongous jerk.

(Chances are, of course, you would also, either by necessity or happenstance, be a (c) Conservative, Libertarian, and/or Republican.)

After all, isn't this exactly what al Qaeda tries to do, make your country and mine look like a big frigging stupid bully?

But when a US citizen like you does it, especially one working for our government, you're giving "aid and comfort to the enemy," and should either be (a) tried for treason and jailed in your own prison, and later maybe summarily "Rosenberged", and also (b) fired without your pension, or whenever possible, (c) stripped of your citizenship and deported in disgrace to Australia or some other country where intelligent people reside who know how to deal with the likes of you.

Or maybe we can have your name dictated by some friendly congressman into the Congressional Record as being SAQ, and also posted on Post Office bulletin boards and the sides of milk cartons.  I think I'm now grasping at straws.

But anyway, yes, the "Suspected Al Qaeda" list should not be confined to low- and middle-level government employees.  I'm sure we all can think of more than one high-up muckymuck US administration official who would be well advised to learn to speak Australian.

Note to GWB: No, you knucklehead, not Austria - it's Australia!  The one with the kangaroos!  Just practice saying "G'day" and swatting flies from your face as you speak, and you'll probably be fine ... that is, assuming they ever let you through customs.

Or would you prefer France?

I think Rick was upset.

But it gets worse…

This from the Guardian (UK) –

Just five months before American voters decide who will be appointed to the most powerful office in the world, the US state department said it would no longer allow overseas journalists to renew visas from within the country.

From next week the estimated 20,000 foreign journalists stationed in the US, who used to be able to renew their visas with ease in any major city, will be forced to leave the country to do so.

Rather than applying to renew their visas in Washington or New York, they will be forced to leave the country and re-apply at a US embassy or consulate abroad, delaying their application for between four weeks and six months.

This from the ex-Brit now American conservative gay journalist Andrew Sullivan living at the tip of Cape Cod –

It's already a nightmare to enter this country, because of the new security regulations. British journalists have been jailed, humiliated and deported for the most minor of details, immigration officials at the borders now have powers that defy judicial review and act accordingly. Many of my European friends tell me that they simply won't visit the U.S. any more because of the experience of entering what appears to be a police state at the border - and the risk of summary arrest for no good reason. This is bad enough when it affects millions of ordinary people - tourists, business-people (I've noticed a big decline in European tourists on the Cape this summer). But when you target the group that is responsible for conveying what the United States is to the rest of the world, you are only hurting yourself.

But our friend Joseph in France, who has been in on some of this sort of thing, reminds us it’s not all new –

As some of you may know, in 1995 I traveled to Russia to as a production supervisor of a portion of a television documentary on the 40^th anniversary of VE Day.  We were there to film the celebrations at Red Square and at the Mamayev monument at Volgograd (formerly Leningrad) where half a million turned out, only slightly more than were killed at the battle.

Upon our arrival, laden with three TV cameras (primitive now, but then worth 80 grand a pop) the customs officials effectively "stole" our passports.  A shell game was played at the end of which our passports had disappeared.  We were free to lodge a complaint, of course.  Naturally, this was Memorial Day weekend (…or is that Labor Day? I always get them confused) and the US consulate visa section was closed for until Tuesday.  After we finally received replacements, I had to wait near a phone booth for several hours waiting for instructions on where to meet a man who would provide our replacement visas.  Naturally, I was to bring cash.

The folks at the US Consulate told us that this was a frequent game being played with foreign media, especially those with television and movie cameras.  Not a shakedown as much as a slow down.  As the country was just a shambles and Moscow was a bit of a Wild West show, they just wanted to hinder your ability to take those images away. R ussians are proud people.

It seems to me that the only possible explanation for the policy is just that - to hinder the efforts of foreign journalists.  Why only the foreign press?  Presumably, because our government has less influence on them.  Begging the question "how much does our government influence the content of the American media"?   Don't make me get all cynical.

I just never thought I'd see the day when we traded our "free and open society" for one where we attempt to silence the opinions of those we disagree with.

BTW: Whichever journalist at SLATE.COM who led the F9/11 review with "I celebrate it. I lament it" had it spot on: La Monde Selon Bush is the version for those who can read.

[ Note: See June 27, 2004: If Michael Moore had any self-control... The film he didn't make – for details on La Monde Selon Bush. ]

So nothing new here really.  We’re just being a little soviet in our approach.

But at the Canadian border crossings? 

Rick was, after all, upset.