The Border: Go Directly to Jail!

Much of this border interchange, brought to me by the Dept. of Homeland Security, is vastly irritating but nothing more. It is what the Republicans are always complaining about as the inevitable nature of government bureaucracy. Surely it has long seemed to me, in that spirit, that any government ought to be particularly careful in figuring out where people have the most interaction with the government and ensuring that that interaction is friendly, helpful, and understandable. But apparently, that is not one of the seven principles of running this country, these days. Suffice to say, however, that having seen the border before and after 9/11, the behaviors after 9/11, inspired by this administration, have been more obstructionist, more irritating, and ultimately more outrageous. To some extent, this is understandable. I do not doubt but that the guards have all had opportunities for training programs in which some political appointee says to them, “How would YOU like to be the person who authorized the entry of a deadly terrorist into the country? You simply can’t be too careful.” Something on the order of, “Burn them all; God will recognize his own.”

Well, no one would suggest that they are not being too careful nowadays. I always hope that the deadly terrorist who comes to the Pt. Robert’s border crossing has some further plan for getting to the rest-of-the-USA. Perhaps he can get a teenager to smuggle him down in the school bus in the teenager’s backpack? Otherwise, he’d better bring a boat with him and be prepared to deal with the Marina people as well on his way to the water. Or maybe a very small, fold-up airplane to use at the grass airstrip that we have for small airplanes and helicopters.

The Nexus go-thru-fast card is advertised as the next big step in ID’s. It can be made good for airport security (go-thru-fast lane there, too), but first you have to make another trip to the airport to get your irises scanned. I used to have a before-9/11 fast lane airport pass, but it only knew about my fingerprints. When they took my fingerprints on that occasion, they told me I’d make a good burglar because my fingerprints are hard to identify (too much hand sewing and gardening, apparently). So late this career counseling and encouragement! But the iris scan is not achieved yet, mostly because going to the airport requires me to deal with TSA. Not on my schedule.

So the Nexus card may be coming to you and you may like to know why you might not get one or why you might not be able to keep it. Point Roberts residents have had quite a bit of experience with being rejected and with being thrown out of the program. Ever had any kind of conviction, no matter how trivial, misdemeanor or felony? Well, you are not going to get a Nexus card. People have been rejected for having a ‘drunk and disorderly’ conviction over three decades previously with nothing since then. DUI’s, failure to pay child support, drug possession, unsafe driving, failing to fill out your application form correctly (a form which gives you, as I recall, two lines to record every name you have ever used in your life. Which, if you’ve dabbled in a lot of identities or tried marriage with multiple enthusiasms is not an adequate space, as in: Judith Elizabeth Wilson, Judith Wilson Hurst, Judith Wilson Albaum, Judith Wilson Ross, Judy Ross, Judith W. Ross, Judy W. Ross. It was that line-up that caused my agency person to designate me, for all time, Judith Elizabeth Ross. They didn’t reject me for the Nexus program for my failure to include all these possibilities, but I was chided for having failed to include them all and for having failed to know my right name, and I was warned that they could reject my application for this, but chose not to as an expression of good will, I guess.

Getting the card, though, may not be the same as keeping it. They can take it away from you for just about any reason, and they do: e.g., for violating the food ordinances; they can take it away from you if you have work materials in your car when you go through the Nexus lane; or if you have a person in the car with you who doesn’t have a Nexus card, or doesn’t have it with him at the moment; or if you have your daughter’s sweater, but not your daughter with her Nexus card in your car (you may not take anything in your car that belongs to anyone else through the Nexus lane). That last one creates a particularly difficult question for me, though. It’s about laundry. Our 650 sq. foot house doesn’t actually have enough room for a washing machine. It’s not a big inconvenience as we don’t use up that many clothes and I can always cross the border to the laundromat a mile away. But the laundry…is it mine? Certainly it consists of Ed’s clothes AND my clothes? And can I take Ed’s clothes to the laundromat in Canada? Or can I claim that, as the doer of laundry, for that period of time, the clothes actually all belong to me? But then am I taking work materials in the car with me? And if I take all this laundry, across the border, will I have demonstrated that I am unworthy to be trusted by my country to have this special pass? Will they think I might be a terrorist with a laundry fetish? Will they take my card away from me? And will I go berserk if they do? I don’t know the answers to any of those questions, but so far I have not discussed this matter in detail with Homeland Security.