House delays rules requiring passports

[Eugene]

Source: Associated Press

Last updated June 15, 2007 9:32 a.m. PT

House delays rules requiring passports

By ANDREW TAYLOR
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

WASHINGTON -- The House voted overwhelmingly Friday to delay
for 17 months new rules requiring passports for U.S. land and sea
travelers entering the United States from Canada, Mexico, the
Caribbean and Bermuda.

The State Department has been flooded with passport applications
since new rules requiring passports for air travelers went into effect
in January. The resulting backlog has caused delays of up to three
months for passports and ruined or delayed the travel plans of
thousands of Americans.

In response, the government has already temporarily waived a
passport requirement for air travel, provided people can demonstrate
they've applied for a passport.

-snip-

The 379-45 House vote Friday matches a provision included in the
Senate's version of a homeland security spending measure, approved
by the Appropriations Committee Thursday.

-snip-

Read more: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1153AP_Congress_Passports.html

[Demeter]

1. So There, George

[annabanana]

2. Question: Are the passports they're issuing now the ones with

the chips?

[gratuitous]

3. Wait, is this a vital counterterrorism tool, or just cosmetic?

That is to say, was the passport requirement supposed to be some vital tool in our counterterrorism efforts? Why, oh why, is Congress putting us all at risk of doom (Doom! I tell you!) by delaying this absolutely essential program??? Or is this existential war against terrorism to take a back seat to convenience?

Unless, of course, this whole program was designed to gull the public into thinking "something" had been done to make us safer from terrorism when it was no such thing at all. Remember the days of duct tape and visqueen? Not even the Right Wing Amen Chorus gets exercised about this, which makes me think it's all a sham.