Once again, both sides on the US idealogical divide join forces to denounce the stupid US border policies with regards to Canada. Like I've been saying all along - sheer stupidity! Finally, Americans of all political stripes are coming to the same conclusion. What took you so long??????????????????????!!!!!!!!!! Americans deserve to feel ashamed at how their government has treated Canadians and indeed their own citizens. With friends like this who needs enemies?

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servl...International/

Groups blast U.S. border-travel plans
ALAN FREEMAN

From Friday's Globe and Mail

WASHINGTON — Two organizations from opposite sides of America's ideological divide united yesterday to condemn U.S. government plans to require a passport or similar ID for cross-border travel from Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean.

"There's a mess here in our border security," said Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the Cato Institute, a conservative think tank. He said Congress was stampeded into approving the passport requirement in the mistaken belief that it would stop further Sept. 11-like terrorist attacks.

Mr. Harper said that the passport requirement, which will be phased in next year, is "a collective overreaction to the terrorist threat" that would not add to U.S. security while attacking individual privacy rights.

Joining him at a news conference was Tim Sparapani, legislative counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union, a liberal group usually at loggerheads with the Cato Institute.

Mr. Sparapani said the passport law will only "give an illusion of security," and will in fact undermine the privacy of law-abiding citizens and increase identity theft. He said requiring a passport or similar ID will increase the number of incidents in which minorities are singled out for extra inspections while not stopping criminals from slipping across the border.

"Terrorists, smugglers and undocumented immigrants could still find ways to enter the country or obtain false documents," he said.

The news conference was organized by the non-governmental organization Citizens Against Government Waste, which published a report blasting the measure as potentially costing billions of dollars while the benefits are questionable.

"People and commerce should be allowed to flow freely without burdening taxpayers and leaving Americans vulnerable to a potential invasion of privacy," concludes the report, which suggests there is no need to change the current system in which travellers are required only to provide driver's licences and birth certificates to prove identity.