Border Insecurity Part I:
In 2005, I traveled on company business to Seattle. At that time I was an Australian Citizen, who was a landed immigrant in Canada. As part of entering US space, I was given a Visa Waiver, was photographed, and fingerprinted. On my return I was to surrender the little green card to a Canadian customs officer.
On my return I was waved through the checkpoint and I forgot to stop and hand this little piece of paper back. I did not receive a phone call or other message urging me to surrender this piece of paper.
In 2006, I repeated the trip but was now a Canadian citizen entering US space. I was not questioned about my whereabouts during 2005 and early 2006; technically I had not reported leaving the US, which was due to my lack of diligence with respect to the little green paper in my Australian passport.
In November of 2006, we (my family) did a road trip to California, and it was only then that the now offending Visa Waiver caused me to laugh, and cry.
The US officer at the border told me I had to supply all manner of documentation to demonstrate I had left the US as stated on the Visa Waiver. This I did.
This of course was an absurd way of solving things:
Here are the absurdities:
I had left the US twice already: in 2005 and 2006; remember to get into a country you must have left it!
I was not stopped in 2006 to explain my lack of due diligence on the paperwork—the only reason that this came to a head was the officer seeing the offending piece of paper in my passport.
the documentation I had to provide could have been manipulated by an associate in Canada to indicate my bogus presence
No follow-up or border alert was placed on my file to solve the issue—nobody raised issues with my poor paperwork.
Border Insecurity Part II:
Last June, I had to fly to Australia on urgent family business. I took a bottle of moisturizer, and a container of petroleum jelly, with me in a mandated zip-loc bag—the bottle was more than 100ml! The container of petroleum jelly was not. This bag was visually inspected in Vancouver, Los Angeles, Sydney, and on my return was inspected in Perth, Sydney and San Francisco.
It was only in San Francisco that I had to relinquish the offending items, because they exceeded size specs for containers.
This raised the questions:
How stringent are these luggage checks?
How much variation in adhering to rules is there? Not in San Francisco, but OK elsewhere?
If you have similar experiences of absurdity, of "catch 22",
e-mail me your experiences
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Why should I bother to save Energy?
Why should we bother to save energy? What difference does it make? And why replacing some light bulbs may not make a difference!
First of all, I agree that global warming is man made. It is the developing nations, who are responsible, and only developing nations through their example can bring this worrisome trend under control.
When I read the suggestions of turn off the lights, if it’s yellow let it mellow, share a ride, dry your clothing in the sun…,
I am increasing depressed by the nagging conclusion: “This is not going make a dent in our greenhouse gas binge!
Most of the suggestions above, and many others by the way, are great suggestions for being energy frugal. Why won’t these make a difference?
Because most of our greenhouse gas generation (G3) is from transportation, energy extraction, and power generation.
If we wanted to shut down G3, then our economy would grind to a halt; never mind that we all would very quickly begin to starve, could not go to work, etc…
So if someone suggests to me to do the honorable thing again, I am going to walk away.
The debate’s focus on alternative energy is good, but the crux of our looming environmental crisis is our inability to curb our G3, as well as being able to substitute low emission energy generation.
It is good when we talk about electric cars. It is good when we talk conserving resources, the environment, keeping the environment clean, conserving animal and plant species. But if that electricity comes from coal, oil, LNG or any other fossil fuel that is bad, if we cannot capture CO2 effectively.
If we talk hydrogen generation and storage the solution must be with the end in mind: Will H2 creation and storage create more GG?
So by all means save energy, however it will not solve the problem of more and increasing CO2 —and other greenhouse gases—in the atmosphere.
Our governments need to put the hammer to the perceived idea a clean environment is not compatible with good economics. We must also find ways to have the current CO2 producers be economic producers when it comes to cleaning the environment.
For more provocative thoughts check out the website of the Rocky Mountain Institute
So what should governments do to curb the problem? And why government?
First of all, I agree that global warming is man made. It is the developing nations, who are responsible, and only developing nations through their example can bring this worrisome trend under control.
When I read the suggestions of turn off the lights, if it’s yellow let it mellow, share a ride, dry your clothing in the sun…,
I am increasing depressed by the nagging conclusion: “This is not going make a dent in our greenhouse gas binge!
Most of the suggestions above, and many others by the way, are great suggestions for being energy frugal. Why won’t these make a difference?
Because most of our greenhouse gas generation (G3) is from transportation, energy extraction, and power generation.
If we wanted to shut down G3, then our economy would grind to a halt; never mind that we all would very quickly begin to starve, could not go to work, etc…
So if someone suggests to me to do the honorable thing again, I am going to walk away.
The debate’s focus on alternative energy is good, but the crux of our looming environmental crisis is our inability to curb our G3, as well as being able to substitute low emission energy generation.
It is good when we talk about electric cars. It is good when we talk conserving resources, the environment, keeping the environment clean, conserving animal and plant species. But if that electricity comes from coal, oil, LNG or any other fossil fuel that is bad, if we cannot capture CO2 effectively.
If we talk hydrogen generation and storage the solution must be with the end in mind: Will H2 creation and storage create more GG?
So by all means save energy, however it will not solve the problem of more and increasing CO2 —and other greenhouse gases—in the atmosphere.
Our governments need to put the hammer to the perceived idea a clean environment is not compatible with good economics. We must also find ways to have the current CO2 producers be economic producers when it comes to cleaning the environment.
For more provocative thoughts check out the website of the Rocky Mountain Institute
So what should governments do to curb the problem? And why government?
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