[FourPeas]

Turns out that when he was in the state Senate a decade ago, McClintock said he discovered suddenly that he couldn't check into his flight.

"When I asked why, I was told I was on this government list," McClintock said, calling the whole experience "Kafkaesque."

"My first reaction was to ask, 'Why am I on that list?' 'We can't tell you that.' 'What are the criteria you use?' I asked. 'That's classified.' I said, 'How can I get off this list?' The answer was, 'You can't.'"

He said it ended up being a case of mistaken identity with an Irish Republican Army activist the "British government was mad at."

McClintock said he soon learned that a fellow state senator also had been placed on the list, as well as the late U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy. McClintock said he at least had the state Senate sergeant-at-arms to work through to clear up the confusion -- "something an ordinary American would not."

Still, he said it took months of working with officials and repeated petitions to the government to get his name removed.

I'm amazing at the people who don't realize the arbitrary way in which people can get on the no-fly list, or the hoops that an innocent American has to go through to get off it. The government secrecy concerning the no-fly list is simply not appropriate for a free people even without the threat of using it to deny constitutionally guaranteed rights.

[joe fonebone]

thank you gwb...

and the republicans...

and those who supported the patriot act...

and socialists / communists everywhere