America's fake identity crisis (Mark Steyn)

National Post ^ | January 6th, 2003 | Mark Steyn

[Sabertooth]

It's hard not to feel sorry for Mohammed Asghar, a Lahore jeweller who woke up the other morning to find his picture in the paper along with the news that the FBI were looking for him. Not a good way to start the day.

The FBI didn't know they were looking for Mr. Asghar. They thought they were looking for Mustafa Khan Owasi, under whose name they released the photograph of Mr. Asghar. Mr. Owasi is one of five highly suspicious men Americans were urged to be alert for in the run-up to New Year's Eve. They may or may not have entered the United States using false British passports, or Canadian, or some other form of documentation. But what we do know is that they're Arab, unless they're Pakistani or some other nationality, and that they crossed over the Ontario/New York border, or possibly the British Columbia/Washington border, or via some other route entirely. Or they may not be in North America at all. But, if they are, they look like the guys in these photographs, except for the one of that jeweller in Lahore who's never been to the United States.

So, wherever you are on the planet, keep your eyes peeled for five guys who look like the sort of guys who, if they were going to use fake picture ID, would use the kind of fake picture ID with a picture of this particular jeweller from Lahore on it.

I'm all for lulling the enemy into a false sense of security, but, if you're going to bluff them into thinking you're clueless, I think the FBI have to be a bit less obvious.

Anyway, Mr. Asghar thinks his identity may have fallen into the wrong hands a couple of months ago when he decided to take a trip to Britain. As one does when planning a vacation, he got himself a full set of false travel documents. Unfortunately, immigration officials in Dubai spotted they were phony, and sent him back to Pakistan. Although he concedes a fake copy of his fake ID could have been passed to some other fellow, Mr. Asghar denies he has any links to terrorism. "I don't know who misused my travel documents," he says, indignantly.

This has caused great mirth among some Americans: How dare some other fellow misuse my fake documents! They're for me to misuse! It's true that Lahore is a hotbed of false document manufacturing. But, on the other hand, so is the United States. Millions of Americans have fake ID. To name one example, Jenna Bush.

Here's another: Salvador Martinez-Gonzalez. Mr. Martinez-Gonzalez is an illegal immigrant who spent two happy years working at the White House, setting up tents for receptions and other events in the grounds. He was arrested on December 2nd while attempting to re-enter the U.S. from Mexico. Touchingly, among the items found on his person were snapshots of him with Bill Clinton, Vice-President Cheney and other luminaries. The Secret Service huffily insist he didn't wangle his way into the joint with false identification. Their position is that he used "legitimate identification he'd purchased from someone else." So that's OK.

They also say that he posed no security threat. Given that his photo album shows him standing right next to the President, if he posed no security threat it's mainly because he chose not to, rather than because of anything the Secret Service did. He got far closer to the big guy than most of the world's Prime Ministers ever get, and with a bag of tent hooks and other sharp instruments.

As CNN's Candy Crowley pointed out, when she applied for her first White House press pass, she had to undergo a six-month background check, which included the Secret Service asking her neighbours if she did drugs. That's for the privilege of being miles from the President, sitting at the back of the briefing room getting ignored by Ari Fleischer. But, if you want to operate a nail gun in the Rose Garden, feel free to walk right in.

America is nothing if not a land of contrasts. But generally speaking a good rule of thumb is this: where no formal verification of identity is remotely necessary, you'll be asked for a ton of it; where it might conceivably be useful, you'll breeze through. If they ever do push through this mandatory Federal Identity Card, you can bet you'll be required to produce it if you want to enrol your three-year old in the Thomas The Tank Engine Junior Engineers' Club at your neighbourhood toy store, entitling you to 5% off your tenth purchase of Thomas-related items. But you'll never be asked for it if you want a baggage-screening job on Air Force One, and, even if you are, you'll be able to buy one for 30 bucks from a guy in a parking lot.

Maybe the Secret Service are right and all the fellows with "legitimate identification purchased from someone else" pose no security threat. But, in her riveting exposé of the immigration bureaucracy, Invasion, Michelle Malkin does a superb job of connecting the particular lapses of September 11th with the broader "undocumented" culture in the U.S.

One vignette is especially choice: A month before their rendezvous with destiny, two of the 9/11 killers drove to Falls Church, Virginia, to the parking lot of a 7-Eleven where "undocumented" Hispanics congregate in search of casual labour. The terrorists were in search of ID, and it pretty much fell into their lap. Luis Martinez-Flores, an illegal from El Salvador who's been in America since 1994, approached their car and offered his services. He accompanied them to the nearest Department of Motor Vehicles office, supplied the al-Qaeda guys with fake addresses for the residency forms and certified that they lived there. The ID was processed on the spot, and afterwards the trio drove back to the 7-Eleven where Hanjour and Almidhar withdrew a hundred bucks from the ATM and paid off Mr. Martinez-Flores.

Newly certified as lawful residents of the Commonwealth of Virginia, Osama's boys returned to the DMV the very next day to walk two of their fellow terrorists through the same process. These were the photo IDs with which all four boarded Flight 77 -- the one that crashed into the Pentagon. Virginia's non-system was by no means unique: 13 of the 19 murderers had Florida licences, though none were residents thereof.

Want to make it harder for terrorists to acquire the bona fides of a solid citizen? Good luck. Across America, an alliance of immigration advocacy groups, state bureaucracies, local school boards, law enforcement, the Democratic Party and a substantial chunk of the Republican Party (including the President) is wedded to the notion that the best way to deal with the country's vast army of the "undocumented" is to turn a blind eye when they come to the DMV wicket -- and that way they'll all gradually acquire their documents, and be eligible for welfare, education, health care and ultimately to vote for the Democrats in large numbers and (so Bush dreams) for the Republicans in small but significant numbers.

To facilitate this, the state now willingly processes a vast amount of paperwork it knows to be at best incomplete and at worst utterly false. If this was ever a good idea, it isn't since September 11th: If five al-Qaeda Pakistanis on British passports really did slip across the border -- well, OK, not "slip," that makes it sound as if it requires some skill -- but, if they really did get across the 49th parallel, all they have to do is hook up with America's "undocumented" support network and the Tennessee DMV will do the rest.

Meanwhile, conservatives who are churlish enough to complain about all this get damned as "racist," even by some in their own party, who tut that objecting to what happened in Virginia will make it even harder for Republicans to reach out to minorities. One can respect those who are anti-immigration or pro-immigration, but to be pro-illegal immigration is to collude in the corrosion of civic infrastructure. Rewarding the "undocumented" undermines the legitimacy of the state's official databases -- driver's licences, passports, Social Security -- and makes it more likely they'll turn to tracking you on unofficial, shadowy ones.

But, 16 months after 9/11, enlightened opinion is as stubborn as ever on this issue. Which has done more harm to America? Fake documents from Lahore or fake documents from Falls Church? Mohammed Asghar is right: It's outrageous that someone misused his false ID. On the other hand, the lucky beneficiary may already be working as a White House under-gardener.

[Sabertooth]

Salvador Martinez-Gonzalez… is an illegal immigrant who spent two happy years working at the White House, setting up tents for receptions and other events in the grounds. He was arrested on December 2nd while attempting to re-enter the U.S. from Mexico. Touchingly, among the items found on his person were snapshots of him with Bill Clinton, Vice-President Cheney and other luminaries. The Secret Service huffily insist he didn't wangle his way into the joint with false identification. Their position is that he used "legitimate identification he'd purchased from someone else." So that's OK.

< -snip- >

Want to make it harder for terrorists to acquire the bona fides of a solid citizen? Good luck. Across America, an alliance of immigration advocacy groups, state bureaucracies, local school boards, law enforcement, the Democratic Party and a substantial chunk of the Republican Party (including the President) is wedded to the notion that the best way to deal with the country's vast army of the "undocumented" is to turn a blind eye when they come to the DMV wicket -- and that way they'll all gradually acquire their documents, and be eligible for welfare, education, health care and ultimately to vote for the Democrats in large numbers and (so Bush dreams) for the Republicans in small but significant numbers.

"Salvador Martinez-Gonzalez" has been arrested and is being held on immigration violations. One wonders, however, why the Bush Administration is (belatedly) concerned about an Illegal breaching security in the Presidential residence, yet President Bush doesn't seem to mind much when Illegals are crowding our neighborhoods, street corners, towns, cities, and States.

President Bush got his reputation for being soft on Illegal Aliens the old fashioned way:

He earned it.

From his opposition to California's Proposition #187, to offering goodies to Illegals while he was Governor of Texas, to courting Mexico's Presidente Vicente Fox with visions of Amnesty (or "regularizing," or "normalizing," or "making their work legal") for Mexico's 4 million (at least, and counting) Illegal Aliens, to surreptitiously trying to push through an extension of Bill Clinton's Section 245(i) Amnesty scam for selected Illegals at the expense of lawful immigration applicants, President George W. Bush has, by his policies and pronouncements, assiduously cultivated an image as a malfeasant do-nothing in dealing with Illegals.

Now, with the Senate, the House, and the Presidency in GOP hands, Bush no longer has Tom Daschle to use as an alibi. It's put up or shut up time for the Republicans, and our President.

[Sabertooth]

((((((growl)))))

[Sabertooth]

It just keeps getting better..

Mexican ID cards accepted
at San Francisco federal building

[Sabertooth]

Americans, WAKE UP , WAKE UP , and "WRITE IN TANCREDO FOR PRESIDENT" in the next election.

It's to early to start talking like that. President Bush and the GOP have an eighteen month opportunity to get on the right track. If you jump off the wagon now, they have no reason to steer in the direction in which you'd like them to go.

[Joe Bonforte]

If you jump off the wagon now, they have no reason to steer in the direction in which you'd like them to go.

That's all well and good, but I see no evidence they would steer the wagon in the direction I want to go (scaling back the welfare state) if you held red-hot pokers to their heads.

[Gritty]

If the government doesn't solve this problem, and soon, it will likely be unceremoneously solved by the "American people" after the next major 9/11 type event. And it won't be pretty. And a lot of innocent people will be hurt. And it will be the government's fault.

But rest assured, the "American people" will be the ones accused of ciminality and sent to jail.

[harpseal]

btt

[My2Cents]

Have you ever noticed that most Arabs have two or three different names ("...Abdul al Sharif, also known as Mohammed ben Husseini...")

[alwaysconservative]

Bump and thanks for posting this! Steyn is simply one of the most laser-sharp wits around. I liked the part about the CNN reporter getting ignored by Ari Fleischer versus the guy with tent hooks standing next to the President. Funny, funny stuff.

[Brian Allen]

<< President Bush got his reputation for being soft on Illegal Aliens the old fashioned way:

He earned it. >>

Sad to say.

Thank God for Tom Tancredo!

[Nick Danger]

WAKE UP , WAKE UP , and "WRITE IN TANCREDO FOR PRESIDENT" in the next election.

I urge everyone to form the bones of a chicken into a pyramid, sprinkle pepper on it, and put it in the window sill in order to make the harmonics converge.

We can never have enough of these plans.

[Notforprophet]

Ping?

[alwaysconservative]

Americans, WAKE UP , WAKE UP , and "WRITE IN TANCREDO FOR PRESIDENT" in the next election.

For once, would SOMEONE from the Tancredo crowd please quit bashing Bush for a moment and tell me exactly WHAT that guy proposes as a SOLUTION to the problems of: 1) Illegal immigration (and explain the impact on our budget of such actions, such as use of the military)

2) Legal immigration (and explain the impact of restrictions of rights on our legal citizens and visitors)

3) Terrorism (that doesn't involve further breaching or suspending our Constitutional protections).

Maybe if someone could articulate this, we could send the information to our administration team for their consideration instead of vague threats.

As far as I am concerned, the issue involves an exquisite balance; it is a matter of law as well as politics, principle versus practicality. No matter what, based on their own personal agenda, someone is going to be peeved with the decisions of the current administration. I happen to ADORE President Bush, and while I was also leery of how the immigration issue was handled prior to 9/11, I believe that our President (and his political advisors) well know how to assess the risks of our previous policy. And by continuing to slap them in the face by urging a vote for a one-issue wonder is nothing short of political suicide. If you want to guarantee a disastrous Democrat in the WH again, go ahead and pump Tancredo. Me, I prefer to let our masterful team know that I will support whatever efforts they make to curb the problems without making this country into a socialist nanny state governed by the para-military wannabes. (End of rant, and donning flame-proof suit now!)

[justanotherfreeper]

Across America, an alliance of immigration advocacy groups, state bureaucracies, lo. . .

No, it's worse. It's an alliance of corporate business types who want cheap labor and Dem activists who want the votes of poor people. I attended an immigration conference sponsored by David Horowitz last year. Grover Norquist (the conservative who runs the Americans for Tax Reform and a pro-immigration shill) talked about being at a White House meeting of business groups, ALL of whom wanted expanded immigration. Very few GOPers have the backbone to tell the corporate interests to take a flying leap.

The situation will NOT change until there is a POLITICAL movement -- like the NRA, the eco-wackos and pro-life -- that DEFEATS OFFICEHOLDERS. Right now you have a million little groups run off of grandma's kitchen table and the think tank Center for Immigration Studies and that's IT!!! Until you make congressmen feel the heat, they won't see the light. (And it's useless to tell them immigration is what changed California from GOP to Dem, as they all smugly think "well, it can't happen in my state." Throw a couple of these immigration apologists out of office and see how fast the rest of them figure it out.)

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[Dialup Llama]

Easy. Take common precautions that a bank might take so that someone can't used made up or stolen Social Security numbers. Maintain the integrity of offical documents by instructing states to accept only primary documentation to get a drivers license (no matriculas or Cracker Jack IDs). Tie the expiration of drivers licenses to visa expiration dates. Track visa holders etc... Common stuff anyone would do if you really thought a WMD might get in the country.

[MeekOneGOP]

Thanks for the post and the ping !

[Dialup Llama]

Styen nails it here in one succinct paragraph:

"Want to make it harder for terrorists to acquire the bona fides of a solid citizen? Good luck. Across America, an alliance of immigration advocacy groups, state bureaucracies, local school boards, law enforcement, the Democratic Party and a substantial chunk of the Republican Party (including the President) is wedded to the notion that the best way to deal with the country's vast army of the "undocumented" is to turn a blind eye when they come to the DMV wicket -- and that way they'll all gradually acquire their documents, and be eligible for welfare, education, health care and ultimately to vote for the Democrats in large numbers and (so Bush dreams) for the Republicans in small but significant numbers."

[Mears]

We have a ridiculous government,terrified of offending one minority or another.

I know it's all for votes,but is there ANY politician out there that cares about the average citizen? I think not.

I also admire Senator Tancredo,why isn't GWB paying attention to him?