Date: Wed, 10 Apr 2002 03:42:05 -0400
From: Elspeth Kovar <ekovar at radix.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: The Constitution and the Citizen
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

Steve Smith wrote:
>
> "Strong, Lee" wrote:
> >
> >         Haddad's crime is a real, nonpolitical crime that he actually
> > committed.  The website you introduced into this discussion admits that.  It
> > is legitimate to arrest a person on one crime that he has actually committed
> > even if you think he is ALSO guilty of another.
>
> Yep.  We have a number of "crimes" that are very useful for nailing
> people we don't like.  Overstaying a visa is one.  Given the famous
> efficiency of the INS (see
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A16787-2002Mar12
> for the most famous recent example), overstaying a visa is common to the
> point of being unavoidable.

Steve, that doesn't make sense.  It translates into "Because the agency
that is supposed to kick me out if I overstay my visa is inefficient
overstaying my visa is unavoidable."  Run that by me again?

Look, people know when their visas expire.  They know that if they stay
in the US afterwards that they're here illegally.  The fact that there
has, until now, been no concerted effort to track down such people
doesn't change the fact that they're knowingly committing a crime, with
no quotes whatsoever.

Elspeth