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A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
November 12, 2001
C.G. Estabrook
Instead
of Terror
Alexander Cockburn
Wide World
of Torture
November 11, 2001
Douglas
Valentine
Homeland
Insecurity: The Politics of Terror in America
November 10, 2001
Grover Furr
Seeking an Opposition
to the Afghan War
Bruce
Kyle
Anatomy
of a Green Smear:
Backstabbing Nancy Oden
November 9, 2001
Karen Snell
Torture By
Proxy
John Troyer
A
New Kind of Activism
Tariq Ali
Q &
A About the War
Michael
Colby
Schoolgirl
Gets Booted
for Anti-war Views
November 8, 2001
Mokhiber/Weissman
The
Cipro Rip-Off
Mitchel Cohen
The Smear Campaign
Against Nancy Oden
Steve
Perry
American
Roulette
November 7, 2001
Bahour/Dahan
Placebo Peace
Plan
Tom Turnipseed
Bush
Gives Billions
to His Oil Buddies
Cockburn/St. Clair
Greens, Airports
and
National ID Cards
Dr. Susan
Block
Ayatollah
Asscroft
Brian J. Foley
Bombing Campaign
Not "Self-Defense" Under International Law
November 6, 2001
Mark Scaramella
Where's
That Red Cross Money Going
C.G. Estabrook
Our Torturers
Sheperd
Bliss
Scott
Nearing on War
Rep. Ron Paul
Underwriting
the Taliban
Tariq
Ali
The
General Who
Came to Dinner
Evan Ravitz
Stop the War
Through
Direct Democracy
Steve
Perry
Hunger
in Afghanistan
November 5, 2001
Patrick Cockburn
Living
in the Minefields
David Price
Terror
and Indigenous People
November 3, 2001
Declan McCullagh
Nancy Oden Interview
Daniel
Wolff
The
Memphis Blues Again
Mark Weisbrot
War on Civilians
Dave Marsh
How
the RIAA (and the FBI) Cheat Musicians
Robert Jensen
Speaking
Out Against
War on Campus
November 2, 2001
CounterPunch
Wire
Green
Party Leader Detained at Maine Airport; Prevented from Boarding
Any Plane
Alexander Cockburn
FBI Eyes
Torture
November 1, 2001
Dean Baker
Dying
for Patents
Sami Amarah
US Attempts
to Recruit
Russian Vets of Afghan War
Molly Secours
Where
Are the Voices of Reason? Let the Women
Be Heard
William Blum
Unleashing the
CIA
October 31, 2001
Tom Turnipseed
Terrorize
the Poor,
Subsidize the Rich
Chris Clarke
Thank God
for Berkeley
Steve
Perry
The
Silent Genocide
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Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
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A Pocket Guide to
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November
12, 2001
My Day At the Airport
By Nancy Oden
On Thursday, November 1, 2001, I left my farmhouse
on the North Coast of Maine, where I'm an organic grower, and
headed for the Bangor International Airport in Bangor, Maine.
I was dressed conservatively in a long, brown skirt with a matching
jacket and turtleneck sweater, no jewelry, no buttons or other
political indications attached, looking very like other women
my age in this part of the world.
I am a relatively well known environmental, social, and political
activist who has run for public office. It should be noted that,
while I've been an activist for over thirty years, I've never
been arrested, nor has there been anything in my life that would
signal I meant harm to anyone.
Also, this was the third time this year
I had traveled out of (or attempted to, in this case) Bangor
Airport on American Airlines using an e-ticket purchased from
Priceline.com bought weeks before with my own credit card. They
had no reason for profiling and singling me out. It had to have
been because of my political views which, of course, is not a
good reason (see U.S. Constitution's first Ten Amendments, otherwise
known as the Bill of Rights).
I was headed for Chicago for a Green
Party USA National Coordinating Committee meeting, where I was
to speak the next night on biochemical warfare and pesticides
as weapons of war. I was also scheduled to interview job applicants,
present several proposals and financial reports, and so on. I
am a lead person on the National Coordinating Committee of the
Green Party USA (the original Green Party, although there is
now another which took a very similar name).
I arrived at the Bangor Airport the now-requisite
two hours ahead of the flight and walked in to the airport to
the sight of a couple of dozen National Guard troops carrying
machine guns in their hands wandering around the lobby. I walked
down to the American Airlines ticket counter, where there were
no other passengers, and told the airlines ticket agent my name.
I was holding out my picture ID and the printed itinerary they
told us to bring, but he barely glanced at them. I remember
thinking, "Does he have a picture of me under that counter?
Why didn't he look at my ID?"
No one checked my ID at any time. They
all knew what I looked like and, it became clear, my antiwar
stance. I am not that well known that they would have known
me on sight. Why were they briefed about me before I arrived
at the airport? What were they told? Was it the FBI or some
other agency? Which one?
The ticket agent spent an inordinate
amount of time on his computer, then finally produced a boarding
pass with a large "S" written on it. I asked him what
that meant, and he said I had been picked to have my bags searched.
Well, one expects that now, so I said, "Oh, that's okay."
But I had a feeling there was more.
Since there was no one else around, I
turned back to him and looked him in the eye - he seemed a decent
guy - and asked him, "My being picked wasn't random, was
it?" He hesitated a moment, but then said, "No, your
name was already flagged in the computer and you would have been
searched in any case." Well, still possibly coincidence.
Then to the x-ray for my bags and me.
I said to the two women sitting by the machine that scans the
bags. sort of apologetically, "I've been picked to have
my bags searched. I know this might sound silly, but since you
handle all these people's bags and belongings--with the Anthrax
scare and all--I'd like it if whoever searches through my clothes
and things wash their hands first." They looked at me with
hate and loathing and one said, "We don't want YOUR germs,
either." (Turns out they wear rubber gloves.)
"Whoa," I thought, "either
I'm back in kindergarten or these normally quite civil women
have some reason for being hostile." I had the distinct
feeling they had been told awful things about me - I want to
know what they were told about this profiled individual coming
to their airport.
Neither my bags nor I set off any beeps
in the machinery so we walked right through to the boarding area.
Here I sat down with the other passengers. There was one National
Guard soldier in the boarding area; he was a short man with a
black eye wearing camo gear and carrying a machine gun.
Soon after I sat down, the National Guardsman
looked at the dozen or so passengers, his eyes stopping at me
and he yelled, "Bring those bags over here!" Since
he didn't call my name, how did he know which person was me,
since I did not look appreciably different from the others?
When I didn't move fast enough, he yelled
again, "Hurry up! Move! Bring those bags up here!"
This did not make me move faster. By now people were beginning
to stare at me as if I might possibly be someone bent on doing
something wrong.
I set my two smallish bags on the table
where two women were waiting to search my bags. As one of them
had trouble with a zipper on my older bag, I said, "Oh,
that zipper is not right, here, let me open it for you,"
and I reached over the table to undo the zipper. Immediately,
the soldier yelled out, "Get your hands away from there!"
By now the other passengers were getting nervous, of course.
He was standing at the end of the table
with the women on one side looking in my bags and me standing
on the other side of the table. I turned to face him, which
put my back towards everyone else, and he grabbed my left arm
and began loudly spouting pro-war nonsense into my face. "Don't
you understand we have to get them before they get us? Don't
you understand what happened September 11?" and so on.
I immediately pulled my arm away from
him and said, "Do not touch me. You cannot do that,"
and stepped back a foot or so, saying that I didn't want to hear
his views on why he thought we should kill starving, helpless
people in Afghanistan.
He grabbed for me again. I stepped back
further stating emphatically, "Do Not Touch Me," and
further emphasizing that I did not want to listen to his views
on the war. He was about to leave his position and come after
me again, but I saw the senior security man who is usually there
shake his head "No" at the soldier, who then backed
off, but he was angry that I would not submit to his holding
me while he forced his views on me.
I turned and there just a couple of inches
away was the man with the metal-detecting wand. I stepped back
a foot or two so he wasn't right up against me, and he did the
wand thing. I was the only one whose bags were searched. For
a woman of a certain age such as myself to stand there with arms
outstretched while a man skimmed my body with a device was very
embarrassing and demeaning.
I asked him not to touch me with the
wand, as I didn't know what it was, but, of course, he had to
touch my shoulder with it. I ignored this, just wanting to get
out of there. While he was doing the wand thing, I heard the
soldier, who was behind me, say, "Don't let her on the plane."
I thought he was talking to himself.
Then they were done with the searching,
and I walked the three feet to the boarding gate. The American
Airlines agent said, "You can't get on the plane."
I asked why. He replied, "Because he [indicating the soldier]
says you didn't cooperate with the search." I said, "But
you were standing here the whole time. Didn't you see him grab
my arm and talk loudly into my face?" He said he couldn't
see that because my back was to people, only saw me back off.
I then told the American Airlines agent
that I needed to get to Chicago and stated what I had to do there.
The American Airlines agent then said, rather softly, probably
so the guardsman soldier couldn't hear, "We'll put you on
the four o'clock plane; that's the last one out today that you
can go through Boston and still get to Chicago tonight."
I replied, "Fine, let's just do this. I don't care if
I'm late so long as I get there."
Unfortunately, the Guardsman overheard,
and he wasn't done with me. Clearly, this non-subservient female
had to be punished for not being sufficiently obsequious. He
saw me picking up my bags to go out into the lobby and wait for
the 4 o'clock plane, and yelled (that seemed to be his only means
of communication), "Come With Me!" I asked, "Why?
Where are we going?" He replied, louder, "Come With
Me!"
A few people to whom I've told this insist
the government/military is trying to "criminalize"
me and other political activists who don't have criminal records.
This is what's done to people of color. When they're harassed
and/or beaten by police, they eventually, of course, do something
to protect themselves and then get arrested for hitting an officer
or whatever. If they then get convicted of a felony, they've
go to prison and probably a few years of parole when one's rights
are mostly non-existent, and draconian restrictions are put upon
one's activities. Convicted felons lose a lot of rights in this
country: their travel is henceforth limited, in some states
they can't vote, own a gun, and various other limitations.
Under the circumstances, and because
I had a few hours until four o'clock anyway, it seemed best to
go with the guardsman. The circumstances being that each individual
soldier/national guardsman seems to be The Law unto themselves.
Each of them makes it up as they go along, punishing people
who don't hop to. Military law is not democracy.
He took me to the entrance area, apart
from anyone else. Then he ordered, loudly, "Sit Down!"
I gave him a look and then sat. The soldier found the airport
policeman and told him to stay with me. Upon reflection, I probably
wasn't free to leave, but I thought I was waiting for the next
plane so just stayed there.
The Airport policeman was a pleasant
local man and we talked about what had just happened as well
as people we knew, etc. Within minutes I looked up to see 5-6
National Guardsmen in their camo gear all carrying machine guns
marching in a sort of formation towards me. I was sitting down
quietly talking with the policeman. The situation looked like
a bad movie.
It occurred to me that this is how people
get "disappeared," which has happened to over 1,200
Americans so far since September 11. We used to hear about this
only in repressive military regimes in other places (usually
bolstered by our tax dollars). I'm sure they were ready to arrest
me for allegedly "not cooperating with a security search,"
with which I had, indeed, cooperated.
All of a sudden the ludicrousness of
the situation struck me. There I am, sitting down with my bags,
a woman clearly not a physical threat, and this phalanx of soldiers
in formation descends upon me ready to arrest me for something
I did not do. I gave a little laugh and said to the lead man,
"What, all this, just for me?" Then, I asked, "What's
this really about? What's going on here?"
He replied, "We understand you didn't
cooperate with a security search." I said, "That's
ridiculous. They searched my bags and they did the wand search.
The only problem was your man here [I indicated the short guy
with the black eye] grabbing my arm and spouting pro-war views
loudly in my face." The lead soldier (I don't know his
rank) said, astonishingly, "He told me only hit your arm."
I looked at the lead soldier wide-eyed
with a few unbidden (certainly unwanted when I'm trying to look
fierce) tears in my eyes, and asked, "Even if that's all
he had done, would that be okay?" I think he then realized
the guardsman had been way out of line and said, "Wait here."
They left, and the policeman stayed with me. I don't really
think I was free to go, although I had not been arrested.
I found out later they had gone upstairs
and told the Bangor Airport manager to tell all airlines in the
Airport not to allow me to fly out of Bangor that day, and possibly
more than just that one day. Since the military are in charge
of our airports and they can override civilians in charge, this
was made to happen.
I was to be punished for the crime of
questioning their authority, especially for the guardsman to
hold my arm and force me to listen to his brain-washed rantings.
Every airline in the Bangor Airport was
given my name and told that I did not cooperate with a security
search. Not cooperating with a security search at an airport
is a federal crime. If, indeed, I had not cooperated, they would
have arrested me right then and there. But I had been searched
so they couldn't say that.
However, now I have to wonder if every
airline in the world doesn't have me in their computer as a person
who didn't cooperate with the security search, which means they
can deny me passage in their airplanes. We will find out as
time goes on.
They told the policeman this news and
had him tell me that I wouldn't be allowed to fly out of Bangor
that day. So I said I had to go American Airlines and get my
money back. The policeman came with me.
The same AA clerk was at the counter.
He stepped outside the counter to converse with the policeman
and me. He confirmed that they had been told not to allow me
to fly out of Bangor that day. I asked him about the next day
and he said he didn't know. This is not a small matter for me
since the Bangor Airport is 100 miles from where I live.
The AA clerk then suggested I drive to
Boston (5-1/2 hour drive) and fly out of there. There were several
problems with that, I told him. First, my old car barely made
it the 100 miles to the Bangor Airport and might not make it
to Boston or back again. Then there were the parking fees in
Boston as well as the fact that I might not be allowed to fly
out of there or might not be able to get a seat once I got there.
Also, if they would not honor my now-expired ticket, I'd have
to pay full fare, which I couldn't afford. Not a serious option.
I then asked the American Airlines clerk
for my money back so I might consider some alternative means
of transport. He said he couldn't refund my money. I asked
him why and he said, "It's a non-refundable ticket."
This was so ridiculous that all three of us laughed a little.
All the airlines issue tickets on other tickets all the time.
So I asked him again and he said he couldn't refund the ticket,
indicating it wasn't his decision, which I understood, and told
him I'd take it up with the airline later.
Then the policeman, half apologetically,
told me I'd been banned from the Airport for that day, and that
he had to escort me out. I told him I understood that he was
under the military's rule, and that I would call it his walking
me to the door, rather than escorting me out of the Airport.
We walked to the exit. I thanked him for being kind and considerate,
which he had been, and left with the sinking feeling that something
bad is happening to our country. And this is how it begins.
Postscript:
I have since gotten in touch with the
Bangor Airport manager who assures me that it's fine with them
if they fly out of there, but that it ultimately isn't their
decision.
I've also been told by American Airlines'
head of security in Texas that I am welcome to fly on their airline
any time, and that they will contact Priceline.com about both
of them giving my money back. This is all good, excepting that
the military can arbitrarily, at any time, revoke my right to
travel for no good reason, as they did November 1 in Bangor,
Maine. So long as the military are in charge of civilian affairs,
we are not free; we do not have our Bill of Rights protecting
us because they've abrogated it and declared themselves the Law.
We are forming a national Bill of Rights
Defense Committee, and invite all of you and/or groups you're
affiliated with to help us form such a coalition based on defense
of our civil liberties. Please email back saying you'll be part
of this new coalition of groups and individuals, and include
your name and phone number. Then we can call a meeting to decide
what to do. We need a large, strong, united voice to tell the
military government we now have (Bush, Sr., who used to be not
only President but before that head of the CIA, Dick Cheney,
Daddy Bush's fellow oil man and defense contractor, and the Pentagon
brass) that we will not accept killing democracy in order to
save it.
We do not want corporations, with their
only interest in next quarter's profits, running the world.
We, the people, should be making the decisions that affect our
lives. Real Democracy. Nothing less will do. CP
Nancy Oden
is an organic farmer and Green
Party organizer. She lives in Jonesboro, Maine. She can be
contacted at: cleanearth@acadia.net
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