Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
Canadian islanders angry over US mail searches
Campobello, a small Canadian island on the southwestern tip of New Brunswick, is only accessible year-round by bridge from the US state of Maine. US Customs agents have recently begun intercepting mail sent by Canada's postal agency to the island, leaving residents frustrated - and worried about their privacy.
It was late summer when packages began arriving at the post office in the Campobello village of Welshpool with bright green labels declaring they'd been inspected by US customs. Packages, envelopes, it didn't matter, they were checked at the border.
"Anything that arrives at the border is subject to being searched - that means anything," postmaster Kathleen Case told the BBC.
Some days every item of mail - which are placed in a bonded truck in Canada and then sent about 80km (50 miles) through Maine and over the international Franklin Delano Roosevelt Bridge to Campobello - is inspected. Some packages have been seized.
"Here we are, a symbol of US-Canada friendship, and this is going on," says resident Steve Hatch. The former journalist has lodged a complaint with Canada Post, arguing the security of the mail destined for the island's 800 residents is being compromised and their privacy unprotected.
"Anything you order, [US border patrol agents] are going to know about," Mr Hatch told the BBC.
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @12:34PM (5 children)
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(Score: 4, Funny) by bradley13 on Monday December 02 2019, @01:18PM (4 children)
Geez, AC, who peed in your cornflakes?
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @01:31PM (2 children)
It's a bot. So Bender did it. Robot on Robot violence is the norm. Mom was a bad mother so all (Ro)Bots are bad (asses.)
Admins: give me the IP so I cane go a shoot it in the ball bearings!
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @01:43PM (1 child)
Silly moron, you'll have to ban the IP range of the entire fucking internet, and then how will your precious fucking old people spew their right wing shit?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @02:31PM
When you grow up what will you do? Bot! At least Bender had a good job. He can also bend your ass into a little zero.
Get some respect for yourself. Then and only then can you sit a big boys table.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @01:37PM
SoylentNews is politics. Right wing politics. Extremely selfish self-serving self-centered greedy pensioner right wing politics. And absolutely nothing else.
(Score: 4, Informative) by DavePolaschek on Monday December 02 2019, @01:23PM (7 children)
The Northwest Angle [wikipedia.org] in Minnesota is in a similar position, but with the tables reversed. Similarly, Point Roberts, WA and East Alburgh, VT. I expect there would be a similar uproar in the Angle if Canadian customs started searching the US Mail.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by fadrian on Monday December 02 2019, @01:54PM (5 children)
Tit for tat is probably the best strategy for this issue.
That is all.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday December 02 2019, @02:22PM (3 children)
What I can't figure out is: who cares? What could we possibly learn from snooping in Canadian mail destined for an island that's more inside the US than Canada? If you're building a terror base in Maine, wouldn't it make more sense to do it somewhere inland, remote, unremarkable?
Besides, if they want to know what these people are ordering from Amazon, there are much easier ways.
This seems like a(n executive) policy move designed to create a bargaining chip to trade for something.
🌻🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by kazzie on Monday December 02 2019, @02:41PM (1 child)
Maybe learn whether someone's shipping recreational cannabis around? That was legalised in Canada around the same time this trouble kicked off. Maybe the US aren't so keen on mail trucks driving through Maine with it on board.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday December 02 2019, @07:42PM
I could see it being an MJ traffic monitoring thing... with the bill in the House, it's about to become big business nationwide, gotta make sure the money flows to the right pockets.
🌻🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by legont on Monday December 02 2019, @06:58PM
The point is to train people to behave.
Alternatively, one could call it government terrorism.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @04:14PM
Agreed. When US Customs slowed down service at the Niagara Falls bridges (labor dispute?, have forgotten the immediate cause), Canada Customs quickly did the same. It got the problem on the US side fixed pretty quickly when people going both directions were hollering.
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Monday December 02 2019, @07:23PM
Good point. I'd forgotten about the NW Angle, but I had a friend that grew up in Port Roberts. I helped him deliver a boat to the Port Roberts Marina about 25 years ago. Folks in Port Roberts have to drive a couple of miles north to Tsawwassen, where there is a large shopping center, for many basic supplies. For instance hardware and building materials, drug stores, doctors and hospitals, auto parts and mechanics, just about anything one might need or want, they have to drive to Canada to get. There is a small market in Port Roberts, but every thing they stock has to come in from Canada.
The Musk/Trump interview appears to have been hacked, but not a DDOS hack...more like A Distributed Denial of Reality.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @01:42PM
They opened each and every letter sent through their postal service and had fore-knowledge of where things were headed. Today they do this through keyloggers on computers and compromised operating systems and hardware. They also get access to (in)security cameras and get to see who is doing what. It should be surprising if they are not caught getting camera and microphone data from phones and computers. They also made sure their spyware (google, facebook etc) is everywhere so that anyone on the internet will be communicating with their servers even when they try not to.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Monday December 02 2019, @02:03PM (8 children)
It is sad to see this. Once upon a time you would wave as you drove across the border. But the world has changed. America has turned itself inside-out, and Canada has, too.
The shift started after 9/11. Bush and Cheney soured the border situation with Canada. It has gone downhill from there.
Yet, smuggling across the northern border has been a problem for years. The Mohawks are notorious for doing it [indiancountrynews.com] via their reservation that straddles the line. That corner of New Brunswick where the town in TFA is is remote and permanently economically depressed, so it would not be surprising if some of the locals were running such an operation, nor that the US Border Patrol would be giving them greater scrutiny.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Monday December 02 2019, @02:44PM (1 child)
It might be more practical to do so during the summer, when there's a direct ferry from Canada to Campobello. No need to deal with pesky US postal inspections that way...
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday December 02 2019, @04:13PM
I don't know how the tides are there, but if they're as dramatic as those near the Hopewell Rocks I wouldn't be surprised if people could wade across at low tide.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday December 02 2019, @07:06PM (3 children)
I can't remember that, personally. It seems that every time I crossed the border, I spent ten to fifteen minutes chatting with someone. At the least, "Are you a US citizen? Do you have any weapons? Do you have any contraband? Have you ever been convicted of a crime? Is there anyone else in the vehicle with you? Do you plan on ravishing our women?"
Going into Windsor, Ontario, I had a co-driver with me. His CB handle is Blue-Eyed Mexican, for info. Pretty Canadian customs agent stood up on the running board of the truck, and asked me her list of questions. She looked past me, and addressed old Blue Eyes, "Are you a US citizen?" Blue Eyes says, "No, ma'am." She pauses a heartbeat or two, and asks, "Well, where are you from?" Blue says, "I'm from South Texas." The pretty agent looks at me, kinda rolls her eyes, and continues asking Blue the rest of her questions. As she stepped down from the running board, she asked me if I could keep my co-driver under control. All I could do was to tell her that I would try!
ICE is having a Pretti Good season.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @09:20PM
That question is only asked if you are crossing into Canada. If you are crossing into US from Canada, they never ask if you have any weapons.
Happened all the times in the pre-1990s, especially in the mid-west. Just driving down to get some cheaper gas, for example. And now, you can't even cross the border without a passport.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @09:37PM
Before 9/11 when I was a student in Michigan I could easily cross the border and back from Detroit to Windsor using just my driving license - and I wasn't even an U.S. citizen.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday December 03 2019, @01:49PM
Admittedly the experience I had crossing the border at that time was all in the West, between Washington and BC, or Idaho and Montana and Alberta. Our motor homes would roll north, and their tour buses packed with Calgary skiers and alcohol and pot fumes would roll south. In high school friends would undertake missions north of the border to buy crates of whiskey because the drinking age was lower there, and bring them back across with no problems.
It was a different time.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Monday December 02 2019, @07:30PM (1 child)
"...smuggling across the northern border has been a problem for years."
Not just years but decades, big fortunes were made smuggling booze from Canada during Prohibition.
The Musk/Trump interview appears to have been hacked, but not a DDOS hack...more like A Distributed Denial of Reality.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday December 03 2019, @01:41PM
Good point. I seem to recall from Western history that there were tribes that would take things in the other direction also, specifically, rustled horses.
Innocent, friendly small border towns are not always so innocent or friendly, even on the northern border. Alas.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by jmichaelhudsondotnet on Monday December 02 2019, @03:10PM (2 children)
Everyone is suspect all of the time now, there is no innocent until proven guilty. Canadians are not allowed to have secrets from the United States, if there were a place they could have secrets that is just where the next osama bin laden would go.
We are going to have to start distancing the words 'freedom and democracy' or 'republican federal government with separation of powers' from the united states brand, which brings people like me great shame.
The guys wearing the fancy storm trooper outfits at the border and everywhere, I'm not so sure what they are in this for anymore though.
Seems they quite enjoy playing KGB gestapo games, makes me kindof wonder if they have any idea what words mean. They sure don't know what the flag means and that should have at least been clear to them at some point.
decultification.org
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @03:43PM
And ut is a bi-partisan issue, well as far as the corporate backed demon rats go.
The pageantry is a farce. Election and voting reform, no more electoral college, no more digital voting, no more first past the post, no more super pacs. Have a public politics channel and web server to host political campaigns, no more purchasing ads on corporate media.
There, that is a good start.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @07:09PM
Not to worry. You bring more shame to the US just by being you.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @03:47PM (5 children)
Let the Canadian government negotiate with the US to protect the bonded shipment from inspection, or make a direct postal connection between their territories.
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Monday December 02 2019, @05:16PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @05:36PM
I'm an American, and I agree with the AC up there, but probably for a more generously spirited reason: I'd like for my Canadian friends to do what they can to make themselves safe from the crap that's been going on in my country.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Monday December 02 2019, @07:17PM (1 child)
Bonded loads are subject to inspection, any time, anywhere. But, cutting the seal on a bonded load is a headache, for all concerned. Headaches cost money, for everyone involved, and the bonding agent generally squawks to someone in authority. Said authority then demands an accounting from which ever agent determined that it was necessary to cut that seal. I traveled into and out of Canada with bonded loads, many times, and only once was I ever requested to open the trailer for an inspection. When I informed the diesel cop that the load was bonded, and that he should call 1-800-you-dumbass before he cut the seal, he quickly changed his mind.
I have no idea if the postal service uses a bonding service. It would make more sense for government postal services to bond their own trucks, if it were necessary to do so.
ICE is having a Pretti Good season.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Pslytely Psycho on Monday December 02 2019, @09:01PM
I had a similar experience hauling copper and nickle rolls for the U.S. Mint from Cedar Rapids to the Mint in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was and inspection site at like two in the morning at some unremembered scalehouse with a large lot. I kept insisting this was not a load he wanted to cut the seal with as he stood there with cutters in hand. I finally convinced him to take my paperwork to whomever was in charge because it was going to be a real mess if he went ahead and cut it. (it had like three seals from three different inspectors on it, and the U.S. mint doesn't take kindly to cutting them)
He squawked on his radio and about ten minutes later his supervisor appeared, looked at my bill of lading for about two seconds told me to go and started laying into the cop for being too stupid to realize what kind of load I was carrying.
It was delicious. (evil grin)
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 2) by Username on Monday December 02 2019, @09:54PM
Yeah, if the hippies dont want their weed confiscated, dont ship it through USPS.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Osamabobama on Monday December 02 2019, @05:47PM (4 children)
What is the IRL version of a VPN?
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @06:55PM
A series of tubes.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday December 02 2019, @07:18PM
I think that would be a stealth submarine.
ICE is having a Pretti Good season.
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Monday December 02 2019, @09:05PM
Ninjas obviously...... :D
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 02 2019, @09:40PM
Mexicans with shovels...