More meat for conspiracy theorists: The Bush Administration, Condi Rice’s State Department, and those awful RFID passport delays

Look dude, let’s get this straight. I’m not saying there actually is a conspiracy. All I’m saying is, the news about Americans facing huge delays in obtaining passports could get you thinking like a conspiracy theorist. Got that? Thinking like one is all I said. Thinking.

The news?

The State Department suddenly finds itself facing an “unprecedented demand” for passports, after new U.S. Government rules require passports for citizens visiting Canada, the Caribbean and Mexico. Those are places where you used to be able to cross back and forth with nothing but your driver’s license and a smile.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/07/washington/07passport.html?em&ex=1181361600&en=ff62d217ac815dff&ei=5087%0A

I’m not saying this is wrong. Al Quaida and possibly some other nasty people are out to get us. We don’t want them slipping across the border with nothing but a bomb, a discount certificate for flying school lessons and a forged driver’s license.

But wait a second!

All you have to do is look at winter traffic to Cancun and the Caribbean to know that humongous numbers of people who once never bothered getting passports now will need them. Not to mention the tourists who want to enjoy Canda.

So why the delay? Why is the State Department telling Americans it will take “at least 10 weeks” to get a passport when it only used to take two? Why weren't they geared up for this?

Is it that the old Bush Administration incompetence again? Did they merely forget or fail to foresee that insisting more Americans carry passports would increase the demand for passports? I mean, duh!

Or is it…

CONSPIRACY THEORY #1: The Bush Administration doesn’t want Americans to leave the country.

Why? Maybe because we’ll find out how many foreigners have suddenly begun hating us since the Bushies began tearing apart all the good will America had built up over the years.

MAYBE IT’S THE IMBEDDED RFIDs
THAT ARE TRACKING YOUR EVERY MOVE

New passports will contain an RFID, which will enable the government to know where you and your passport are at any time.

According to the Bushies, “"The reason we are doing this is that it simply makes passports more secure…It's yet another layer beyond the security features we currently use to ensure the bearer is the person who was issued the passport originally."
http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2004/10/65412

Yeah, sure. How does the RFID know you’re who you say you are? Unless…

CONSPIRACY THEORY #2: While you were asleep, the government secretly and surgically imbedded an RFID in your brain that matches the one in your passport...

Nah! Forget that one. I’ve got better, based on the RFID in your passport.

Such as…


CONSPIRACY THEORY #3: The Bush administration is out to catch you doing sex tourism so they can throw your butt into the hoosegow.

Go to a bordello in Bangkok and Uncle Sam’s Big Brother will be watching via satellite and waiting to bust you. Or it could be…

CONSPIRACY THEORY #4: The Bushies are out to find out who’s a closet gay and out you.

Go to a gay bar, and suddenly the satellite tracking your RFID will beep a creep in the White House and the government will know exactly where you are. If you’re in the military, you didn’t tell. and nobody asked, you’re still no longer safe. Now they won’t have to ask. They’ll know you were in the bar where everybody wants to dance with Dave. If you’re a gay closet Dem, you’re dead political meat, so to speak. Not only that, but it could be…

CONSPIRACY THEORY #5: The government is checking out cheating spouses who say they’re traveling “on business.”

Check into a hot pillow joint with a chick and suddenly word creeps back to the Christian Coalition, which then e-mails your wife. Or maybe you get electronically reported to the CIA. Next you know, you get paid a visit by a shadowy CIA agent. He tells you, “We’d hate to have to tell your wife about that blonde, the orange thong you bought for her, and the strawberry-flavored whipped cream.

“So next time you visit Paris, we want you to go to such-and-such a mosque and start voicing sympathy with Al Qaida. Infiltrate them and report back to us. If you get caught, we will disclaim all knowledge of you. If they behead you, tough luck, Charlie. But don’t worry, we’ll make some feeble protest about your death after the fact.”

CONSPIRACY THEORY #6: It’s a way for the Feds to figure out who’s sneaking into Cuba.

The whole world’s allowed to visit Cuba, except us “free” Americans. Lots of Americans go anyway, via Canada or Mexico. The Cubans don’t stamp American passports. They simply stick a separate paper visa in your ID and off you go to see whatever Fidel hath wrought, and maybe to take a gander at an antique T-bird or ’54 Chevy. When you leave, you leave the paper visa, too.

A few years ago, at an open meeting of the New York Cycle Club in Manhattan, three different people put on slide presentations in one night about their bicycle tours of Cuba. During the Q&A session that followed, one smartass in the back of the room stood up and said, “You do realize, of course, that three members of the club work for the FBI and two are in the room tonight?” There was a lot of nervous laughter. A couple of guys hurriedly put away their pads and ballpoints.

No more, pal. A blood hound in the Hoover building down in D.C. will find you out faster than Lance Armstrong can race downhill on the Alpe de Huez. After which, refer back to Conspiracy Theory #5.

CONSPIRACY THEORY #7: The U.S. Government’s intentions are pure, but Al Qaida is planning to track the chips, single out Americans abroad, and kidnap us, blow us up, shoot us or behead us. And those sleeping-at-the-switch Bushies won’t figure it out until hundreds of us leave our noggins in Nuremburg or some other foreign locale.

CONSPIRACY THEORY #8: Las Vegas is going to change its advertising slogan. What happens there will no longer stay there. In fact, it will go straight into a dossier that has your name on it.

If you want to add a few conspiracy theories of your own, feel free to submit them.

Until then, happy travels.