There’s a time bomb ticking over here in Europe, and it’s completely off the radar where it will hit the hardest: the US. The Bush administration is pushing for radical new regulations on airline travel including:
- Armed guards on all US-airline flights from Europe to the US
- More personal data on all air passengers FLYING OVER (not even landing in) the US
- Europeans will need new permits and a lengthier permission-application process before even booking a ticket to the US
- "Washington is also asking European airlines to provide personal data on non-travellers - for example family members - who are allowed beyond departure barriers to help elderly, young or ill passengers to board aircraft flying to America, a demand the airlines reject as ‘absurd’".

Under the radar, but an important developing story. Why? The tourism industry is incredibly important to the US and this paranoid development doesn’t help. Doesn’t win the hearts and minds of our allies abroad either.
Bureaucrats in Brussels are debating all of this right now and, as usual, will probably cave on many points. But big conventions, the tourism industry etc. are already going ballistic, diverting future plans away from the US.
Ominous development… Read more about it here in The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008...irlineindustry


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