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Western Union Blocking Money Transfers to Arabs
lowrydr310 writes "Western Union is blocking money transfers to people with Arab names. They have delayed or blocked thousands of cash deliveries on suspicion of terrorist connections simply because senders or recipients have names like Mohammed or Ahmed. 'In one example, an Indian driver here said Western Union prevented him from sending $120 to a friend at home last month because the recipient's name was Mohammed.' Western union claims they are merely following U.S. Treasury Department guidelines that scrutinize cash flows for terrorist links. I agree that Western Union shouldn't allow anyone supporting terrorism to use their service, however I'm fairly certain there are millions of people named Mohammed or Ahmed who aren't terrorists. I wonder if any other financial companies such as banks are doing the same thing."
Remember, folks, racism is A-OK if it's trying to prevent terrorism or 419 scams.
</sarcasm>
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
"Western Union prevented him from sending $120 to a friend at home last month because the recipient's name was Mohammed"
Not true. They prevented him from sending the cash because his name was Sahir Mohammed. A bit of a difference.
Perhaps a Sahir Mohammed has some links to 'bad guys'?
Well, it happens here in the US too. There are plenty of stories regading people being put on the 'do not fly' list due to circumstances like this as well.
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
Has it come to this? Why not just take anyone that "looks like a terrorist" and shuffle them off to camps, like we unfortunately did with thousands of Asian Americans in WWII? I know they're just a company, but it is alarming to see any action that just blankly denies access to their systems based on something as generic as a name. It's not like blocking all Adolf Hitler's either, there are TONS of people named Mohammed, it is a very common name. I had two of them in my grade school classes, both exact same name of Mohammed Ali.
stuff |
with the name of, "Muhammed Ali," you might have a problem here,... Never mind the fact that you've got a major building in the U.S. dedicated to the cause of peace,...
Cryptome had a related article...
http://cryptome.org/western-union.htm
You're using her as bait, Master!
The statistics may have changed, but I remember one of those trick/trivia questions from when I was younger (in the 1980s): What's the most common name in the world?
It turned out it was, if you include all the variations, Mohammed. Throw in Mahmet, Makhmoud, Mahmoud, and various other spellings and transliterations.
Somehow, I doubt a large enough percentage of them are liekly to be terrorists for the name to be worth checking.
Welcome to American during WWII.
:(
Hooray for typecasting.
Thats another case of ridiculous procedures, One of the most ridicule stuff I found on WU was that when using the persons description when making a MO the form omits (to be politicaly correct im sure) the persons skin color. Cmon one of the MOST obvious diferences on fisionomy is skin color, please quit the politicly correctnesses.
From here:
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
This sort of heavy-handed behavior in the name of "the War on Terror" just reinforces the idea that this is not just a war on terrorism, but a war between cultures, a holy crusade. This is the sort of rhetoric that these terrorist organizations use to recruit new members, it hardly does us any good to give them evidence to support their case that the West is conducting an all-out war on Islam.
The more we marginalize Arabs (and sometimes people that just look sort of Arab) and Muslims, the more likely they are to align themselves with terrorist organizations out of desperation or righteous indignation. We need to fight terrorist cells based on real intelligence, not knee-jerk reactions.
With this US administration's beliefs and attitudes towards this sort of thing I fully believe this is happening. Ahmed sending 50 bucks to Utah shouldn't matter. Bubba from Georgia sending thousands or more to a middle eastern country should. And the block shouldn't happen unless it's a very large amount of money for smaller amounts the transaction deserves a closer look by someone in black sunglasses.
Hold up, wait a minute, let me put some pimpin in it
Wow, why don't they just hire some mercenaries to round up every Arab American and put them in detention camps? Or the government could do it just like we did to Japanese Americans during WWII...
When will we ever learn?
Haiku for you!
they realize Hitler is dead, right?
:x
Local goverments are receiving countless requests from those of Arab descent for name changes to Smith, Jones, Jackson, Bush, etc.
I know of a charity that works with (mostly christian) organisations in the west bank. Their usual way of getting money to their partners is to fly into Israel with a big bundle of money. Otherwise it tends to get massively delayed by US banks.
In soviet russia stale jokes recycle you!
I just hope there's a country LEFT by the time Bushie boy's term is over...
They'll be glad to send money for you to someone with a nice Anglo name, such as Timothy McVeigh.
NetInfo connection failed for server 127.0.0.1/local
From the summary:
I agree that Western Union shouldn't allow anyone supporting terrorism to use their service, . . .
But aggressive war waged on civilians is the worst form of terrorism, and anyone who votes for pro-war Republicans or pro-war Democrats is actively supporting this terrorism. That includes the great majority of those who vote in the U.S.
Therefore, for Western Union to stop supporting terrorism, it would effectively have to stop doing business in the U.S.
Nonaggression works!
"Mohamed Jihad" in arabic culture is problaby as common as "John Dalton" in USA. Would you find it acceptable to have a US bank block your funds because you are called "Dalton", although everyone who reads Lucky Luke knows that the Daltons are a bunch of western terrorists.
There is a limit to discrimination and this one has been blown off by far. Your remark is also totally misplaced. US government should start thinking with its brain again (provided there is anyone with a brain in there) and stop the nonsense.
A quick search on the author ANJAN SUNDARAM shows him to be a bit of a rabble rouser. His article is completely anecdotal and short on facts. Perfect for this forum. Seems reporting from the Congo is not as beneficial to his career as race baiting in the war on terror.
an ill wind that blows no good
So if I wanted to help out my childhood friend from New York who has the last name 'Ahmad' I'm out of luck.
Well, considering his dad has been an airline pilot fo years, they've probably moved since he was released after 9/11 for security measures.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
I would have said John Smith but the point is that you can't restrict merely by name because it's very possible to have the same name associated with two people....one who is a terrorist and one who isn't.
Gorkman
Obviously, you are just Trolling, but I'll bite anyway. If the Japanese-Americans were jailed in WWII, why weren't the German-Americans jailed? Or the Italian-Americans (at least until 1944)? come on, if we were trying to protect ourselves, why did we leave ourselves open to spying from the two European Axis powers? Oh, that's right, it must have been those commie-pinko liberals....
I think there may be more then just a few thousand people with that name who are not terrorists. It is the 23rd most popular name in England alone. That would be a lot of terrorists!
I surely hope you are joking. Otherwise, the right adjective to describe what you are is not "evil" but "stupid" (dimwitted maybe?). Attaching any word relating to some people in some part of any place would be an insult to said people.
I wonder if they'll block transfers from arab sounding names to George Bush (not senior). Hate to stop all that Saudi cash headed to republican pockets.
"We are all geniuses when we dream"
- E.M. Cioran
I work for a division of a large financial firm, and we are required to download a list of Specially Designated Nationals from the Treasury Department and compare names from it against new accounts and transfers. The list includes lists of suspected terrorists, and they're not all Arabic (think Irish Republican Army).
Billy Hitler? That's nothing. My given name is Brutus Judas Iscariot Benedict Arnold Fawkes.
This is the U.S. government's fault. The U.S. government and the U.S. Treasury department create a whole bunch of "anti-terrorism" rules with some pretty extreme penalties for non-compliance. Western Union is simply complying with a bunch of bad regulations.
The real problem is that people don't understand that there will be lots of unintended consequences to any legislation or regulations. ALL regulation or legislation hurts innocent people to some extent. People love to scream for laws and regulation to solve all the worlds problems, without ever dreaming that the laws or regulations can cause more harm than good. People have absolute faith in laws to do what they are intended and only what they are intended.
That, and people think it is the government's job to protect them from every single possible thing that can harm them (from terrorists, or iTunes DRM, or corn sweeteners, or whatever people are making hysterical calls for legislation on). In this case, the cost of having a free society where people aren't profiled by race or religion, is that it might be easier for a terrorist to attack the U.S. If you are one of those people screaming for the government to do more to stop terrorism, you are responsible for this. If you are one of the people crying "Bush didn't do enough to stop 9/11 and terrorism", then you especially guilty of supporting racial profiling (even if you claim not to support it), because how the hell else is anyone supposed to stop a crime BEFORE IT HAPPENS unless they are profiling potential criminals?
Western Union is just the innocent victim of the laws and policies that you most likely support!
I don't know if banks are using the same lists. I suspect that they are. I do know that banks put an extended freeze on transactions over $10,000, to allow for "Homeland Security" review. This applies even to activity totally within the United States, regardless of your name.
If you want to view the list of names financial institutions are required to reference, you can go ahead and peruse them here at the Office of Foreign Assets Control website, updated quite regularly. You'll find the list is dominated by Arabic (not necessarily Muslim) and Latin American names.
OFAC's mission as quoted on their website:
The Office of Foreign Assets Control ("OFAC") of the US Department of the Treasury administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions based on US foreign policy and national security goals against targeted foreign countries, terrorists, international narcotics traffickers, and those engaged in activities related to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. OFAC acts under Presidential wartime and national emergency powers, as well as authority granted by specific legislation, to impose controls on transactions and freeze foreign assets under US jurisdiction.
From TFA: [i]In Washington, U.S. Treasury spokeswoman Molly Millerwise said foreign banks have used the department's list of terrorist names to freeze $150 million in assets since Sept. 11. Millerwise didn't know the value of money transfers blocked using the list, but said frustrations endured were regrettable but necessary. "We have an obligation to do all we can to keep money out of the hands of terrorists," Millerwise said. The list of names, available on the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control Web site, contains hundreds of Mohammeds. [/i] So this is not, as the summary and a few sentences in the article implied, simply a question of racists indiscriminately blocking all people with Arab-sounding first names. If that were the case, I doubt Western Union would be able to afford to do it, since, as others have mentioned, there are an awful lot of Mohammeds out there in the US. What the article says, however, is that the sum total of transactions affected in this way is in the 1000's-- most only delayed by a few hours-- with far fewer actual blocks made on transactions. That suggests that the ostensible explanation-- that for a customer who happens to have the exact same first and last name as a terrorist, Western Union takes a little time to make sure they're dealing with somebody else-- is actually the correct one. And is it really such a bad policy? Back in the Unabomer days, if my name was Ted Kaczynski and I asked someone to wire me money, I'd sure as hell expect the company to take some time to check out my identity, and I wouldn't follow up by alleging racism against people of Polish descent.
Nope, it's disgraceful to parasites, leeches, and any other "disgusting foul creature", too... but then so is calling those creatures "disgusting foul creatures"
Probably because a large fraction of white Americans were of at least partial German ancestry. Plus, during the "Great War" (now known as World War 1), significant anti-German prejudice did occur, with one result being that many German-Americans altered their last names, to sound less German. (For instance, my great-great grandfather changed our family name from "von Adam" to "Adams.")
Nonaggression works!
Damn HTML. I meant to put BR in the brackets, not B.
Terror is fear caused by the perception of danger.
The solution is, of course, the perception of security.
The crippling effect of terror is that people are afraid to do things they normally would if they did not perceive a danger.
Actual protection from the hazard (if there was an actual hazard) would not necessarily remove the perception of danger.
Citizen 1: I'm stayin' home. There's terrorists out there.
Citizen 2: Have you seen one?
Citizen 1: Nope, but nobody's doing anything about it. I'm not leaving the house till this is over!
To combat the terror, we present the appearance of security measures. Going overboard and causing outrage is just part of the salesmanship.
Citizen 1: A real terrorist would never get through--they're bustin' guys just for lookin' like terrorists!
Citizen 2: Woohoo--we whupped them terists good. Let's go down to the Winn-Dixie. We're out of beer!
C1 & C2 hop in the car and immediately put it in the ditch because they're hammered. But they were wearing seatbelts, so they're OK!
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
There are just too many people in this world to address us all with names. I was once at a party where two other peole had my same name: first and last. If any of them were to be put on a terrorist watch list, I'm sure I would have trouble transfering money.
And it seems to me that the muslim world has some of the least-creative names. If there really IS a terrorist named Mohamed al-Whatever, the 1,000 other people in the world with the same name are all going to have problems. Could this be what is causing problems here?
What could solve this problem? I propose the UN establishes a database to assign everyone in the world a unique serial number. That way, we will never have name-collision problems. And everyone who works with databases would have much to be happy about.
If such a system were put in place, the world's financial institutions would likely eventually require it for business transactions, and it would catch on without needing any official enforcement.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
Exploring the Guniess Book of World Records sometime back in the 80's, I read that "Mohammed" was the most common first name in the world. (The most common last name was "Chang"-- we were speculating as to how many "Mohammed Chang"'s there might be...)
So, it's essentially like blocking payments to everyone in the English-speaking world named "Smith", because you once encountered someone named "Smith" who was a crook.
always fall back on the knee-jerk reaction. It won't work either but it has that crunchy mouth-feel that makes its seem like you're biting down on something substantial when, in fact, you're only eating rice cakes.
Wow. This is certainly the most shortsighted moronic post I have ever read on Slashdot. I truly hope I just missed the sarcasm. Or no, maybe you want to start repeating other mistakes the US Government has made? I'm becoming less and less sure that we aren't actually the terrorists in this whole affair. (Not to imply that there aren't some bad men doing bad things over seas, just that we don't seem to be much better, and in some cases, actually worse.)
How do find a German spy? Check to see if their last name begins with 'Von'! ("General Hospital")
If the Japanese-Americans were jailed in WWII, why weren't the German-Americans jailed? Or the Italian-Americans (at least until 1944)? come on, if we were trying to protect ourselves, why did we leave ourselves open to spying from the two European Axis powers?
Because Japanese-Americans are easier to spot and a lot of people are racist, you should watch (or read) Snow Falling On Cedars.
Names like "Muhammad" are found on individuals of the black race (think of a famous boxer) and individuals of the Caucasian race (think Arabs). There does not seem to be a racial element here. Out in the real world, there's plenty of bigotry that is not race-related.
Where were you when the voynix came?
This is a bit OT but I find it interesting that Mohammed is most common first name in the world, and Wong is most common last name in the world. And yet, there are no Mohammed Wong's. At least none that have graced the cover of Tiger Beat magazine (I have a subscription).
I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
From my post:
They're politicians for crying outloud, compairing them to anything else, drags that something else down, there's no escaping it.
I know it is, but thats about the lowest thing I could think of. Though a misquito carrying west nile, malaria, and numerous other diseases, now that I think about it is probably as close as you can get to a good comparision, even then, I still would feel sorry for the misquito comparing it to a politican.
To remove further confusion, I here by appologize to all parasites, leeches, and any other creature that could be considered "disgusting and foul" as well as their fans for comparing them to a politician, I did not mean to smite those stupid creatures in any way.
PS thank you Kevin Smith!
-PB_TPU_40 The trick to flying is to throw yourself at the ground and miss.
Rights violations? What right do you have to use Western Union? It's a private company and they can choose who they do business with.
Besides, I would gladly exclude ten-thousand Muslims from Western Union, along with their hurt feelings, in exchange to prevent one payment that goes to a hijacker or suicide bomber. I would offend ten-thousand men to have one less death from 9/11.
Not being able to fly on an airplane or transfer money is NOT the same as imprisonment/internment.
Reason, free market capitalism, and individualism
But whatever you do, don't criticize the government in your blog, say anything that someone else might find "hateful," question the historical details of the Holocaust, or commit any other anti-Canadian thought crimes. Then you'll wind up in prison.
So they only delayed around a half million transfers and found a grand total of 0 terrorists. Private sector is now trying to emulate gov't ?
I assume terrorists for some reason are unable to get fake ID for John Smith, right ?!?
I swear the world gets dumber by the day.
I would suspect this works by routing transactions meeting certain criteria (ie source/destination state, name, etc.) through a monitoring system of some sort. From a security standpoint, there is a flaw in this system in that a potential terrorist could know he/she is being monitored. Even if the process is completely manual, a timing attack could determine the criteria being used. The attackers would simply initiate a bunch of transactions with varying names & locations, and record the time each takes. With that data, the attacker could determine a 'safe' location and name, or DoS the system by initiating a large number of unsafe transactions. A more secure approach (from Western Union's perspective) would be to delay all transactions for an equal amount of time, though I doubt that would go over too well. An alternative would be to randomly delay a "non-flagged" transaction for each "flagged" transaction.
Let me put it like this: You should be wary of an unsubstantiated article by a newbie foreign journalist with no legitimate affiliation written in a political atmosphere where the liberals have an axe to grind.
an ill wind that blows no good
Mohammad (spelt in a lot of different ways) is the most common name in the world. Yes, it is more common than Jack or Smith or Jones.
No Mohamed Sahirs on the SDN listd n/sdnlist.txt
http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/s
Lots of Sahirs and Mohameds but i dont see that combination.
I do know that banks put an extended freeze on transactions over $10,000, to allow for "Homeland Security" review. This applies even to activity totally within the United States, regardless of your name.
This was not even a Dubya deal. You can thank Bill Clinton for this one back in the early 1990's. It was because all people who made large bank deposits were automatically assumed and made guilty of laundering drug money... until proven otherwise.
...for long, at this rate.
... instead of closing the accounts of and blocking the money transfers to these allegedly "suspicious" individuals, why not report them to the FBI and let them do the investigating and/or arresting?
Stupid corporate vigilantism -- almost worse than the amateur stuff.
All this does is to make life more annoying for innocent individuals.
You think Al-Quada don't have some work around for this in place already? e.g. buying/selling gold for example. Chances are they probably don't blatantly wire money around anyway.
I'm not saying anyone should support the promotion of someone who is out to kill for no reason. I'm fairly pacifistic, and I also do not wish to support killing for ANY reason. My fear here is that our government really has no right to tell us where to put our money.
Had Western Union existed 300 years ago, would England have prevented them from financing a bunch of "anarchists" in the New World? There are many freedom fighters all over the world who are considered "terrorists" by our government, and I am one to believe that individuals have the right and freedom to do what they please with their money -- especially in foreign support. Some of the countries, maybe even many of the countries that we support financially with illegal and unconstitutional foreign aid dollars are considered terrorist to me.
If you want to sponsor someone with your money that you earned with your time, it is your choice. No government should have the right to prevent you spending your money as you please in ANY way (campaign finance, rebel funding, vacation, retirement, drugs, prostitutes, schooling, whatever). Money is nothing magical, money is merely a store of your time to be redeemed to save you time in the future. That is all money is, time saved up for another day. Why should there be barriers on how you use your time, if you personally aren't hurting anyone?
This is not a war. You can't have a war on terror, any more than you can have a war on good table manners or abstract thought.
And I'd like to be the first to support this war on good table manners, for the sake of the children. Food fights are needed to relieve stress, provide exercise, prevent overeating, and consume food to help our struggling agricultural sector. For the sake of the children's safety and our economy and the American way of life, please support the ban on good table manners so desperately needed to keep America great. Those who promote "table manners" are replacing our proud, American heritage with French and Jewish styles of eating and it is downright ungodly and un-American!
I appreciate your bringing this struggle to my attention and will write my congresscritter immediately.
That goes beyond stupidity into the realms of absolute idiocy, assuming it's an accurate report.
And therein lies the major flaw of Slashdot summaries which leads to vast amounts of whining and hand wringing and the spoiling of undergarments over something that didn't actually happen like the summary claims.
And the next thing you know, /. will block Arab usernames.
I never had that problem!
In case of fire, do not use elevator. Use water!
If we are trying to win the "hearts and minds" of those innocents in the Middle East (who may or may not hate us or our foreign policies), I don't think that preventing their friends/relatives in the US from sending home money that they probably need to survive. Why don't they try something useful like requiring these financial institutions to scrub a list of specific names (first and last) of actual people (or actual aliases) which are known, or at least strongly suspected, of having terrorist ties (other than having a Muslim name). Also, a "mule" (as in the drug traffiking sense of the word) with an Anglo (or simply non-muslim) name in a country in the Middle East could be used to clear the transaction then pass off the money once it's in the country, bypassing the name thing altogether. I don't think there's an easy solution to "the war on terror", but we certainly aren't going to make things any better for our kids if we isolate all Muslims (with blanket policies like these).
"If God had wanted us to vote, he would have given us candidates." - Jay Leno
I hardly think Western Union is a major funding stream for terrorism anymore. I'm sure you can find an exaple to the contrary, but in the era of paypal and other e-payment systems that allow peer-to-peer payments for minimal transaction fees I don't see people shuffling money with Western Union. This is just another example of companies and governments doing stupid things because of what's happened in the past instead of anticipating what will happen in the future and deal with it instead.
STFU & GBTW
The Government can't protect you so they're going to deputize thousands of work-a-day joes to do the dirty work of scaring you silly so they can take more of your rights away.
Just another "we do something against the terror" bubble. Nothing else. As if that would change anything.
So you're not allowing WU to transfer to Mohammeds? Great. Next thing you know we'll get some sons of terrorists named Billy-Bob and the transfer is made to them instead. With the dad, as their custodian, cashing in. "Problem" solved.
Window dressing for the naked emperor, I'd call it.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
As a 4th generation Japanese-American I am familiar with the internment of my grandparents' generation during WWII. My grandfather fought in the 442d Combat Batallion for the US while his sister was interned in Tulelake, CA. It seems like the selective internment of a group of people was a harsh response to the threat... my grandfather was dodging bullets in Italy trying to protect the country that temporarily imprisoned his sister, but you'll be hard pressed to find a Japanese-American who complains about this event.
I guess my point is this... it wasn't all Japanese-Americans that were relocated, just those living on the West Coast after Pearl Harbor. And my grandfather's generation of Nissei (2nd Generation Japanese-Americans) were never bitter about their treatment... they understood, as so few do today, that war can bring out the best in people, as well as the worst.
BTW... there was never a formal internment of German-Americans because 2nd or 3rd generation Germans looked just like a typical white American. Japanese-Americans were much easier to identify. I suspect that if Al Queda was a primarily European organization, we wouldn't have companies like Western Union selectively rooting out potential terrorists.
And finally, I think it is hilarious that people (and by that I mean white, middle-class liberals) get up in arms about the treatment of my family during WWII, when I have never heard them get angry or even complain about it. The past is the past, and our future in this great country exists because of the sacrifice of people like my grandfather.
# man tar
We jumped the shark.
I think I speak for the collective when I say "Fucking Jerks".
I am not normally a "Can't we all just be friends?" kind of guy, but this crap has to end and I think we could really use a self evaluation right about now. We owe it to ourselves and everyone else.
You heard me.
Besides just throwing this rant, I am also never using Western Union again. For anything. I am so sick of this rediculous bullshit and I am embarrased to be associated with fucks like this in any way. I am certainly not going to give them any of my money.
They wont miss me, and I wont miss them.
Besides, everyone knows that terrorists get all their money from working taxis in New York.
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
1. al-Qaeda receives more than 90 percent - even today - of its funding directly or indirectly from Saudi Arabian citizens.
2. Most people using Western Union with Arab names are not from Saudi Arabia.
3. Requiring a Passport of someone wiring money with an Arab name, and just checking to see if they're citizens of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, or Egypt would work much more effectively.
4. Fake passports and name changes are easy to buy, usually costing less than $25 on downtown streets of any major port city (or even Detroit, Michigan).
5. Fake patriotism, like concern for non-existent flag-burning rampages, is very easy to do, and highly ineffective.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Remember: Bigots wear bowties. It sure makes for easy identification of the Nation of Islam.
Hey, man. I won't hear one bad word from you like that about Tucker Carlson.
Though, it does explain a lot about Pee Wee Herman.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Gee, a U.S. company is following U.S. law and flagging financial transactions that may be related to terrorism. Most of said transactions are delayed a short time, some are blocked entirely. Yeah, lots to get upset with there.
Profiling you say? Profiles are like stereotypes, they exist because the is truth to them.
Racism you say? You do not know if the list only covers Muslims. Is it still racist if the list contains the known aliases for members of the IRA, or Red Dawn, or the other terrorist organizations?
Sounds to me like the Western Union employee didn't understand what actually happens, that or he was deliberately misleading people.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Has Jack Meoff gotten onto the list yet? If so, and there are any TSA personnel reading this, please let him know I have a lot of his mail back at home next time he comes through the security gates.
If you mean the leftist junta who guard this site ceaselessly to staunch alternative points of view, you may be right. The first readers wisely modded it up. It may creep back up once the junta has moved on. But I am not discouraged about presenting a minority point of view. The author is not a credible journalist.
an ill wind that blows no good
*looks around suspiciously*
Quem a paca cara compra, paca cara pagará.
I'm all for profiling (in the forensic science sense), but this is simply ridiculous!
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
"We would be dooming ourselves to spending the rest of eternity in a state of constant war for absolutely no reason"
Maybe this state of constant war is the whole point? Rule by Fear. Look at the expanded presidential powers Bush is claiming because he is a "war time president." This way, those expanded presidential powers will remain forever, or at least as long as the "War on Terror" lasts. It should end shortly after the previously declared "War on Drugs" and the "War on Poverty" are won.
I agree that Western Union shouldn't allow anyone supporting terrorism to use their service,
Then I'll agree that you're an idiot. Maybe we should start scrutinizing everyone for potential violence before we sell them a hammer, or check everyone if they're a sex offender before selling them a condom. Or not sell computer to hackers, and of course we'll have to screen everyone buying a computer whether they are a hacker. Or know a hacker. Or know someone who might have sent them to buy a computer for their hacker relative.
This is totally ridiculous. You can either put everyone under suspicion and total surveilance, or you can make them fill out a form saying "my money does not support terrorism" - which is, of course, total nonsense because your terrorist supporters will simply lie.
There is no fucking way to prevent Western Union, or your bank, or cash or the Internet or any other device or service that offers a generic service like information or money transfer from being used by people with an agenda you don't like without building a police state.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Most likely they're blocking money transfers as part of their compliance with OFAC
The rules are supposed to be you check relevant information (including but not limited to name) against the watch list, and then hold any monies which are associated with a positive hit on the watch list until it is resolved whether the recipient is a false positive or truly on the watch list. Most financial companies which I have worked with try to resolve within 24 hours, but my experience is limited to a small small number of companies.
It does sound that Western Union is having an issue properly identifying and resolving OFAC positives.
OFAC is a legal compliance requirement. Much like another of our favorites, SOX.
You're luck I have disabled slashdot's rating system or I wouldn't even have been able to read your post :(.
Haiku for you!
In Soviet Russia people had passports for everyday identification purposes and they were required to carry them along all the time. Among other data there was a place to write down one's ethnicity. Will that be the dream of today?
Here's an example of the passport. One can see just below the blank line there's space to state ethnicity. In this odd case, moronic officer from Soviet Udmurtia has written "negro". However, more common words included Russian, Ukrainian, Uzbek or Georgian.
Oddly, it wasn't the US that provided the chemical or conventional weapons to Iraq. Conventional weapons were mostly of the Warsaw Pact variety or of French origin (AK47,T60,Exocet, etc). Chemical weapons depended heavily on German and Dutch sources. Delivery systems were home grown variants of Soviet design.
The US did provide satellite intellegence and agricultural loan guarantees to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war. We made things easier for them to get conventional weapons, but we didn't supply them.
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
The bottom line: if United Airlines had been pulling aside and inspecting every single Muhammed that was in line to board, they would have caught a certain Muhammed Atta and saved themselves billions. From an economic standpoint therefore this is a prudent policy.
Just kidding, actually in my High School in Canada there are 6 Mohamed's and 3 Ahmad's, my school is almost 1/2 Arab, it would be a cool fight (Arab's vs. Whites & Blacks).
This is sad because most terrorist's in the US are probably homegrown americans.
"Go suck your head." - Edward Runey
Remember after the Oklahoma City bombing how hard it was for a white person to rent a Ryder truck or any type of moving truck? I had to go rent moving trucks for my white friends because they were getting spit on and turned away.
Can I bum a sig?
The rednecks I have always known aren't big on PC things like raping our political and legal systems to accomodate potential terrorists. They'd rather just shoot the fuckers that our military catchs abroad than subject everyone, including Muslims, to police state type tactics in the United States. Bush is not a redneck. You can't be a redneck and go to Yale for a MBA. Many of the people that Bush represents, probably most of them are country club dads and soccer moms, not your average yeehaw redneck.
And btw, dumbass, there is nothing "ignorant" about the Bush Administration. They know EXACTLY what they are doing. The word your PC mind is groping for is "evil," not "ignorant." Idiots and ignorami don't get elected to the Presidency. Evil people, well, that's a compeletely different matter, ain't it?
I guess I must be a redneck because I agree with them. No trials for people caught carrying explosives to a terrorist attack. Line them up and shoot them dead like they're an enemy soldier. No stasi-style surveillance state. A nice 0.50 round to the head is just fine with me.
"Western Union told me that if I send money to Sahir Mohammed, the money will be blocked because of his name,"
I'm not muslim nor is my name anything similar to Mohammed or anything. I've bumped against this recently. After taking out a home loan with one leader we decided it would be easier to have the money in our local bank when making payouts for home improvements. Boy were we wrong. It took nearly two weeks before the dust settled. We ended up calling our bank to find out the problem.
We were told it's standard procedure to investigate the money flow when they see "unusual" patterns (such as a large deposit of cash). Eventually they figured out we weren't terrorists and our contractor would like to get paid like anyone else.
Has Comcast disconnected your Internet account? Same here. You can read about it at http://comcastissue.blogspot.com
racism isn't just about believing one race to be superior, it's also about stereotyping; i.e. all arabs are terrorists
Like the submitter & the editor of this article, you are using the word "Arab" incorrectly.
There are Arab Jews, Arab Christians, Arab Zorastrians, Arab Animists, Arab Agnostics, Arab Atheists, etc, etc, etc.
The ones we are worried about, however, are the Arab MUSLIMS.
I want to make sure more people get to read this subthread and decide for themselves, independently from the moderation system here what's what.
Restating the parent post there: Within the past 20 years on this planet, muslim extremists have committed more terrorist acts than any other terrorist organization (or any other individual.) For a list (not a complete list, but a good start) see this wikipedia entry. It has links to many other sub-lists of terrorist acts that for example happen in Israel and Iraq.
Also you have to figure out what 'muslim extremist connection' means. Chechnia, serbia, pakistan....
You can't handle the truth.
And it's probably also safe to say that many more Arabs have died at the hands of their own people than by the U.S.
infested with jello like fishes no melotron wishes
Sorry about that; apparently I hit "Submit" instead of "Preview".
So, You would spank your kid for something a kid in Ohio did because they're the same age. You would arrest your wife and put her in jail because a woman with her eye color was seen selling drugs. You would starve your mother because she is the same age as a woman caught speeding in Hawaii. You are advocating the abuse of innocent people on the off chance that one or two just might be guilty. THAT IS WHAT THAT DICKHEAD SADDAM IS ON TRIAL FOR YOU JACKASS!!!!! What does it take to get that through your heads. We are suffering under a regime with the same philosophy as the regime it ousted. I am sure that a majority of Iraqis felt the same way you do when Saddam was torturing shiites. They went about their business without a second thought to the fact that there were people who could get a job or food or money or housing or education simply because they had the wrong name or religion. People that worried from day to day if the country they lived in would allow them to live. That is what you are so proudly hailing as reasonable to protect your sorry ass. You don't deserve to live in this country. Ijust hope you haven't mated yet, your existence putrifies the gene pool.
Not to debate your logic, but the problem lies in that the only word Americans know for a broad conflict is 'war'. War on Poverty, War on Terror, Cold War, Flame War, etc. You further compound the mistake by attacking the conflict because it doesn't fit the fundimental definition of 'war.' Get past the semantics.
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
You failed to ask yourself the simple questions of "Why do Arabs do terrorist activities?".
And I'm sure the answer to that question in your warped mind is - Because the U.S. made them do it. Or maybe it's because the Devil made them do it, or Mohammed, or Jesus or Cartman. Any excuse you can come up with to blame anyone but the people directly responsible for carrying out terrorist activities. It's not their fault, it's because of someone else.
infested with jello like fishes no melotron wishes
- It used to be that we'd often set people free who were 100% guilty, in order to minimize the chance of convicting someone innocent. Now we don't care if innocent people are sometimes convicted, just as long as those who are 100% guilty are never set free.
The result is that our freedoms are being eroded and replaced by a false sense of security. Maintaining security is never an easy task, but five years ago Bush and Cheney were not paying attention.Seriously, look at the numbers for 2001: 2001 Statistics (2004 Almanac) Disease / Condition Annual Deaths 1) Heart Disease 700,142 2) Malignant Neoplasms (Cancer) 553,768 3) Stroke (cerebrovascular disease) 163,538 4) Chronic Lower Respiratory disease 123,013 5) Accidents (Car Accidents* (2002) - 44,000) 101,537 6) Diabetes Mellitus 71,372 7) Pneumonia & Influenza 62,034 8) Alzheimer's Disease 53,852 9) Kidney disease (Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome, & nephrosis) 39,480 10) Septicemia (toxins in the blood - known as "blood poisoning") 32,238 Total Deaths per Year** 2,400,000 taken from: http://www.ritecode.com/aerobicgardening/topkill.h tml
So.. even if you round the number up to 3,000 for the 9/11 attacks.. that's still nothing to the number of people who die of disease every year.
Why are we wasting billions on wars in the middle east to "stop terrorism" when its not even that big of a problem anyway. Wouldn't that money be put to better use by providing better healthcare to people, on programs that encourage healthier lifestyles, cleaning up the air and water. These wars DO NOT BENEFIT anyone in the US except oil and weapons companies. The US no longer has any credibility, and we are being hated more and more by the global community.
9/11 should have been treated like a criminal investigation, arrests should have been made immediately to anyone who aided in the attacks, and that would have been the end of it. But no, lets all be racists towards Arabs because 19 of them attacked us, and their ring leader is still in a cave somewhere. This racism only encourages more wars in the middle east and will only result in more soldiers getting killed, Americans loosing more rights, and more profits to oil and weapons companies.
there are two reasons to oppose gay marriage: bigotry and political pandering to bigots
#3:
Dude, marriage means one thing, and changing it to mean a new thing is not something I approve. Let 'em get civil unions and change the laws to include benefits and visitation right to civil unions, instead of changing marriage, change the technicalities that make marriage a necessity.
Fuck, don't pigeonhole people in your lil' prejudiced categories just because they disagree with you on one issue.
P.S. Couldn't care less about the sanctity of marriage or any of that, it's been one thing since it has existed, and changing it is not a move. Ancient greeks weren't opposed to homosexuality, but they had the same meaning for marriage that we have now.
You can't take the sky from me...
If profiling has to be done, then the rules should be established upfront so that no single race or religion can get a free pass--that is, if safety is really a priority.
I seriously doubt Western Union has, or will deny money transfers to recipients who fit this profile of a famous terrorist:
American citizen, White, short-haired, male, Irish-American, Catholic, who had been Republican or Libertarian, had been also been a member of the NRA, and is a veteran who saw combat.
The above was taken from a description of Timothy McVeigh--you remember what he did, and the following outrage against white people who might be terrorists, right?
On a serious note, I wonder how many Americans fit the above profile compared to Americans with Arab-sounding names. I'm guessing the above profile, matching Timothy McVeigh, would be able to filter out all but a tiny fraction of Americans. And who knows if it might prevent another similar incident?
If you currently favor biased profiling that favors the predominant race or religion, would you feel the same way if America becomes predominantly non-White?
I personally think profiling *might* prevent harmful incidents, but refusing to profile one race (white) or the political party in power (Republican) is not the way to go about preventing terrorism. There should be no free rides if profiling is going to be implemented. Do it right, do it for best results, or don't do it at all.
I don't even know if it is really racism.
It happened to myself and a friend of mine. We where on a bussiness trip in Ireland in the 80s and was going to vist some distant family in Northern Ireland. My family is from Northern Ireland around Belfast so I wanted to meet my great uncle and aunt.
When I got to the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland I was let through with no problem. My friend in the car behind me was just about strip searched. The Britsh seached every bag he had and grilled him for about an hour about why he was going to Northern Ireland.
The differences between he and I where.
My last name is German and I am from Florida.
My friend's last name was O'Shay and he was from Boston, he was also wearing a crucifix.
It didn't help that a police station was blown up just that morning. Of course the funny thing is that I was the one that had family in Northern Ireland, my friend didn't know a soul in Ireland and just going with me to have something to do for the weekend. Frankly if I was going to be suggling guns into Northern Ireland the last thing I would do is wear a crucifix.
To be honest this story sounds like somebody at Western Union being stupid.
The goverment wouldn't want to prevent that money from being sent. It would want to track it.
If the story is true I want to change my name. I figure after it goes to court I will never have to work again. The lawyers for Western Union must be jumping for joy over this. They will make mint trying defend this case.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
God help you, Mr. AC. The Bush family has been doing business with the Sauds for decades. In fact, Junior didn't need his father's money to start his own (failed) businesses, he received millions in funding from the Sauds. But they're not the only ones receiving fucktons of Saudi investment... also on the list... Haliburton.
WAKE THE FUCK UP.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
From what I can gather from the article this policy is actually harming security.
They say Treasury guidelines are sending more people to informal money transfer networks called "hundis" or "hawalas" that have been used by gangsters and terrorists because they circumvent such scrutiny.
"Sending money by hawala is cheaper and it does not get checked by banks, so it is quicker," said a Pakistani taxi driver who called himself Munir Ahmed. "They say it is not legal, but it is a reliable alternative to Western Union."
If law abiding people are avoiding official institutions what makes them think that terrorists are stupid enough to use them?!?
More than that by driving additional people to the hawalas it circumvents existing security measures. For starters it means that more money (even the legit stuff) is moving around and they have no idea where it went, also the additional people using the hawalas will mean they are more developed for the terrorists use them. Additionally when you uncover a hawala network it will be that much harder to pick out the terrorists since you've added all these false positives, and finally for the terrorists who would have used official institutions in the past since it was easy and the hawalas weren't developed, now you no longer have a money trail you can inspect later on.
All this security measure does is inconvenience and alientate a whole bunch of people while making the world a little less safe.
I stole this Sig
"The first readers wisely modded it up."
It is "wise" to mod "informative" a post without information?
"The author is not a credible journalist."
Why? You say a "quick search" reveals this. How? I don't know if the guy is a decent journalist or not, but you have'nt provided any argument other than not liking what he has to report. He claims he interveiewed a bunch of Western Union employees and customers, and reports on this policy. Do you assert he is lying? Do you have any reference for someone claiming this is not Western Union policy? What information do you have for us besides the facts presented not fitting with your world view?
Oh, I see, this asking you to actually have some reason for your claims is all a leftist conspiracy. Reality has a well known liberal bias. Damn commie "facts".
Actually it came in around just after 9/11. Because prior to 9/11 I had routinely moved money from my US bank to my bank in Ireland. After 9/11 my bank were reluctant to wire money as they said they would have to go through a whole range of procedures that would delay them. At that time me turning up and getting a cheque wouldn't (but I was in no mood to fly back to the US to get the cash, and don't trust postal service).
Suspected terrorists change their name to Bob Smith.
My dad is pretty conservative, grew up in a red state, all that kind of thing. He is, however, also smart and insightful.
He asked the simple, and obvious in hindsight, question: "What's the government got to do with marriage anyway?".
Prior to Social Security, about the only legitimate answer would have been inheritance laws.
I agree the headline is horribly misleading. First of all, Western Union is just not blocking transfers outright, they are delaying or blocking some transfers. From the article:
Most of the flagged transactions are delayed a few hours. Some are blocked entirely. [Emphasis mine]
Second, it isn't just Western Union that is doing this, other financial institutions do it as well as the parent points out.
Third, they're not specifically targeting Arabs, it's just that many of the names of Arab terrorists are extremely common in the Arab world. And since it was Arab terrorists that struck on Sept. 11th then they are the ones that are currently under the most scrutiny.
Really this was just a loaded Slashdot headline.
infested with jello like fishes no melotron wishes
No self respecting hillbilly chews tobacco. We dip snuff.
I work for a bigger Swiss bank. How do we do it? Well, there is a list of persons who cannot open an account. And the list does not include any wildchars but is a list of existing defined persons. So lets say you are the prime minister of Dictaturstan; your are on the list. There is also a list where we first have to check with the legal and compliance departement if it is ok to serve this customer.
If you want to open a bank account with us, we do need your ID. It is the law. Any James Bond ideas of just depositing a suitcase full of money and giving a pass phrase to retrieve money are just plain shit. The often cited "numbered accounts" just mean that your ID is stored separately from your account information. Normal bank employees never see the identity of the account holder. Yet, even such account holders were showing an ID when opening there numbered account and we do have their data.
Ok, I am biased but the Swiss banking regulation is extremly strict. Money laundry is rather easy in Britain.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control specifies a list of Specially Designated Nationals. Banks and other organizations are required to freeze accounts of people on this list until their real identity can be verified.
/
You can see the list here:
http://www.treas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/sdn
My favorite is the guy with the a.k.a. of Foopie. His other a.k.a is AHMED THE TANZANIAN which is a little more intimidating than Foopie.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article13 808.htm
You first.
You can't take the sky from me...
By his own words, George Bush is no the speaker for Christians (though he does claim to speak to God on a regular basic). He is however "The Decider" - and evidently became the decider because he himself decided to.
Soon, people will look to you to have their needs met--without even realizing that the needs are imaginary or that they could meet those needs without your help.
We can't win this war because there is no war to win.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
This has been happening long before 9/11. All financial institution that provide wire transfer service have a watch list that is first identified by location of the wire (both to and from) then by the send/recipient. Wires can also be denied if validity of the person cannot be proved. You can't just send a wire to John Doe, Joe Schmoe or Mohammad Mohammed with no background in a listed country with possible terrorist ties. It's funny that most of these people have been block before 9/11, but it's not until after 9/11 that the rascism card is pull.
The most merciful thing in the world is the inability of the human mind to correlate its contents.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the pessimism belched out in these posts; it's like all the helpless bitterness rotting in the gut of the hopeless spilled out into those pages remotely polical.
My complaint is that while having every low-down and 'I-know-better', dirty generalization to puke onto these pages there are no solutions belond not-Bush.
Now, the most I can expect from this crowd is as list of bogus accusations against this administration. To counter them would to stoop to the level of those accusations. But, to head some of you off at the pass, here are a couple:
Everyone believed the cold war is over and the USA won it.
Wrong
Actually Rusia is free, but it looks the people in America find themselfs suddenly on the wrong site of the iron curtain. The USA is slowly shifting to a police state worse then the USSR ever has been. Just fearing terorists.
Not allowing money transfers, just because someones name is Mohammed is one of the stupid things I ever ever heard. Who the fuck is actualy in charge in the USA? Pipo the clown? Kafka?
More likely denying people to use the service will turn them into terorists.
Besides the story was talking about transfers out of the USA. I would suspect a terorist should being interest in transfering money INTO the US.
In the short run, this aproach might annoye the real terorist, but not stop them.
In the long run, you'll have more of them.
And they still wonder where terorists come from?
Terorists aren't born, they are created by other (forgive me the word) humans.
I do hope the parent story is fud or a hoax.
It's that simple.
Would you wish to deny marriage to couples that do not want to (or cannot) have children?
Some people want to get married because they want to spend the rest of their lives together, not merely for procreation.
So what exactly is marriage? Can you define it without specifically stating it is between a man and a woman?
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
If they really wanted to get a grip on the 419 scams they should stop money being sent to anyone in Nigeria.
What Western Union is doing is NAMEist: Making judgement based on someone's name. By making it a race issue, you are committing an act of racism.
More pretzel logic in upcoming messages. ;-)
won't be long before you have to show your internal passports at the road checkpoints. the no work list is coming soon brought to you by the same ppl who gave you the no fly and no transfer money list. but you upstanding citizens will have your universal id card to prove who you are.
but don't start protesting too much, or your name goes on the list. then you can say bye bye to that house car and life. isn't facism cool? tony the tyrant says 'It's GRRRRRRRREAT!
t
-.no
Japanese, like Jews, forgive and forget, because they accept personal responsibility and move on vs place blame and stagnate.
Now, your whitey hating gangster in his Escalade might disagree.
I guess patronizing racism is better than belligerent, repressive racism. I mean, ish.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
That's the whole problem with this "War on Terror". Everyone agrees that catching terrorists is a good thing, in the abstract. But what about the cost? Is it really worth inconveniencing thousands of people with a common name (whether it be Smith or Mohammed) to add a 0.0000001% probability that you might detect an actual terrorist? I can't say what the answer is, but I sure get the sense that no-one in power is asking the question.
I suspect this is a grossly simplified attempt to honor the Office of Foreign Assets Control's Specially Designated Nationals list. I work for a company providing services to the financial industry, and one of our requirements was to flag transactions possibly involving individuals on this list. It's a very difficult problem, to be sure, but you're supposed to try. We've implemented some fairly sophisticated pattern matching routines to try and minimize false hits, but I'm sure some get through. On the other hand, because we only provide services to the financial industry (and we're not the banks themselves) we only raise a red flag when a potential match is found, it's up to the institutions to do something with that information. :-)
Of course there are the Protestant Christians which, quite like the Muslims, recognise no superior earthly authority for their Church. And that's how you get kooks that speak for "the Christians" and officially voice extreme (and diverging) opinions, while there is just one kook that edicts conservative views for the all the Catholics... which are christians too.
Ah, the joys of secular Church leadership :D
You're not old until regret takes the place of your dreams.
And you have been demonstrated to be an unreliable person. Freaking Troll.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
Don't you have anything more important to worry about? Who cares if gays get married? Does it affect you in any way whatsoever? Get over it and find something more relevant to spend your time worrying about...
"I like systems, their application excepted", George Sand (French)
I think you will find that most first generation German-Americans looked a lot like your average Americans.
GAAH! MY PRINTER IS ON FIRE!!! PUT IT OUT! PUT IT OUT!
Keep it hidden, keep it secret.
Your public acts of asshattery really disgust many people, and if you had any morals you would just scream at yourself in the mirror. But no, you need to show off (for a bigger thrill?) and make people sick with what they see as assholish.
It is not your place or right to say, "Well, too bad. If you don't like it don't look." It's confusing for our kids to see, and again ends up seeming as though all you have is one giant, inflamed rectum, spewing your diarhea all over creation.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
that in most states, even if the breathalzyer says "0.00", you can still be arrested (and convicted) for DUI if you fail the manual dexterity and memory tests.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
True... but I think the accent might be a pretty good clue as to their origins. As an aside, the German immigration movement occurred in the last half of the 19th century, placing them at generation 2-4 during WWII. Definitely enough time for the accent to be minimized for most of these people.
# man tar
Umm, this thread started by someone talking about the current political administration and being negative towards "rednecks." We never said anything about everyone being the same race. Technically bias in any form is racisim, as Mohammed is usually found in Islamic families and that is a religion and where by you can be racist towards a religion. Not only that its discrimination which again is racisim. I sincierly suggesst that you heed what Lincoln once said, "It is better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool then to open it and remove all doubt." I am NOT trying to offend you or look down my nose at you, however I and the poster of the comment are both confused by your statement, doubly so as it is off topic in the thread which you posted your reply. If you think we're condoing this BS please get real.
-PB_TPU_40 The trick to flying is to throw yourself at the ground and miss.
..will be just like WWI and WWII where people start dropping their family names in preference for good Western names like Smith and Jones. The next generation of Islamic terrorists will be Brads and Jennifers...
What part of only going after Americans isn't being discriminate?
Non-pedantically, though, when one burns down a building that's part of a strip mall, and destroys several other buildings at the same time, that kinda starts pushing the bounds of being discriminate.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
They are making money on the float. Any excuse to delay funds and keep the money in their accounts means more money on the float for them. Same thing with PayPal. They could have a 48hr turnaround with deposits into your account. However it can take up to a week. Really no reason for it other than to maximize the use of your money for their profit.
In this case they are using a very bad excuse.
What could possibly go wrong?
Did they already clear this guys name, or is the search far too broad? Does anyone else think that most money launderers already knew where to get this list *before* they found it on slashdot?
Mmm, pretzel.
Are you sure about that? No doubt something happenned over there (that was called by the media and others "the Gulf War"), but was what we were shown on television the same as what actually happenned over there?
Some people don't think so...
We live in a world where what is real is filtered through so many different forms of media and messengers, or worse, outright made up and presented as "real" (for example, what is the flavor of Gatorade Frost?) - that our minds, in an effort to maintain stability and sanity, begin to accept everything as "real", and stop questioning what is hyperreal. Even when we do question it, some of us just "go along" and pretend that the actions in the hyperreal landscape have no bearing on what we perceive as "real" (which is why places like Las Vegas and Disneyland "work" - that is, make money).
Explore the concept of hyperreality. Convince me we aren't living in a weird, Bladerunner-esque dystopia. We may not have fembot replicants running around trying to convince everyone they are humans, but just give it some time...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
And no i'm not saying they were mistreated in their childhood poor them we must 'understand' them, it wasn't their fault. Murder is murder is murder but that swings both ways (be it state sponsored individual or a 'terrorist' organization)
The only way to prevent people from taking up arms against you is to not give them a reason to do so. Try spending the hundreds of billions a year we spend on war on elimination of hunger on creation of jobs and on propping up democratic institutions (encouraging checks and balances in other countries and the like) and watch the difference it can make.
Violence begets violence and we're the only ones with the means to break the cycle
just like pot
Actually, as someone with asthma, I'm more bothered by pot smoking. Of course, pot smoke doesn't bother me any more (or less) than the generally legal tobacco smoke.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Why don't we just mandate that everyone have their name tattooed on them at birth! Or, even better, let's go ahead and put a machine-readable barcode, right on their forearms! That should work, right?
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
Well, it happens here in the US too. There are plenty of stories regading people being put on the 'do not fly' list due to circumstances like this as well.
I'd say with a fairly high degree of certainty that any system capable of producing so many false positives, is pretty much worthless. But then, this is the US government, and I'm sure they know exactly what they're doing.
...but to call Osoma Bin-Laden, who by the way was never actually connected directly to the desctuction, a criminal is just ignorant.
Firstly; bin Laden connected himself to 9/11 - in statements he made in more than one video.
Second: There's plenty of valid arguments for 9/11 being a criminal act. His "soldiers" weren't wearing uniforms, etc. He does not represent a sovereign nation recognized by the UN (Islamic Republic of Afghanistan - ie. Taliban, was not recognized officially by the UN either) - so therefore, he doesn't get the legal "benefit" - and indemnification, of a formal declaration of war. Also, there are formal rules of engagement and other considerations, where the techniques of attack used on 9/11 are clearly illegal - including the killing of civillians.
Finally - bin Laden is also internationally wanted in connection with fraud charges in his financing of operations.
Too bad he's too convenient for the neocon war profiteering assholes for them to actually put any effort into catching him and making him pay for his crimes.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
At it again. I sure am sick of this boneheaded confiscate-the-nail-clipper mentality. Does anyone have any idea when this idiocy is going to stop? Feh.
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy
thought I'd add to this. Clinton did implement some law (I forget which) but there was a law passed after 9/11 that made the transfer of money a bit more restrictive (in regards to what triggers HLS).
"millions of people named Mohammed or Ahmed who aren't terrorists" are you sure? are you REALLY sure?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
America is tearing itself apart.
Mohammed is the most popular name IN THE WORLD.
Funnily enough when homosexual people in Australia did get civil unions recognised in the Australian Capital Territory the federal goverment overturned it because (get this) our constitution gives the federal goverment jurisdiction over marriage. So even if homosexual people do call it a different name to avoid 'offending' people's sensibilities the opponents of homosexual unions will still call it marriage if it suits their position.
I think it's sad. I see these old men trying to hang on to the status quo but to me it seems senseless. My generation has grown up alongside "out" gays. We've had them as friends, bosses, workmates etc etc and know we have nothing to fear from them. As such I think state recognised homosexual unions are only a matter of time and these tired old people in power hanging onto their prejudices will soon be history. In the mean time they are just denying people equality.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
My wife and I married after 11 years because we decided it was time to declare to our friends and family that we intended to live out our lives together, as a single family group. Meaning: I love her very much, and I don't see spending my life with anyone else. She loves me very much, and claims she doesn't want to spend her life with anyone else.
So, we got married in front of friends and family. Part of our ceremony involved the gathered friends and family, and asked for their pledge to provide emotional support to us.
Marriage is supposed to be about one thing: two people loving each other to the point where they decide to build a life together, to make decisions together, to create a future together. Children are completely optional. (And, incidently, same-sex couples can raise kids, too, so if that's what marriage is about, there's still no reason to exclude them.)
So, as the other reply said, it's about love. Sure, that's kinda shmaltzy, but what the hell.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
The unspoken point is much more disturbing. They aren't just holding the transaction for a few hours and letting it sit there. They're holding the transaction, calling or notifying a government agency, and saying "Mohammed Everyman is sending $500 to some guy names Jimmy James, is it ok?" and then waiting for the government to check it out and get back to them.
Helloooooo, data mining.
Seriously, what an absolute load of shit. How can you people stand for this? Because it's foreigners??
I say the EU passes a new law, requiring banks and transfer institutions to hold and check all activities by guys named "Bob" and "Mike". But it's ok, it's for security purposes.
You know what? I could rant all day, but there's a much better way to express myself:
*boggle*
*bangs head on desk*
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
There exists a dangerous problem with no ideal solution - if any solution at all. All this does solution does is perpetuate more hate. Next idea please.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
... to any terrorist organization which is serious enough, are flying in and out of any country freely, carrying money in their pockets with student visas, or are handed large sums in cash ...
... and especially transfers of $100 .. wow that is a serious sum, maybe for someone out of the us, but for sure you would not make it to the US on that amount from any asian country, even if you tried to swim over ...
... ...
Yeah right they would use Western Union or Paypal so it would be easily traceable
oh well stupidity wins over common sense again
I understand, that your banks asks you why you received that 15K from abroad, but to ristrict $100 transfers to India ? Screw Western Union
terrorist |?ter?rist| noun a person who uses terrorism in the pursuit of political aims. terror |?ter?r| noun 1 extreme fear : people fled in terror | [in sing. ] a terror of darkness. Anyone who's seen the news in the past few years, and watched the look of terror on people's faces when US troops go into their houses must realize that we're using terror on civilians to fight terrorism. Why look so far outside of the US for non-muslum terrorists?
I hope they are doing this! If you look at the names of those who flew the planes into the buildings, they ALL had arab sounding names. When people who's names sound like (insert your own preference) start flying planes into buildings, or blowing stuff up, we should look at those also. Part of the reason for the terrorist ability to strike the USA was because of all the politically correct crap that has gone on in the USA over the last 30 years. If you want to see how screwed up things are, rent the UNCUT version of "Blazing Saddles" and if you are under 30, you will get a serious education on how the "PC" crowd has screwed things up! You can't say anything anymore without "offending" someone. Well, grow up, get a backbone and GET OVER IT!
The only real difference is that when he was blowing up Russian buildings and killing Russian kids, the US called him a freedom fighter. It's only now that he's turned on his old trainers and suppliers that he's called a bad man.
Similarly for Argentina's 'dirty war', El Salvadoran and Guatmamalan death squads, Chili's right wing government which overthrew a recently elected (oops, socialist) government killed the country's former leader and brutally tortured and murdered all sorts of people asociated with the (overthrown) elected government.
Democracy? Oh. that's any process that brings in a government that we like.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
Yeah and you posted as a coward surprise, surprise eh? Dictionaries do exist and they don't always work. Reason being English is highly mobile and constantly changing, slang usage along with interpretation constantly change definitions. On top of that the media also twists and mispronounces and uses words. If you don't believe me, look at the prefix for Giga.
I made a slight mistake in wording it should have been Technically racism in any form is bias.
Bias is a preference to one side of an argument or person over another. Racism is the execution of that bias towards race, religion as well due to ethnic connections. Such as being racist towards Jews. Maybe you should also read the whole thread and actually understand what's being discussed and what's going on before attacking someone.
Also I would be rude if I called you a Mick by profiling your language usage which would be racist by profiling your ethnicity. This falls along the same lines as profiling by name.
-PB_TPU_40 The trick to flying is to throw yourself at the ground and miss.
it's not towel-head but conehead,
.. no more comments ;) be creative yourself
it's not white but extremely good washed,
it's not lesbian but woman with comfortable shoes,
it's not gay but extremelecious,
it's not a lunatic but someone with a memory leak,
it's not a sexaddict but a drive-n-go,
it's not a pedophile but someone who likes children too much,
it's not a chinese but engrish,
it's not engrish but english (you insensitive clod)
it's not cunt but big butt
it's not fat but horizontally challenged (or big boned)
it's 7:30 am without sleep
--- I am known for the ones who want to find me on the net. Is that a privacy risk or a privilege? One might wonder..
shamelessly taken from the best of craigs list: http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/pdx/102351114 .html
--
10 Reasons Why Gay Marriage is Wrong
01) Being gay is not natural. Real Americans always reject unnatural things like eyeglasses, polyester, and air conditioning.
02) Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall.
03) Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage contract.
04) Straight marriage has been around a long time and hasn't changed at all; women are still property, blacks still can't marry whites, and divorce is still illegal.
05) Straight marriage will be less meaningful if gay marriage were allowed; the sanctity of Britany Spears' 55-hour just-for-fun marriage would be destroyed.
06) Straight marriages are valid because they produce children. Gay couples, infertile couples, and old people shouldn't be allowed to marry because our orphanages aren't full yet, and the world needs more children.
07) Obviously gay parents will raise gay children, since straight parents only raise straight children.
08) Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That's why we have only one religion in America.
09) Children can never succeed without a male and a female role model at home. That's why we as a society expressly forbid single parents to raise children.
10) Gay marriage will change the foundation of society; we could never adapt to new social norms. Just like we haven't adapted to cars, the service-sector economy, or longer life spans.
Re-post this if you believe love makes a marriage.
There were almost _no_ terrorists in Iraq before the US invasion - Saddam Hussein didn't like anybody who might be a threat to his power. When the US invaded, lots of people started fighting back, but fighting against an invading army isn't terrorism, it's just resistance. After the US invaded, a number of foreign terrorists decided that helping the Iraqi resistance was a good way to fight their enemy, the US, and Saddam was no longer there to keep them away, so there are now some terrorists in Iraq, but not a lot.
There weren't a lot of terrorists in Afghanistan, either, though there were more than Iraq. The Taliban weren't terrorists - Afghanistan was a conflict zone between a bunch of warlords, and the Taliban were a warlord gang that were a bit more religiously ideological than some of their competition, and they mostly won the civil war and became what passed for a central government - the US even gave them ~$43million to thank them for their suppression of the opium growers. They did have some ideological alignment with the Al Qaeda terrorists, and allowed them to operate, but they weren't terrorists, just hardliners. And Afghanistan was also chaotic enough that it was easy for Al Qaeda to operate there, especially since bin Laden spent a lot of money on public infrastructure. The US attack on Al Qaeda may have been reasonable; the US attack on the Taliban was not very reasonable, and their continued attack against Taliban and holding of Taliban prisoners in Gitmo after the defeat of the Taliban government is extremely unreasonable. It's pretty much like the British not only bombing Massachusetts because the IRA raised funds there, but continuing to hunt down and kill any Democrats they can find after the fall of Kennedyism.
Some of the people that the US is attacking in Afghanistan are terrorists, but they're mostly Taliban holdouts, or other locals who aren't cooperating with Karzai's central government.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
The real problem is that if you propagate her memes, she wins...
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
If they want to be racist about who they send money to in non-Arabic countries, that's just the usual level of offensiveness and stupidity that goes with racism - but this is egregiously stupid racism.
Of course, if they start refusing to send money to people in the US with Muslim sounding names, they're going to find a Million Man March of Black Muslims in front of their headquarters.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
There are millions of people in those countries with the means to emigrate but that are happy to remain where they are.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
the original writer asked if banks were doing the same thing western union did.
well the answer is: yes (AND NO!).
Here in Arizona, banks are not only attempting to cater to the local hispanic
population, they are also offering to "send money to mexico for free!"
(this was the latest Bank of America Advertisement posted on a sign outside
a branch at the fry's food store in west phoenix).
so, here it is, banks and other financial institutions will block or delay
payments to middle eastern folks, but give away the whole how to illegal aliens.
I can't really figure that one out (It just doesn't add up!).
Understanding is much like a 3-edged-sword. in this: there are always 2 sides and the truth.
Twerp.
an ill wind that blows no good
Marriage does not mean one thing, it has and does mean different things in different places and different times. For example marriage has sometimes been considered insoluble (and probably still is in some places). However for most of us it isn't. In some times and places men have been allowed multiple wives. In some cases marriages are arranged between people who have never met.
Marriage is the legally binding contract ensuring sexual exclusivity between a man and a woman in exchange for material compensation. It's a tool of a patriarchal society, because you can never be sure who the father is unless there's only one candidate (and even then, you still have to trust the mother that there's only one candidate).
Details like these do not change that.
Ttradition alone is no argument because it could equally be used to support slavery or deny women the vote.
I'm not arguing tradition, I'm arguing definition.
Funnily enough when homosexual people in Australia did get civil unions recognised in the Australian Capital Territory the federal goverment overturned it because (get this) our constitution gives the federal goverment jurisdiction over marriage. So even if homosexual people do call it a different name to avoid 'offending' people's sensibilities the opponents of homosexual unions will still call it marriage if it suits their position.
Ah, that's political bullshitting that ALSO abuses definition. I don't like that either.
You can't take the sky from me...
The OFAC - Office of Foreign Assets Control provides companies with an SDN - Specially Designated Nationals List which provides names, countries and entities that have to be monitored and/or blocked.
VERY poor taste.. considering the day it is..
One year on from the July 7TH bombings.....
Actually i am proud to be a Londonner.. they shown a LOT of courage and strength.
Oh and i am Asian (brown/sri lankan)... and am well respected...
Have a nice day!
My, this thread got whiny ;-)
Look, it's not too difficult to comprehend: you can both be right (and wrong). This happens when you do not give a clear definition of what one means with 'racism'. Even official definitions don't help always, because sometimes there is more then one meaning to a term too. And then one person has one definition in mind, and the other another.
redneck ( P ) Pronunciation Key (rdnk)
n. Offensive Slang
1)Used as a disparaging term for a member of the white rural laboring class, especially in the southern United States.
2)A white person regarded as having a provincial, conservative, often bigoted attitude.
So, you are claiming more in the lines of 1), while he is taking 2) as reference. So you are both right. But is it racism?
racism ( P ) Pronunciation Key (rszm)
n.
1)The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.
2)Discrimination or prejudice based on race.
According to these definitions (dictionary.com - which I still find a bit more reliable then wikipedia, frankly), one can not come to the conclusion 'redneck' is a racist term, so I'm inclined to say the former poster was rather correct in his earlier claim.
That said, I do not doubt that somewhere, somehow, another dictionary will give a more broad interpretation, which might lead some substantiation that 'redneck' is (also) a racist term. However, in its original meaning, the word 'racist' invariably and inherently refers to 'race' - and I don't think redneck specifically refers to a race, nor to any ethnical group (anymore).
Thus, you both could argue something else, and to some degree be both right. All in all, I think the former poster was more right then you, however.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
Guilty till proved innocent.
Another company to not use the services of.
---
The conflict in the Ulster provinces of the United Kingdom have a root cause in the Irish etnnic minority wanting to dominate and suppress the non-Irish ethnic majority. There's even an element of imperialism too: some Irish support this non-Irish land being forcibly annexed to Ireland. It is a little misleading to call the area "northern Ireland": it is the north of the island of Ireland, but is not part of the nation of Ireland at all.
So tell me, how did Ulster become a province of the UK?
You see, history is full of talk about the brittish empire, there is no such talk about a Irish empire, rather, there are some stretches of history that show a Brittish occupied Ireland. If you'd study those specific times, yoiu'd start getting a clue about how there used to be an extremely good reasons for the Irish to not want to be ruled by Brits.
The comment was strictly responding to the original poster.
Of course, I'm against killing civilians, in any context, and of course in London, too.
But the fact that London police officers killed a brazilian guy for carrying a backpack is an example of how the OP ideas can go wrong.
Ironic, on a pro-civil liberties site, that I got a message saying anonymous posting was banned, and that logged in posting could get banned too.
Guess moderation idn't enough, and censorship is in effect.
Say anything pro-US, pro-gov't or anti-Mac and no longer do people want to protect unpopular speech.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
I have the personal experience of having seen a Western Union booth display (under the counter, of course , where only the employees could see it) a piece of notice which said "Please ensure that you take driver's license number and phone number from anyone looking like to be of Middle Eastern descent and trasnfering more than $500". ,no, I am not an Arab
I never went back to Wester Union. And
Perhaps white people shouldn't be allowed to rent vans, or park need federal buildings. I've got 168 reasons why that's a 100% valid and respectable law.
I'm sure I could come up with a bunch more...
All veterans should be on the do-not-fly-list
Try posting some "leftist" sentiments and you'll discover there are at least as many in the right-wing junta who will mod you down.
In what way is this off topic? Where are these retarded mods and how do they keep getting access to a computer!? Shesh! Metamods, please fix what the incompetent mods have rated. My reply is most certainly on topic for this thread of discussion!