For some countries like Russia it can be even more strict. They only get laptops not connected to the company network at all, and are only allowed to put a few files onto it via a flash drive. The smartphone is replaced by a feature phone without internet.
I traveled a lot around 2010, long before Trump. Phone searches at the border were common even then. I had to give my passcode to Canada and European countries.
I can attest that this kind of frightening incident did not start with Trump. As a traveler, I heard horror stories back then, but not many people talked about them. I feel like most of the sudden interest in these stories has an obvious motive.
I don’t know that I would do that if I was a scientist right now.
Keep in mind we're talking about people with a moral framework that reduces the situation to these two choices. They'd need to abandon their sense of morality to maintain the status quo.
Thomas Payne published "Common Sense" anonymously, and had that not happened the United States may not exist. It is a relatively obvious fact that there can be no freedom of speech without anonymous speech. Especially in the face of tyranny.
If you add enough random energy to any channel, it becomes impossible to filter signal from noise
https://people.math.harvard.edu/~ctm/home/text/others/shanno...
If you(the royal you) disagree, then please point out the last pro democracy advocate who didn’t get demolished by their local authoritarian leader in the past 30 years
Anti-intellectual populism is the new normal, and any thinking person who values their safety should be weighing anonymity and silence as viable options.
As the stewardesses say, you should always put on your own oxygen mask first.
The US hasn’t historically had high literacy rates though I definitely agree we are back to McCarthy levels of anti-intellectualism. Probably worse.
I have a 4th grade child. When she was in 3rd grade, I realized that a 3rd grade education allows you to function in many different forms. A 3rd grade reading level is more than enough for living in nearly every situation.
I would hope that full grown adults develop other "intellect" skills that help them in life, but as far as reading level - 3rd grade is plenty.
I understand the allure of the simple answer, but "Trade schools are good enough, we need more plumbers anyhow!" only works until Joe the Plumber has to sign a contract, read a EULA, or steer the fate of our entire nation by voting.
Reading isn’t just about successfully understanding words. It’s the ability to decipher context, particularly in long texts in which metaphor and subtext are important.
You need look no further than the current crop of VCs and tech leaders who can all clearly barely read. Andreessen, Musk, Zuckerberg all love to point at classic science fiction and modern media while making comments which articulate how completely they have missed the point. When musk says the Cybertruck is “…something Blade Runner would drive” or Andreessen quotes Marinetti as a hero, or Zuckerberg unironically uses “move fast and break things” as a motto it’s clear how little of what they have read they understand.
People today are praising translations of Hitler’s speeches. They do this because they cannot connect the points he’s making to the inevitable outcomes of those attitudes. They lack the ability to see into the text and truly understand it.
That’s why a 3rd grade reading ability is a problem. Zuckerberg and Musk are dropouts. It’s shows.
It is your life, you choose your battles.
But if not enough dare to speak their mind openly, then this will be the new normal.
Not really possible in the US since 2023. Specific political speech, even writing op-eds, has been criminalized or black-list-worthy by both sides of the political spectrum -- democrat and and republican.
As I said elsewhere in this post, most adults now read below the sixth grade level. Popular media has been getting shorter and shorter, all while relying less and less on the printed word. Meanwhile the most popular news sources are targeted to people with the comprehension and reading skills of children, and the most popular movies are literally based on children's comic books. Hell, video games outsell movies by an ever increasing margin and the majority of adults now find it impossible/unpleasant to sit through even an entire comic book film without checking their cell phones. Even music has become increasing simple and repetitive, designed not to challenge the listener. Our shared culture is almost entirely the culture of children.
So then, do we really expect these adult-sized children to be capable of facing down hard choices, or making rational informed decisions? No, they accept the "obvious" (but often incorrect) answers offered by charlatans and simpletons in lieu of genuine reason and the hard work of finding actual (and often painful) solutions for the very messy real world.
(Trying to think of another good example and the Watchmen series tackled racism head-on, also Persepolis is a great animation covering the Iranian revolution)
Because if you read into its history, I mean we started with a genocide and chattel slavery. Then created & implemented an entirely novel and comprehensive social-legal framework to justify and manage an apartheid society for another few generations. Lynching was a beloved public spectacle just a century ago. Hitler & Hendrik Verwoerd looked to us for inspiration.
I'm american and not particularly an america-hater overall, I could create an equivalent list of positive things we've accomplished. But both are true, and the above are facts. What's happening now has always been part of our country too. We have never really reckoned with this, and it will keep coming back until we do.
First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
—Martin Niemöller
However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.
- Stanley Kubrick >>> the use of minimalist phone and a laptop is something I'm planning for all my travel
I don't think their comment has any PII or even signals to adversaries how to fight back. It's just common for people to have lots of information. Sure, adversaries can press you about this but at that point they're probably going to press you for another reason anyways.
Do you also reveal your hand when playing card games? On the basis that the other players already know all the cards anyway?
Having revealed my strategy for keeping you from seeing my cards, were you able to learn more about my cards after I have revealed my strategy for preventing you from seeing my cards? If so I'd like to learn. If not, then reread my previous comment.
E.g. This story of the French researcher which started as, "A French scientist has been denied entry into the United States, apparently because the scientist had expressed a personal opinion on the Trump administration's research policy"
In fact turned out to be, "The French researcher in question was in possession of confidential information on his electronic device from Los Alamos National Laboratory — in violation of a non-disclosure agreement— something he admitted to taking without permission and attempted to conceal,”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/21/world/europe/us-france-sc...
Does that sound plausible to you? Or even a better argument? If I was fully onboard with America is the only country that matters I would be apoplectic to find out they let a known spy just leave
I'm not saying it can't be determined, but it feels like an issue that can't be easily resolved during a border check within a few hours.
In reality, given the pattern of intimidation and lies from this government, it was probably something innocuous that was trumped up even just to be a violation of an NDA (e.g. maybe a draft of a not-yet-published non-unusual research paper that included an author from Los Alamos), or else this government would have emphasized the sensitive or dangerous nature of that "confidential information".
As for whether they knowingly let a spy leave, that would depend on a full timeline.
No it does not if the defense for denying him entry was knowing that he was a spy?
Stop arguing out of both sides of your mouth. So far both proffered explanations are unacceptable.
To be clear the two answers so far have been,
1: we found personal comments of him on his phone critical of the administration and denied him entry based on that, which is unacceptable on free speech grounds
Or
2: he was known or found to have secrets from one of our nuclear labs and was denied entry based on the fact that we knew he had these forbidden files, and we let him go. This is unacceptable on national security grounds.
You can’t mix and match from the two scenarios
If he stole documents I don’t want my government only flagging him for denial to reentry. If he stole documents from our nuclear labs I want him in cuffs.
How am I being inconsistent if your “false dichotomy” claim persists?
My entire point is that these things are seldom so black and white as put forward. The US administration has a self serving answer, but so do the French and this anonymous scientist. Which do you think is less professionally damaging for a European, being denied entrance due to views on American politics or being denied based on mishandling of classified material?
In an ideal world, I would prefer to see any mishandling of classification prosecuted, that seldom is how it works.
Without knowing a timeline, it isn't even clear which administration was running things under which events.
I don't give a fuck what the French or Europeans think. I am holding my own government accountable to what are ostensibly the values we share(freedom of speech and national security) and finding them lacking. It requires zero input from the French scientist in question for me to be upset with the situation
And no, I don't need a timeline to understand this because my problem with the government's own explanation does not have a time based component
We get ~200,000 foreign visitors flying into US airports a day. That we have a handful of people over months who had issues seems more like the normal rate, and evidence there is no weird screening policy, which would probably affect thousands, not dozens.
Also I find it very hard to believe that random border guards would find such thing during a spot check.
Instead we have a French beurocrat complaining about it on his behalf himself pushing the bad messages found narrative. This all smells of cover-up.
A plausible explanation would be that the US knows confidential information ended up in France and the person who was denied entry was the only plausible vector but was not caught red handed. Instead he was shadow banned and was nabbed for interrogation at the border where he confessed. And it could well be that the border agents scraped together a story about his messages as an excuse to bounce a persona non grata to keep the diplomatic issue quiet because banning a guy for Trump hate is a better diplomatic choice. (i.e. what is to be gained from holding him vs letting France burn him for getting caught). This all seems extremely plausible to me.
In any case there's obviously more to the story and that's the point. Not knowing who this guy is really underscores there's something diplomatically delicate at play here and the US has sent France whatever message it needs already IMHO.
Put another way: if you are affiliated with France's nuclear weapons program maybe there's something work-related going on between France and the US. That's how I interpret this story.
A simpler thing to make up would be a family matter, some unverifiable criminal record or whatever. Even noncooperation which is a valid reason to refuse entry. Or most likely: simply "no comment" would have done.
It doesn't help that we don't know the identity, no. But I'd keep my head down too if it happened to me. Science is a field where everyone knows everyone and it's not one where you want to be known as a troublemaker.
I agree we don't know the details and that there's probably more to the story but I don't think the criticism thing is made up.
It just keeps seeming to be these things where the press is really pushing this narrative but the stories they bring always carry an asterisk.
To be quite honest I have alarm fatigue when these keep popping up. They all register as clickbait. I have not encountered a single one yet that wasn't smoke spun up for clicks and outrage.
We've been though only 60 days now and institution after institution is being completely dismantled.
Health, Education, Science, Weather Service, soon USPS, aid to the world with medication to stop HIV etc and food for children, all gone.
They paid a torture prison to take people out of US jurisdiction so judges couldn't order hearings, there are people who were legit seeking asylum and have obviously never been in a gang or criminals who might never see the light of day again
Russel Vought, Stephen Miller, Steve Bannon are full blown fascists following the Project2025 plan page by page.
Imagine this country in 200 more weeks.
Imagine what's going to go down once Congress and the Supreme Court are out for the summer and can't react quickly enough to all the illegal activities.
It's going to take DECADES to recover from this damage.
This is for the simple reason that I have determined, based on a large body of cases that are accumulating at a disturbing rate, that the current US administration considers themselves "above the law". Furthermore, the administration has shown that they are eager to carry out actions that violate due process and freedom of speech against anyone they perceive as opposing their policies/views.
EDIT: I'm happy to document such cases for those who have not been paying attention, but I also encourage those who are doubtful to simply search the many examples that have been posted here on HN (unfortunately, many flagged in an attempt to suppress discussion).