Sign in / up

back to article Your xenophobia is killing us, Silicon Valley warns US Congress

A slew of Silicon Valley leaders have warned US Congress that changes to visa waiver rules for entering the United States are impeding business. The open letter is signed by more than 30 industry heads including the chairmen, CEOs and founders of Twitter, Paypal, Uber, Pixar, Dropbox, Zynga, Pinterest and eBay, among others. …

COMMENTS

Post your comment
House rules Send corrections
Add to 'My topics' unstar *
  1. Youngone Silver badge

    No surprises there then

    The US has been fighting a series of interconnected wars for nearly 20 years now, with seemingly no thought of setting an end goal. I can only assume that the wars are for the benefit of whoever it is that makes the profits from those wars.

    The travel policies detailed in the article seem to me to be an over reaction, but not a huge surprise. They are fighting a fair percent of the world at the moment, so are worried about the war being brought to US soil. Travel restrictions are a common feature of a nation at war, so I guess the big corporations mentioned here will just need to accept that there are sacrifices to make when you're at war.

    The general public in the US seem (from the outside anyway) to be overwhelmingly supportive of their armed forces and oblivious to the damage all this killing is doing to their international reputation.

    24 7 Reply
    1. Gordon 10
      Reply Icon

      Re: No surprises there then

      One correction it's not their armed forces that are at fault - it's their politicians.

      17 1 Reply
      1. Mark 85
        Reply Icon

        @Gordon 10 -- Re: No surprises there then

        Well said. As a Vietnam Vet I well remember the hate and anger we military took because it was "our fault". We even took some crap from certain CongressCritters. A certain President and his wife hated the military for "their wars".

        One last time, buttheads such as Youngone seems to be... It's not the military who decides to go to war or who to go to war with. It's the government leadership (such that it is).

        12 0 Reply
        1. Youngone Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

          @ Mark 85

          As a Vietnam vet you'll be well aware that the US armed forces for that war was mostly draftees.

          The people who sent you off to fight against your will have learned from that loss and provided a bunch of sweeteners to the current generation to get them to volunteer.

          No government in the history of the world has been able to sustain a war without the support of the population they rule, so don't give me that "Its not the military" crap.

          Also, as a Vietnam vet you'll also be aware of the fact that the Vietnam war was unpopular back home because the US was the bad guy, and without the well-honed propaganda available today, was reported as such back home.

          I'm sorry you had to go to war, it can't be an easy thing to live with, but don't get all pissy at me because the war you were (presumably) forced to fight in was

          a: A losing effort

          b: Wrong.

          4 14 Reply
          1. Anonymous Coward
            Reply Icon
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

            "I'm sorry you had to go to war, it can't be an easy thing to live with, but don't get all pissy at me because the war you were (presumably) forced to fight in was

            a: A losing effort

            b: Wrong."

            Fuck me - are you serious? Is that really how you address a war veteran from your own country?

            I doubt that Mark 85 or anyone else for that matter is going to start spouting "Dulce et decorum est" but he probably did what he saw as his duty at a point in time and didn't have your ability to see into the - then - future and see how it would turn out.

            10 8 Reply
            1. Kernel
              Reply Icon

              Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

              "Fuck me - are you serious? Is that really how you address a war veteran from your own country?"

              What's the fact that someone is or isn't a war vet got to do with how they're addressed?

              Just because someone's served in the armed forces doesn't entitle them to any special privileges or automatic respect.

              11 4 Reply
              1. ps2os2
                Reply Icon

                Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

                I am a Vet and I certainly don't care how I am addressed but it seems the older one gets the more pumping up of ego occurs. I suspect that the VFW (and others) have a lot to do with it.

                I generally don't join such organizations because of these few pompous asses. I dislike all authority figures.

                The older they get the more they forget about the people who were civilians and indeed paid for most of the wars, either by taxes or by effort they did contribute. Yes the Vets paid with their lives and painful separation from their loved ones.

                The politicians can share the blame especially now days with the Republicans wanting to start every war they can dream up of. The irony of the whole mess is that when we have wounded the politicians finally get the real idea of the cost of these so called wars and when the VA screws up they try and blame the VA rather than properly fund them.

                Bah Humbug Politicians aren't worth votes they are given.

                6 0 Reply
                1. Alan Brown Silver badge
                  Reply Icon

                  Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

                  "I am a Vet and I certainly don't care how I am addressed but it seems the older one gets the more pumping up of ego occurs. "

                  Mainly amongst those who are in the position to send other people's kids off to get killed, were able to avoid it themselves and are able to get special privileges for their kids. You don't see so much ego-wanking amongst those who were actually getting shot at or doing the shooting.

                  0 0 Reply
              2. Anonymous Coward
                Reply Icon
                Meh

                Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

                Fuck me - are you serious? Is that really how you address a war veteran from your own country?

                The increasingly rampant militarisation is one of the things about the current world that really scares me, and placing ex-soldiers on some sort of moral pedestal is one of the symptoms.

                A couple of generations ago, pretty well every male you met in Europe or the USA would have been a war veteran. Scraping and bowing like this to the entire male population would have got pretty tedious. And whilst there are a few brave individuals, and a fair number of occasionally terrified ones, most people in the military have mundane and not particularly hazardous jobs.

                For example, I don't imagine the lads and lasses of the United States Army Finance Corps are expected to capture enemy pill-boxes only armed with an Excel spreadsheet, or even capture enemy pill-boxes at all.

                7 4 Reply
            2. the spectacularly refined chap
              Reply Icon

              Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

              Fuck me - are you serious? Is that really how you address a war veteran from your own country?

              Yeah.. never let what someone has actually said get in the way of knee-jerk reaction. If you had considered what he said you would have noticed he never claimed to be American, indeed he specifically stated he was an outsider commenting on US attitudes.

              Next point, did the US lose Vietnam? Yes. Was is morally justifiable? Not really, it was essentially US interventionism with no moral case to back it up. Should he really distort reality to pay lip service to a foreign veteran? Even within the US I would hope people are able to distinguish abstract support for the soldiers of one's country with evaluating the legitimacy of their campaign: the instant the US goes to war they are not automatically right - time and again their motives have been questionable at best.

              9 4 Reply
              1. Anonymous Coward
                Reply Icon
                Anonymous Coward

                "US interventionism with no moral case to back it up"

                Sure, while CCCP and Chinese interventionism was full of moral cases to back it up - including "reeducations" camps and the like. North Korea is a very good example of those moral cases.

                But from a point of view the Vietnam failure was a success - look at what happend in South Korea - lots of competitive big companies crippling US ones - at least Vietnam stayed just a poor country useful to offshore to offering very cheap labor....

                2 1 Reply
                1. Alan Brown Silver badge
                  Reply Icon

                  Re: "US interventionism with no moral case to back it up"

                  " at least Vietnam stayed just a poor country"

                  _That_ is changing rapidly.

                  0 0 Reply
            3. KeithR
              Reply Icon

              Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

              "Fuck me - are you serious? Is that really how you address a war veteran from your own country?"

              Yes! What the fuck does being a "war vet" have to do with anything? It's an asinine, infantile tag thrown around by Septics all the time, as if serving in the military makes them special somehow.

              IT DOES NOT.

              I've got a family FULL of men who served in the various UK arms.

              My grandfather on my mother's side was a Captain in the RN in WWI.

              On my Dad's side, my grandfather was in Ypres and the Somme.

              My Dad drove a tank in the first wave of D-Day landings.

              My uncle served on a corvette.

              My brother was a Northumberland Fusilier who - along with several of my friends who also joined up - was fair game for snipers in Bandit Country in Norn Iron in the late '70s.

              (I "did work for the government" in the '70s - spent time Northern Ireland too - but wasn't actually in the military).

              And - outside of the family - NOT ONE OF THEM talked about their experiences as if military service made them somehow "special".

              Indeed - just like EVERYONE ELSE - they could be, and often were, utter arseholes.

              The way Septics wave their "Service - With - A - Capital - S" around makes me fucking puke.

              3 2 Reply
              1. Kurt Meyer
                Reply Icon

                Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

                @KeithR"asinine, infantile"

                Brevity in self-description is always admirable.

                0 0 Reply
            4. Alan Brown Silver badge
              Reply Icon

              Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

              "Fuck me - are you serious? Is that really how you address a war veteran from your own country?"

              What would you call a country which went into a war of independence against the country fighting for its independence. The first thing it had to do once it finally got it (no thanks to the USA) was turn around and fight off an invasion from a country which is a notional US enemy.

              Not to mention the secret wars running in parallel in Laos+Cambodia and the USA's financing/encouragement of the narcotics trade in the area in order to keep warlords onside (thanks to those undeclared wars, there are still vast areas of those countries which are unusable thanks to bomblets and landmines, still live and deadly after 50 years)

              The fact that you seem to think that the USA was in the right speaks volumes. One can be sympathetic to the soldiers whilst simultaneously hostile to the invasion and occupation. Many/most of the soldiers didn't want to be there, however there were more than a few psychopaths amongst them(*). Most of those soldiers also agreed that the war was "wrong" and many of them were at the forefront of antiwar action back in the USA.

              The funny thing about the USA is that it's not Soviet Russia and one is (supposedly) allowed to freely criticise the state and what it has done in the past.

              (*) Most fo the psychopaths in Vietnam were enlisted soldiers. This should give a big hint as to why psychopathic episodes are still happening around US foreign presences. Mental health evaluation should be an integral part of the enlistment process and _remaining_ enlisted.

              0 0 Reply
          2. Mark 85
            Reply Icon

            Re: @Youngone -- No surprises there then

            As a Vietnam vet you'll be well aware that the US armed forces for that war was mostly draftees

            I enlisted and was not drafted. I'm pissy because you seem to think that those who are/were in the military are to blame. I have a feeling that you would have been standing on the sidelines spitting on the returnees much like certain others did. Put the blame where it belongs. On the government leaders. Should we also blame all the wars in the past on the military? I don't think so....

            Yes, it was a losing effort. Again because of the government leadership. LBJ and his daily polls on his popularity played a big part in the loss. Yes, it was wrong. The French got kicked out and so did we. Wrong tactics for the wrong war. There's a pattern here.

            You still seem to think the military picks wars and go fights them without being directed. As unpopular as Vietnam was, the leaders still chose to fight it.

            9 0 Reply
            1. Anonymous Coward
              Reply Icon
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: @Youngone -- No surprises there then

              "I'm pissy because you seem to think that those who are/were in the military are to blame."

              If you choose of your own free will to participate in an unjust war, which devastated another country, caused deaths of millions, and damaged the environment for decades - then sure, you do carry a share of moral responsibility.

              4 7 Reply
            2. Alfred
              Reply Icon

              Re: @Youngone -- No surprises there then

              "I have a feeling that you would have been standing on the sidelines spitting on the returnees much like certain others did."

              In the interests of history, that is disputed.

              http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/07/03/nobody-spat-on-american-gis/

              0 1 Reply
              1. Kurt Meyer
                Reply Icon
                Thumb Down

                Re:@Youngone -- No surprises there then

                @Alfred - Counterpunch? That's your source?

                No institutional bias at Counterpunch, none at all.

                I can hear 'em singing, even at this distance...

                "Well come on all of you big strong men,

                Uncle Sam needs your help again..."

                0 0 Reply
            3. KeithR
              Reply Icon

              Re: @Youngone -- No surprises there then

              "I'm pissy because you seem to think that those who are/were in the military are to blame."

              They very often are.

              It's no secret that (particularly, though not only) US military "hawks" are ever looking for a new war to fight.

              (I say "fight" - I mean "embarrass themselves over").

              Wesley fucking Clark, for example - luckily we had a quality officer like Mike Jackson to stop the US dickhead from starting WW III:

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incident_at_Pristina_airport

              http://www.antiwar.com/orig/jatras12.html

              0 2 Reply
              1. YARR
                Reply Icon

                These travel restrictions are a reaction to terrorism, not general immigration. They are xenophobic because there is no proven way to effectively discriminate against terrorists. Trump's idea of a ban on Muslim immigration is more targeted but wouldn't work, because the terrorists would claim to be of a different religion. An alternative might be to require certain visa applicants to wear an electronic tracking device. It's still discriminatory, but it would overcome the inconvenience caused by the present rules.

                To those blaming wars on the military, the buck always stops with politicians. Some military generals talk up the threat to justify their budget increases, but they are not responsible for initiating conflict. If military personnel conscientiously object to fight a war they don't agree with, they are liable to be court-marshalled. Given that most wars the US is involved in nowadays aren't motivated by the need to defend the US but instead are geopolitical in nature, then traditional patriots motivated to defend their country should avoid joining the US military. It's ironic that some of the people who advocate US military intervention around the world, and expect US military personnel not to exercise their conscience, are often in support of prosecuting those from other countries who were also just following orders.

                1 0 Reply
        2. Alan Brown Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: @Gordon 10 -- No surprises there then

          "It's not the military who decides to go to war or who to go to war with."

          But it _is_ the military who need to take full and unshifting responsibility for Mai Lai, Abu Ghraib prison and numerous other atrocities inflicted by US military personell whilst on active service (including things like off-duty soldiers raping schoolgirls in Okinawa and raping/killing families in Iraq).

          If a soldier is not stable enough to be trustworthy outside the USA then he/she should never be allowed to go outside the USA - and it is the commanding officers who should be held accountable for failures to prevent them from committing these acts, instead of being promoted out of the way.

          0 0 Reply
      2. Anonymous Coward
        Reply Icon
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: No surprises there then

        One correction it's not their armed forces that are at fault - it's their politicians.

        Well, Obama ran on this platform when he ran for re-election, requiring a visa if you are not a U.S. national. You Americans re-elected him so what's the problem?

        0 1 Reply
    2. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: No surprises there then

      The travel restrictions brought in have nothing to do with any of the current "Forever wars" .

      They have everything to do with the Republican congress having Iranian sour grapes while doing Netanyahu's bidding.

      5 2 Reply
  2. nilfs2
    Coat

    Xenophobia and racism are part of the USA culture

    Nothing new here

    22 7 Reply
    1. Kumar2012
      Reply Icon

      Re: Xenophobia and racism are part of the USA culture

      meanwhile crying xenophobia and racism at every turn is part of deranged leftist culture.

      8 29 Reply
      1. nilfs2
        Reply Icon
        Meh

        Re: Xenophobia and racism are part of the USA culture

        My left hand is dedicated to actions that I will not disclose

        7 0 Reply
      2. KeithR
        Reply Icon

        Re: Xenophobia and racism are part of the USA culture

        "meanwhile crying xenophobia and racism at every turn is part of deranged leftist culture"

        Or - in this case - accurate reportage.

        2 2 Reply
  3. Kumar2012
    Childcatcher

    Let me translate; please let us import more cheap labour from the third world while 95 million Americans are out of work and the youth graduate from universities with massive debts and no job prospects, the sad circumstances of these 0.00001%ers could bring a tear to a glass eye. Icon because this is basically the same whine from these losers.

    15 12 Reply
    1. nilfs2
      Reply Icon
      Trollface

      The price you got to pay for being the world's economy leader.

      2 6 Reply
    2. Malcolm 1
      Reply Icon

      This is just referring to travel visas (ie for holiday or business), not H1-B working visas.

      8 0 Reply
      1. Mark 85
        Reply Icon

        Sure... nudge.. nudge.. wink... wink. If that's the case, why is it the tech companies complaining loudest? I do believe they fear the working visas are to be included or are the next bit of legal wrangling.

        5 0 Reply
        1. imanidiot Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Not really. A lot of visitors to tech companies from abroad are knowledge workers who come in to perform a certain service or share certain knowledge in a way that is permitted under the visa waiver.

          It can be very valuable to have some engineers come over and look at the stuff they are going to be altering or implementing on your high-tech machines in person. (Either to or from the US) But if they have to go through a months long Visa application to MAYBE get a visa then this hampers progress, reduces response time and costs a lot of money.

          I work in an industry where the cost of downtime is measured in the 100k per hour range. If they need my knowledge over there they want me there ASAP. Not in 4 weeks time.

          1 1 Reply
    3. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Not quite

      The real translation is:

      You stupid f*** b***rds. How f*** dare you provide non-USA companies with a competitive advantage in Iran?

      0 0 Reply
    4. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      ...please let us import more cheap labour from the third world while 95 million Americans are out of work and the youth graduate from universities with massive debts and no job prospects,...

      The scary thing is the number of downvotes on this comment.

      This situation is tied to the H1B visa problem - simply put, U.S. businesses (as businesses should!) want the cheapest workers available. Offshoring didn't always work so well, but importing indentured servants works well for them, so they keep pressuring Congress to allow this. This does, unfortunately, mean that IT careers are not a good option for college students - IT workers salaries have not increased as much as they should have.

      Coupled with massive slashing of funding for public colleges, that bachelor's degree required for an entry-level software QA job is very expensive, and the student will work about 123 years to pay off the student loan debt.

      That's good for banks, but not for the nation as a whole - that money that is spent on repaying debts would have gone to consumer purchases, buying cars and houses, etc., and basically helping to keep the middle class in existence.

      1 0 Reply
      1. KeithR
        Reply Icon

        "simply put, U.S. businesses (as businesses should!) want the cheapest workers available".

        So in your world view, business has NO moral responsibility to do right in by its own compatriots and - quite likely - customers?

        God bless America!

        Fuck Americans, but bless America.

        1 1 Reply
  4. Long John Brass

    It's a brave new world...

    We've always been at war with Eurasia Eastasia

    16 1 Reply

  5. This post has been deleted by its author

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Can we please stop "dissing" the USA? they don't get sarcasm.

    P.S. I'm being sarcastic.

    10 3 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Sarcasm? Whuh?

      Isn't a "sarcasm" some kind of sexual thrill generated by eating small tinned fish? Or is that a sardinocasm?

      Anyway... I surely don't know what this "xenophobia" talk is about. The USA is all about visa-free travel. We sent any number of our lads to Iraq -- no visa required. And over 4000 of them got to come home in body bags. Talk about world freedom!

      Not only that, the US created employment for the natives (or "Iraqis" as they are sometimes called). Without the US effort, all those Islamic State fighters would no doubt be jobless, hanging about Baghdad street corners smoking cheap Egyptian cigarettes and complaining about Saddam. Now, thanks to the USA's work in destabilized and fragmented Iraq, they are on salary chopping heads and filming themselves for Facebook.

      15 2 Reply
      1. KeithR
        Reply Icon

        Re: Sarcasm? Whuh?

        "We sent any number of our lads to Iraq -- no visa required. And over 4000 of them got to come home in body bags. Talk about world freedom!"

        Who invited them, again?

        Oh yeah - nobody.

        1 1 Reply
  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Are they barring EU citizens or Japaneses to enter with a visa waiver?

    Or it's just barring the middle east countries? If so, I can't see how it can impact "millions" of prospective travelers. Nor I can see in this case why EU, for example, should start to ask for visas either. It's not that till now many EU citizens are also Syrians, although at the actual immigrants rate it could change very soon (thanks to the disaster called US foreign affairs)

    And we are talking about visa for work/business, or tourism? They are not the same kind of visa - or waiver, usually.

    It looks to me there is more interests in cheap labor, than in anything else. Also, without cheap labor to keep them down, wages risk to get higher, and you can't always rely on someone with a Syrian father to set up a cartel to keep them down.

    1 0 Reply
    1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Are they barring EU citizens or Japaneses to enter with a visa waiver?

      Visa waiver is for business or tourism, if you are form a visa waiver country (eg UK) it is quite hard to get a business visa - which means that any visit to a customer is always a crap shoot if they will let you in.

      If it does apply then a bunch of people in the security/oil/engineering businesses that have been to Iraq would be banned, along with a lot of journalists and news crews. On the plus side, presumably Bush/Cheney/Blair will also be banned.

      7 0 Reply
      1. NeilPost Silver badge
        Reply Icon

        Re: Are they barring EU citizens or Japaneses to enter with a visa waiver?

        I had no issues getting a business H1B Visa last year, despite being from the UK. Neither did anyone else from my company.... supporting an existing customer expanding to the US.

        1 1 Reply
      2. Anonymous Coward
        Reply Icon
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Are they barring EU citizens or Japaneses to enter with a visa waiver?

        Oh well, try to have an Israeli visa on your passport, and then try to enter those nice middle east countries...

        0 0 Reply
        1. Vic
          Reply Icon

          Re: Are they barring EU citizens or Japaneses to enter with a visa waiver?

          try to have an Israeli visa on your passport, and then try to enter those nice middle east countries...

          That's easy - you use one passport for Israel, and another for any Arab countries.

          It's very common practice...

          Vic.

          0 0 Reply
  8. Mephistro
    Flame

    "...it would allow exceptions for those groups, but that they would be dealt with on a case-by-case basis."

    Translated: "... they will do as they frecking please."

    Seriously, this expression - "case-by-case" - should be punished by "death in the scorpions pit" or worse. It goes in the same category as "trust me", "benevolent government" and "self-policing organization".

    1 1 Reply
  9. martinusher Silver badge

    It was just a fit of pique by Congress

    Payback for the ending of sanctions on Iran. Just a little bit of petulance, about the level of maturity one has come to expect from that August body.

    Visa waivers are used for visits to the US that don't just involve tourism. They impact people who are visiting corporate offices, going to conferences, all those F2F activities that aren't actually work but are important to the conduct of business. (They'd also impact people coming here for job interviews.....) This kind of blanket ban does just affect people from the Middle East, it applies to naturalized citizens of, say, the UK who were born in these countries.

    ..and we wonder why people regard Congress as a bunch of wankers.

    5 1 Reply
  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Irony?

    Given how frequently the US has mass shootings carried out by its own citizens, it seems closing the borders to anyone who's been to/come from the middle east on the off chance they might be a terrorist strikes me as a bit of a daft policy. But then when did any government implement any other kind?

    Given the extent to which the US is hurting their own economy, it looks to me like the terrorists have won.

    12 1 Reply
    1. Alan Brown Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Irony?

      "Given how frequently the US has mass shootings carried out by its own citizens"

      Exactly. "domestic terroists" has always been the most likely source of any terrorist action in the USA. McVeigh is just one of the more high profile ones in recent history

      It's worth noting that terrorists usually have an agenda. Psycholoigically damaged kids (of any colour) shooting up their school is just a symptom of the malaise within the country (BTW, such events are fewer in number and casualties now than in the 1970s. As with domestic abuse, numbers may be down but reporting is way up)

      0 0 Reply
  11. DainB Bronze badge

    Wise move

    "This kind of blanket ban does just affect people from the Middle East, it applies to naturalized citizens of, say, the UK who were born in these countries."

    Yep, those born and raised in Muslim ghettos of UK and France are not welcomed anywhere. Except UK and France themselves of course.

    1 10 Reply

  12. This post has been deleted by its author

  13. W. Anderson

    dysfunctional bias against anyone non-Western Caucasuan

    If the USA has exhibited xenophobia - that is a fear or hatred - of their own patriotic citizens, due only to their race , ethnicity or non-Christian religion - as strangers/foreign to their popular social fabric, then it is not surprising at all that the Federal government, many national leaders and extremist organizations would follow in the same path of exceeding xenophobia after the Paris and California terrorist attacks.

    The greatest irony of this crass action is that since San Bernadino attacks more than 100 people have been killed here in USA by nut cases who won't be classified as terrorists, precisely because they are Caucasians, even the Kalamazoo murders that are part of 38 mass killing in year 2016 alone.

    A sad, and really sick thinking Congress and populace.

    5 1 Reply
  14. Dr Scrum Master

    I Ran

    I'm thinking of visiting Iran just so that I'd lose the visa waiver...

    Who wants to go to the USA anyway?

    2 0 Reply
  15. Kevin McMurtrie Silver badge
    Big Brother

    Dealt with on a case-by-case basis

    Paper forms, quadruple photocopies, envelopes, and faxes. Submit all that for a hierarchy of review and archive for 10 years. No problem doing that on a global scale. Should be fine.

    1 0 Reply
  16. M7S

    Just a thought

    I assume that over the past decade or so a high proportion of the UK military have visited hot sandy countries appearing on this list. Perhaps other allies of the US have also done so.

    Do they all have to apply for visas in order to take their families on holiday to the US, or if they later get a civilian job that requires travel to the US that would be visa-free for people who are not ex-services?

    2 0 Reply
  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Leaving the EU.

    We could get around this by joining the US.

    0 0 Reply
  18. Christian Berger

    Are there even engineering jobs left in Silicon Valley...

    ... or to be more precise, such jobs that do not involve killing or exploiting people?

    I mean you usually don't need much technical expertise to start a start-up, and even if you don't have that, you can easily outsource it.

    As for larger companies, why are you even in a place where education about science and engineering is as bad as in the US? Just open up a new development centre in a country where people aren't scared of digital clocks.

    4 1 Reply
    1. KeithR
      Reply Icon

      Re: Are there even engineering jobs left in Silicon Valley...

      "Just open up a new development centre in a country where people aren't scared of digital clocks"

      Deserves far more upvotes than I can give!

      1 1 Reply
  19. Trigonoceps occipitalis

    Reciprocity

    I heard that when the USA introduced finger printing on arrival Brazil, having a policy of reciprocity in visas etc, invited citizens of the USA to use the convenient ink pad and paper as they were cleared for entry.

    2 0 Reply
  20. Sir_Hops_A_Lot

    No one should give a crap about what these companies say....

    These are some of the bad actors in my industry who've been spinning out of control the last few years...lying about huge chunks of their business, they've abandoned any pretense of genuinely caring about the expectation of privacy we've enjoyed since the founding of the nation, being taken away from us by the government and more so, by the IT Industry as a whole. We should let karma be a bitch, in this case and maybe call this The Start Of Payback for lying about how many work visas you needed to fill your desks with unqualified and uneducated low-wage workers.

    0 0 Reply

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

Forgotten password ?

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like