Poor Sarwat!

Sarwat Chadda, author of the much touted fall release of The Devil's Kiss, was detained at Newark Airport when he arrived just before BEA from Heathrow. Held for about an hour and forced to endure questioning without even the hope of a phone call, Hyperion's messenger who went to collect the author at the airport originally thought he'd missed his flight.

Well that's an awesome "welcome to New York." As if Newark wasn't the entrance to Satan's colon as it was. Ok, I know pulling an 80 year old biddy from customs for questioning for terrorist involvement is beyond the scope of reason and the majority of Jihad terrorists are of Middle Eastern decent so, statistically speaking, it would make more sense to question the same ratio of Middle Eastern people as there are suspected of belonging to the radical Jihad terrorist organizations, but is there really that much of a threat from a Pakistani young adult author? Really? Yes, I understand that grandma probably isn't a viable suspect (although terrorists can literally be anyone in its broad definition, not just in Bushlish) and Sarwat fits the description (basically anyone Middle Eastern, again in Bushlish) on the US's terrorist watch list but what is detaining him for an hour without outside contact going to do anyone? I'm sure he asked to have his escort brought in to vouch for him, for which, I'm sure, the Jerz border patrol/NSA readily denied him. Because that wouldn't have solved the issue pretty much immediately, right?

*sigh*

This happens to my cousin a lot too, especially since he flies back and forth from Atlanta to Tulsa (read: The South). He's southern Italian and in the summer gets a tan that any tanorexic would eat bronzing oil for. Not to mention thick jet black hair and thick jet black eyebrows, giving him a really dark complexion. He's been pulled for questioning numerous times based solely on his looks, never mind he's not even close to Middle Eastern.

Welcome to America. Now bend over.