At some point I may have mentioned that while my family was riding the train between Chicago and New York last December, we were rudely awakened by armed government agents on the hunt for foreign looking people that may have boarded at South Bend, Toledo, Cleveland, Erie, or any number of totally not Canadian stations. They really didn't pay us much mind. Mostly they were interested in the folks seated in front of us speaking a foreign language (Russian, FWIW). That and yelling at the deaf woman in the next row.
Our general reaction (and AFAICT, the reaction of the folks immediately around us) ranged from extreme anger to OMGWTF?!? It was horrible, and as a US citizen, I have to say, horribly embarrassing.
Why was this happening? The US couldn't possibly have a policy of letting armed border patrol agents board trains and buses within our own national borders in an effort to harass and possibly detain foreign-looking folks.
According to today's New York Times, that was precisely what was (and still is) happening. To quote Lee Greenwood: "I'm American...I forget...that...I'm free."
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