Americas Heartland: Lessons Learned
Written by Jack King
August 2008
Travel is supposed to be educational, and this summer sure has been. One of the first things I
noticed about the heartland of America is that the right-wing Christian nut cases are not doing a
very good job protecting the morals of America. I’ve traveled to 46 states so far in my life and
every single one of them has some sort of gambling. And I’m not talking bingo. I’m talking huge
casinos. Seems like every politician has figured out that the best way to extract money from the
citizenry is to let them gamble it away – right to the state coffers.
And right behind gambling in moral decline is alcohol. Every state in the national now has some
sort of alcohol manufacturing. Most of it is in wine – bad wine. Driving along the interstates in
middle America, you will see more signs for wine tastings than you could ever imagine. In the
heartland, wine is king.
And as if all of that weren’t bad enough, the heartland landscape is covered with strip clubs.
Just about every little town has one out near the interstate. I was driving along I-94 in Indiana.
The U.S. Steel plant was on my left, the largest steel plant in the world before the bottom fell out
of the business and 50 percent of the employees were laid off. On my right was the largest strip
club I have ever seen. The parking lot was packed – at ten o’ clock in the morning. Made me
feel really good to be in a state that has “In God we trust” stamped on its license tags.
Far be it from me to make judgments on others’ morals, but it seems politicians have been
playing right-wing Christians like a cheap tambourine. They keep them riled up with totally
vacuous issues like flag-burning and who wears a flag pin, while doing whatever they wish to
make money for them and their friends. Can anyone out there read or think?
My travels have taken me into Canada a number of times this summer. Thought it might be nice
to get even with all those northern visitors who clog South Florida all winter. Each of these trips
took me into Ontario, but at different border crossings. My first was at Port Huron-Sarnia in
central eastern Michigan. You have to pay a toll to go over the bridge (you pay tolls everywhere
in the heartland) and head for Canada. The Canadian border patrol officers were quite nice –
very efficient and very professional.
Because I was transporting private boats into Canada for repair at the factory, there were
questions as to whether they were being imported. Once that was resolved, I was on my way
with no issue. After the first time, I was in their computer and there were no questions. Coming
back into the United States was another issue entirely.
1/3
Americas Heartland: Lessons Learned
Written by Jack King
August 2008
I was returning a different way, though Niagara Falls. This is where most of the truck traffic
comes into the U.S.; there is very little car traffic. The truck lanes were backed up for several
miles, but there was almost no car traffic. I rolled into Customs and they ordered me to a “more
intense” search area, primarily because there was no one else to search. Six officers started
poking around my truck, then one asked the fateful question: “Have you ever been arrested?”
Let me digress a moment here to say that a journalist who has not been arrested in his career
isn’t really a journalist. And I say “arrested” because that is easy for the cops to do. The next
word, “convicted,” is seldom ever heard because it seldom ever happens.
Now, with the A word thrown out, we had 12 officers searching my truck. After 20 minutes of
tossing my gear out on the tarmac, they told me to reload my stuff and get out of there. I did.
On my next return to the U.S., I decided to come through Detroit. I’m sure there was a reason,
but I can’t remember it. Approaching the Customs booth, I handed my passport to the officer.
“What were you doing in a foreign country?” he barked. Looking at boats, I answered. “What,
you can’t find any good boats in America?” I bit my tongue, said nothing, and drove on. I’ve
never really thought of Canada as being a foreign country.
My final pass into the U.S. took me back to Sarnia, a marvelous, burgeoning, burb on the St.
Claire River and Lake Huron. About ten miles from the border, I noticed that the 18-wheelers
were starting to slow down. They were queuing up in the left lane, where their booths are
located. Eight miles out, the lane was gridlocked. I kept going with the cars, and when I got
about a mile out, we stopped too.
The traffic seemed excessive for a Friday afternoon, and later I found out it was due to Sarnia’s
weekend water festival and Port Huron’s Boat Day festival for the start of the Port
Huron-Mackinac race.
Several hours later, after clearing into the U.S., I met some people from Sarnia at the Port
Huron party and asked them about the backups with U.S. Customs. Essentially they told me it
happens all the time. Turns out that Homeland Security is just not capable of handling the job.
In this particular case, even knowing it was going to be a busy weekend, the gargantuan agency
didn’t have nearly enough personnel to do the work. Why not? One of my Canadian friends
joked that all the money went to build a fence along the Mexican border.
It’s good to be home for a while. I can tell you I won’t ever again complain about spending ten
minutes in the Customs line at MIA.
2/3
Americas Heartland: Lessons Learned
Written by Jack King
August 2008
Feedback: [email protected]
3/3