Doug Maughan suggests that International Development Minister Shahid Malik's experience at Dulles airport may provide a reality check. If so, it is long overdue.
Mr Malik speaks fine words. Before becoming a minister, he suggested the approach of security services should be intelligence-led, not beard-led. On home affairs issues in the Commons, he has consistently referred to the need to balance liberty and security.
Yet when voting, Mr Malik has fully endorsed the government's security theatre agenda and attacks on liberty, voting for ID cards, the introduction of house arrest and extension of detention without charge or trial.
As the MP for a constituency that was home to one of the 7/7 bombers, he should be well aware that ID cards could not have prevented that attack; that they will do nothing to prevent terrorism.
As a former commissioner for racial equality, he must realise that the introduction of ID cards will harm race relations and alienate some of the most marginalised members of society.
Perhaps Mr Malik's detention at Dulles airport will lead him to reflect on the misery that can be caused by petty bureaucrats when they are granted too much power by the state.
Hopefully, he will conclude that the ongoing reversal of the relationship between citizen and state is undesirable.
Maybe then he will cast votes that match his rhetoric. If so, the US immigration service may have done us all a favour.
Geraint Bevan, NO2ID Scotland, 3e Grovepark Gardens, Glasgow.
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