Those who follow me on Twitter (@danharris) know that I "talk" about more than just China on there, and that is one of the reasons why I have not and will not add my tweets directly to this blog. I would guess about 70% of my tweets do involve China, with another 20% or so dealing with international law, business and political issues. The remaining 10% likely will deal with non-China law, movies, food, and baseball.

Since Christmas, I have been tweeting a fair amount on my dissatisfaction regarding America's airport terror screening. I have called for us to institute a system that looks to discern not only weapons, but terrorists:

We must "Israelify" our own airports by screening for terrorists, not just for weapons. http://is.gd/5JeSk

How Israel screens for terrorists.And how WE must start doing the same if our air travel is ever to be safe http://is.gd/5ISrs

Will this guy be on your next flight? Quite possible he will http://is.gd/5IRPF Let's start screening for terrorists,not just weapons

US airlines need to switch to El Al type security and that includes profiling. http://is.gd/5CtkG

And then today it happened and I tweeted the following: YES!!! US starts screening by country. We have chosen common sense over getting killed!!!! http://is.gd/5Lj3y

I am not an expert on security nor an expert on terrorism. But every single day I deal with international businesspeople from Asia and I know they are not at all happy with the way things have been going with respect to US security screenings and I know that unhappiness is costing us billions of dollars we cannot afford and that makes me very unhappy, on many levels.

Starting Monday, the United States will be instituting the following changes in its airport/airplane security:

Citizens of Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, countries that are considered “state sponsors of terrorism,” as well as those of “countries of interest” — including Afghanistan, Algeria, Lebanon, Libya, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen — will face the special scrutiny, officials said.

Passengers holding passports from those nations, or taking flights that originated or passed through any of them, will be required to undergo full-body pat downs and will face extra scrutiny of their carry-on bags before they can board planes to the United States.

So why am I writing about this here? Because this directly and unequivocally impacts US business with China, and other Asian countries. Let me explain.

A couple years ago, a friend of mine, a very very prominent attorney from Korea, who is now actually a senator there and occasionally mentioned as a presidential candidate, came to Seattle to visit me. This person is (or at least was) very pro-US, as is his Korean political party, the Grand National Party. We had scheduled a 6:30 pm dinner, along with a Korean lawyer from his firm who was studying at the University of Washington law school, and the head of SK's Seattle office. This Korean lawyer (now senator) was due in at 5:15 pm and we figured he might be a few minutes late. A few minutes? He did not end up joining us until around 9:00 pm because he, his wife, and his two kids were all RANDOMLY pulled aside and questioned and searched for two hours. Two hours.

He was so mad, he could barely stand it and that night the four of us talked about how the United States had become fearful, crazy and had lost its way, and how actions such as these would eventually weaken our position in the global economy. This Korean lawyer insisted he had never been so humiliated in his life and that his vacation and that of his family had been ruined. He talked seriously about returning to Korea the very next day, and canceling the Disneyland portion of his trip. He swore he would never return to the United States and would tell others in Korea to do the same. He did take his family to Disneyland but he has yet to return to the United States.

About a year ago, a very similar (though not quite as bad) thing happened to a Chinese lawyer with whom my firm works. He too was furious and thought it ridiculous that the United States would single out a Chinese lawyer who has been coming and going to the United States for years. He told me that many of his Chinese clients were choosing Mexico and Canada for their American operations, largely because they could neither trust nor stomach the viccissitudes of US visas and immigration.

Talk to just about anyone from Asia who comes to the US frequently and I am sure you will hear similar stories.

As someone who very much wants the United States integrated into the World economy, both for selfish and selfless reasons, I have for years found the way we treat foreigners as counter-productive and nutty.

We have to play the odds and the odds are overwhelming that Korean lawyers are not terrorists. And guess what, the odds of a Madrassa student from Yemen being a terrorist are way way higher. Now before anyone jumps down my throat, let me make one thing perfectly clear: I am NOT saying that every Madrassa student from Yemen is a terrorist or even that a majority or even ten percent are. They are NOT. But, I am saying that the chances of that person being a terrorist are much higher than a Korean lawyer and it only makes sense that our security screening reflect that. And I do realize that as soon as we start screening for those who have been to Yemen, the terrorists will be sure to avoid Yemen and seek to co-opt Korean lawyers to carry their bombs for them. Those are risks with which I can live.

And I do understand the unfairness of extra screening for the person who travels to or comes from Yemen who likes the United States every bit as much as my Korean lawyer friend did and I feel for that person and wish it did not have to be this way. But, to put it bluntly, I favor our incurring that problem over our continuing to piss off a far larger (both in terms of numbers of people and economic impact) part of the world with the way we used to do things.

I have already sent emails to friends and clients in Asia explaining the new rules to them and how they can likely expect better treatment the next time they come to the United States. I have received a couple emails back, all positive. I have yet to hear from my Korean senator friend, but I expect a positive response from him also.

The bottom line is that the United States is sending out the message that those who want to do business with us will be welcome, while those we suspect are coming here to kill us will be thoroughly screened. I recognize that this change in our security screenings is far from perfect and I truly wish things could be otherwise because there is definitely unfairness involved. But I also see it as unfair to make everyone suffer needlessly and I think it is time we do something new. We have to.

And before anyone chastises me by comparing this new screening policy with how we treated the Japanese during WWII, let me say that I do see some similarities, but I also see enough differences to warrant it. My 12 year old daughter (good for her!) sees the new policy as racist, but I do not and if I did, I would be opposing it. The screening has nothing to do with race and everything to do with those countries from which terrorists inexorably tend to come.

Have at it people.

UPDATE: A leading travel blog, Joe Sharkey at Large, likes the new screenings and had this to say about it:

A couple of years ago, there would have been some howls of protest within the U.S. against any idea of “profiling” an entire nation, even one known to be friendly to terrorist organizations.

My guess is, not this time. In my opinion, this is a smart move by the TSA. It obviously took some fast, smart footwork in coordination with other nations.

I haven’t yet seen the complete list, but the following countries are on it: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iran, Sudan, Syria, Cuba, Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, Lebanon, Algeria.

Expect indignant yowls from those countries.

I say, tough. Suck it up.

The Hot Air Blog seems to like the new rules also, though wonders why Venezuela did not make the list.