An anonymous reader writes: BLOGGER Paul Karl Lukacs has created quite a stir. In April, he wrote a post about what happened to him after he exercised his right to remain silent in response to questions from US Customs and Border Protection agents. Last week, BoingBoing linked to the post, and traffic flooded in. Since then, Mr Lukacs' original post and the blogs that linked to it have received more than 700 comments. What's all the hubbub about? Mostly, it's because people think Mr Lukacs was being a bit of a prat by exercising his rights. I don't think that's the most relevant issue.
According to Mr Lukacs, the customs and border officials ended up detaining him for about an hour and a half before giving up, searching his bags, and letting him re-enter the country. I guess I admire Mr Lukacs' devotion to principle—he is certainly correct that he has an absolute right to re-enter his own country and a Constitutional right to remain silent. But most people—even ardent civil libertarians—don't have time for these sorts of confrontations with authority figures. All of us could assert our rights more often. But that would slow us down—and most people are comfortable sacrificing some level of freedom for convenience's sake.