Drunken Email Rant To Obama Gets Brit Banned From US For Life
Well, this will teach people to drink and email:
A BRIT teen who sent an email to the White House calling President Obama a “p***k” has been banned from America FOR LIFE.
The furious FBI asked local cops to tell college student Luke Angel, 17, his drunken insult was “unacceptable”. Luke yesterday admitted he fired off a single email criticising the US Government after seeing a TV programme about 9/11.
He said: “I don’t remember exactly what I wrote as I was drunk. But I think I called Barack Obama a p***k. It was silly – the sort of thing you do when you’re a teenager and have had a few.”
Luke, of Silsoe, Beds, said it was “a bit extreme” for the FBI to act.
He added: “The police came and took my picture and told me I was banned from America forever. I don’t really care but my parents aren’t very happy.”
A Beds Police spokesman said: “The individual sent an email to the White House full of abusive and threatening language. We were informed by the Metropolitan Police and went to see him. He said, ‘Oh dear, it was me’.”
Obviously, the email must have contained more than the word p***k to get the attention of the FBI. Nonetheless, one does wonder if a lifetime ban is really appropriate in this case.
Wouldn’t this encourage more of the same? The kid’s got some street cred now for punching above his weight. I can see the line starting to form.
Is 17 too old for a good old fashioned spanking?
A lifetime ban seems pretty extreme from what we know of what was said.
I was under the impression that we felt all people had the right to freedom of speech. That should include drunken British teens. He has a perfect right to call Obama a prick.
I hope he’s on the Presidential Pardons list. That would be both appropriate and funny.
He was wrong to call Obama a prick. He should have called him an arrogant thin-skinned humorless narcissistic prick.
The FBI actually took time to work on this?
@ Reynolds: yeah, and we have the right to ban him.
What’s your point?
jpe:
I thought the point was obvious: we shouldn’t ban people for exercising their rights in a legal manner.
Contempt for politicians is a trait that should be encouraged in youths rather than punished.
The question is whether there was a threat involved; even American citizens get in a lot of trouble for threatening the president. But I’m not sure where the FBI comes in — they’re not the Secret Service (which would generally investigate direct presidential threats), nor are they the State Department (which would list the ban), nor are they Customs and Immigration (which would have to enforce the ban), nor are they Homeland Security (which is theoretically in charge of international threats to security). Also, the local police wouldn’t be able to inform him he’s “banned from America”; that kind of thing would likely be served officially, in writing, if a home address is known.
I think the kid is full of it, got punked, or doesn’t really understand what’s going on.
Granting that he’s not a citizen, the whole point of the 1st Amendment is that our government can’t punish speech. Especially political speech. Granting that “You’re a prick, Obama” is pretty unserious contribution to the dialog, it shouldn’t be a cause for banning.