Straws in the wind:  we rent a flat in London to American academics running year or semester-long courses on subjects like English literature or the theatre for American university students.   Until 9/11 these courses were usually full, but latterly the number of students has dropped drastically and at least by half.   The reason given is terrorism.  The kids are more likely to be run over by an SUV than harmed by terrorists, but tell that to Mom.  They are no longer visiting Europe like their parents and their grandparents before them (a visit of one or two weeks does not count).

Meanwhile, Europeans (and others) are declining to visit the US.  If you buy your plane ticket to the US online you risk having all your credit card purchases examined and all your email correspondence inspected.  Milk bottles tests, shoe examinations, thumb-printing, random baggage searches, and grim customs men are just too much bother (don’t EVER joke with a Customs man, or you will be barked at and humiliated.  They are too important to smile).  Last Monday we boarded a jumbo jet at Heathrow and waited on the tarmac for two hours for “paperwork” to be done.  The “paperwork” was apparently the close inspection of the passenger list by the Department of Homeland Security, who demand the names and particulars of all passengers.  It is all too unpleasant.  Meanwhile, any organized terrorist can walk across the Mexican border with slight danger of being spotted.

The upshot of all this is that Americans and other nationalities, at a time of unequalled mobility, will gradually cease to travel, to meet, to discuss, to debate, to and to understand each others cultures and points of view, and we will be dependent on the crafted and manicured messages put out by a media-with-an-agenda to tell us what ordinary people are thinking over the seas.