Obama Signs Bill to Boost US Tourism Promotion

Obama is now Travel-Agent-In-Chief.

Obama signs bill to boost US tourism promotion (3/4/2010 Breitbart)

"Looking for an edge in the global war for tourism dollars, US President Barack Obama Thursday signed into law moves to attract more overseas travelers.

"Obama signed the act "which establishes a corporation for travel promotion to encourage international travel to the United States," the White House said in a statement.

"The effort is to be funded through a matching program featuring up to 100 million dollars in private sector contributions and a 10-dollar fee on foreign travelers who do not pay for a visa, with no money from US taxpayers.

"Supporters of the law highlighted a forecast by the impartial Congressional Budget Office that it would create some 40,000 US jobs -- and cut the ballooning US deficit by some 425 million dollars." [The article continues.]

Charging 10-dollar fees for travelers from countries with the visa waiver program is supposed to encourage international travel?

Huh?

What am I missing? Visa waiver program participants include most of Europe and wealthier countries in Asia/Pacific (Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Brunei, Australia, New Zealand). The travelers from these countries already suffer a newly added inconvenience of having to register online with the U.S. embassies before they travel to the U.S. and obtain approval.

The bill the president signed was H.R. 1299 "United States Capitol Police Administrative Technical Corrections Act of 2009", "which establishes a Corporation for Travel Promotion to encourage international travel to the United States; and makes miscellaneous amendments to authorities of the United States Capitol Police" according to the White House statement.

What a joke. How things have NOT changed. Capitol Police administrative amendments and a creation of a government-sponsored travel promotion scheme on the same bill.

Section 9 of the bill, TRAVEL PROMOTION ACT OF 2009, details out the plan.

The Corporation for Travel Promotion is to be a non-government, non-profit corporation receiving the money from the government and supported by the Department of Commerce. (How could that be a non-government corporation?) The government will give $10 million seed money, and $100 million per fiscal year for which the Corporation will have to raise the matching fund.

Breitbart's article says "no cost to taxpayers", but it sure looks to me that it will cost taxpayers.

In addition, the Department of Commerce will create the Office of Travel Promotion to act as a liaison with the Corporation and do some research on tourism promotion. Hey more new jobs will be created in the federal government, making the government even bigger, and we should all cheer.

It looks like a win scored by the travel industry. Instead of trying to do the tourism promotion on their own, they have managed to get the government to match the fund for promotion. They'd better hope that wealthier travelers from Europe and Asia wouldn't mind being assessed a $10 fee each time they come to the U.S with a threat of penalty for not paying, and wouldn't mind the hassle of having to obtain a pre-approval for their trips.

If the industry and the Obama government believe all this will boost tourism, they are delusional.

Oh by the way, did you know that the Patriot Act's extension was recently approved, without any debate, with all the abusive spying program intact, as it was attached to the bill that deals with medicare reform? What else has snuck in in disguise these days?

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