Interlibrary Loan/ DHS Story a Hoax

The story of the interlibrary loan request for Mao's Little Red Book that produced an interview by the Department of Homeland Security turns out to be a hoax.

However, it is one of those hoaxes that bespeaks a reality, which is that the level of unwarranted (a pun!) surveillance of Americans and violation of their fourth amendment rights under the Bush administration has skyrocketed to new levels of criminality. And, as I said, I do know of people who have been interviewed when they tried to import Arabic books.