I was supposed to fly to Chicago tomorrow for a speaking engagement on Wednesday. Yesterday, however, while my wife and I took a break from holiday shopping and dined at a mall restaurant, my cell phone began vibrating. Ralph Gaillard, the conference organizer for Ragan Communications’ 2004 Web Content Management Conference, was in a bind. A speaker set to do three sessions—including a half-day pre-con and post-con session—wasn’t coming. So I made some hasty arrangements and I’ll be leaving this afternoon so I can pick up the pre-con session on Web writing tomorrow at 1 p.m.

This isn’t the first time the scheduled speaker, Gerry McGovern, has missed a Ragan conference. It happened a few months ago, and for the same reason. McGovern isn’t irresponsible or flaky. He’s just not American. McGovern is Irish, a resident of Dublin, and both times he has tried to board a flight to fulfill his commitments in Chicago, the US government has denied him entry.

McGovern isn’t on any terrorist watch list. It’s not Homeland Security keeping him at bay. Instead, he’s a freelancer, and Congressional action to restrict the ability of freelancers to take money away from hard-working Americans is to blame (according to Ralph). There are so many levels on which this is stupid that it’s hard to know where to begin.

First, there’s McGovern himself, an internationally-acclaimed Web content expert. The 100-plus people—nearly all Americans—who paid to hear him speak are denied his wisdom. It’s tremendous hubris to suppose that nobody outside the US has anything to contribute to a base of knowledge. What are those Nobel committee members thinking when they consider non-American experts for recognition?)

Then there’s the retaliatory factor. I speak frequently in Canada, and have had speaking engagements in the UK, Brussels, Denmark, Hong Kong, Singapore, Slovenia, and a host of other countries. If enough non-US experts are denied entry to the US, you have to wonder how long it takes before these other countries deny people like me entry to their countries.

But the real rub is purely economic. While McGovern would have made a few bucks presenting his material, it’s Ragan that makes the big money. If they had to offer refunds to everybody who paid to see McGovern, it would cost Ragan—a US company—a fortune. Even with me filling in tomorrow, some people will still demand their money back because they paid specifically to see McGovern, not me. I’m still waiting to hear if Ragan found anybody at all to stand in for McGovern at his post-conference session.

No doubt the decisions that led to McGovern’s situation appeased some in the US who were upset by the notion of some foreigner taking US dollars out of the country. The damage, however, outweighs the soothing of some ruffled feathers.

Update: Replying to this post by e-mail, McGovern notes, “I’ve worked in 31 countries—and only in America do I get treated like this.”