Sigh, it's this hard even being a citizen and resident of the country. As a former international student, and now just living here and working (and soon to be booted because...immigration laws), this experience is so commonplace whenever interacting with the government it's not even funny. These topics on HN are commonly discussions about curbed American freedom under the government.
But there's a significant topic of interest for people all around the world when the (arguably) most powerful nation decided to stop playing Mr. Nice Guy with even its own citizens, and what that could mean for the rest of us.
I have pretty much stopped traveling except out of necessity (I cut down from 12 flights a year till 2011 to 1 flight in 2 years since) because of the huge hassle and strain security can become. Imagine what it was like when my (Indian) passport had Arabic stamps on it because it was issued in Oman (where I lived before I came here). I'm not even religious, but I was so often picked for "random checking" the booth probably knew me by name.
What bothers me more than the inconvenience and trauma this causes for people like me and the OP (although that bothers me a lot), is the massive waste of resources this form of civilian harassment is -- at least 7 officers were involved shuttling documents of some guy going on vacation for 4+ hours. All because of their (grossly incorrect, at that) racial profiling, lack of cultural knowledge, and general fear of people who don't look like themselves. Geez.