Assuming America's exits are less fickle than its entrances, Geraldine Black should be in flight to Belfast today, three children and her daughter's boyfriend in tow.

Her husband, Joe Black, is still sitting in a jail cell in Philadelphia which, when you think about it, is not a vacation tradition even among the Irish.

Joe Black arrived July 7 at Philadelphia International Airport, where his family was swarmed by members of the Joint Terrorism Task Force. They had been tipped off that a member of the IRA was on board. Joe Black, when questioned, told them he had, 28 years ago, been an IRA member and was convicted of kneecapping someone.

Agents then checked his visa questionnaire and discovered he had checked off "no" to questions about whether he had ever been convicted of a crime of "moral turpitude" or had been a member of a terrorist organization. Given that the IRA long ago considered itself at war with Britain, it would be no surprise that he did not consider his crime one of moral turpitude and the IRA, despite the word of critics -- your correspondent included -- does not regard itself as a terrorist organization. The A in the name stands for Army. Geraldine Black says she was the one who filled out cards for the entire party and didn't even know what "moral turpitude" meant.

This entire mess was being cleaned up with considerable speed until yesterday. Black agreed to plead guilty to the crime of lying on a federal form. The U.S. attorney's office in Philadelphia, possibly embarrassed by the spectacle of a government unable to catch real terrorists attempting to restrain an expired one, did not challenge this maneuver. Under federal sentencing guidelines, Black would have been subject to a maximum of six months in jail and likely would simply have been shipped home on the next available plane. His lawyer, Dan McElhatton, had already arranged the ticket.

Then, yesterday, a federal judge, hastening to cover his backside with as much paperwork as possible, insisted on a pre-sentence investigation. Joe Black's sentence, probably to amount to "time already served," will now be determined by the willingness of an anonymous federal bureaucrat to get a job done promptly.

"They said possibly Aug. 9," Geraldine Black told me. "I even heard October mentioned."

Both the office of U.S. Attorney Patrick Meehan and the Department of Homeland Security have repeatedly declined to answer questions about the Black case, other than to say they the arrest speaks for itself. That it does.

A man caught up in an antique war in a city where tribal enmities were thrust upon its children served three years for being a member of a group to which Irish American politicians long extended their sympathies. Now that terrorism is out of fashion, a former IRA man who was en route to Pittsburgh for his niece's wedding is caught up in the new fashion of the moment: Security Hysteria.

"These kids are a wreck," Geraldine Black told me as she packed for Belfast. Twice now Joe's calls from jail have reached only the answering machine at his brother-in-law's home in Crafton. His latest message was simply to pack the kids and get back home. He'll have to catch up, presumably when someone finishes paperwork that will tell them no more about Joe Black than they already know: he's a 47-year-old home remodeler with high blood pressure and a long expired IRA membership card. We will be no safer in his absence than we were at risk when he was among us.

It surprised me to hear Geraldine Black say she would like to come back and visit America again, this time to spend her vacation money on seeing the sights: Fallingwater, Ohiopyle, The Warhol, and Niagara Falls. So far she has spent $3,000 on lawyers and the bills are sure to rise.

"I don't blame anybody in America for what happened," she said. "It's what the laws are." I have heard the Irish of Belfast say that in the past -- it's not the people, it's the system. But Geraldine Black is accustomed to living under occupation. If we are not careful, we could soon know how she feels.