Posted on 08/17/2006 11:07:18 PM PDT by Harrius Magnus
POSTED ON AUGUST 16, 2006:
THE USUAL SUSPECTS | Not the Buttpaste!
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An acquaintance of mine and fellow blogger from Britain posted the following item right after the London terror plot was uncovered:
"I've been away for a week in Jamaica and so encountered the new air travel rules on the trip back. At Atlanta, the TSA confiscated my two year old's diaper rash ointment (the quaintly named "Boudreaux's Buttpaste"). Another victory for liberty!"
I know exactly how he feels.
Watching televised images of American travelers lumbering like docile cows through TSA rope lines, obediently tossing their Skin-So-Soft and soda cans into government-approved containers, I felt ... ashamed.
Yes, I know there's a terrorist threat. I know about the plot to blow planes out of the skies using peroxide-based explosives and the flash from disposable cameras. Perhaps our abandoned tubes of Crest and travel-size bottles of Pert Plus are the price we must pay for our security, but in my gut I know it's wrong.
We aren't the problem, we vast majority of Americans lugging our suntan lotion through LaGuardia and our Chapstick through Charleston International. Treating us all like potential terrorists is annoying. It's inconvenient. But worst of all, it makes us look just plain dumb.
What must the Islamists think of us, watching us on Al Jazeera back in Iran or Syria? What chumps we must seem. What dopes!
Do we really think we're fighting terrorism by chugging down our Diet Cokes before we board an airplane? Hey — aren't there bottles of "soda" on the plane already? And who put them there? What do we really know about the immigrant workers pushing the beverage carts at our airports?
And even if all the soft drinks are safe, what about the cargo? It hasn't all been screened, you know. There could be a bomb in there, or in some resourceful terrorist's checked luggage. Come to think of it, who's checking the folks who check our bags?
My point is this: Name any air travel safety measure, no matter how complex and expensive, and I will reply with a cheap and simple alternative that guarantees a terrorist can blow your next flight out of the sky. Shoeless, thirsty passengers with no laptops but lots of bad breath cannot make us safe. But it certainly makes me angry.
It's not the inconvenience. I agree that forcing the female flying public to carry their hygiene products in clear, plastic bags, while somewhat embarrassing, isn't a constitutional crisis. I'm angry that, once again, our government's reaction to the very specific problem of Islam-inspired terrorists is the very broad reaction of treating the rest of us like a terrorist threat.
In Knoxville, Tenn., the TSA has been testing a device designed to read the minds — or at least the motives — of airline passengers. The machines, which look like a cross between a high-tech cubicle and the Orgasmatron from Woody Allen's Sleeper, were described in the Wall Street Journal:
"With one hand inserted into a sensor that monitors physical responses, the travelers used the other hand to answer questions on a touch screen about their plans. A machine measured biometric responses — blood pressure, pulse and sweat levels — that then were analyzed by software... The trial of the Israeli-developed system represents an effort by the U.S. Transportation Security Administration to determine whether technology can spot passengers who have 'hostile intent.'"
Great. First it was metal detectors, then checking every laptop, then removing every shoe. Now it's "No Aquafina and, oh, by the way, Mr. Graham, please sit in the Chair of Inquisition and answer a few questions about how you feel about the Jews..."
Why do we average American schmucks put up with this abuse? We're not the problem. The problem, as every sentient being on planet Earth is painfully aware by now, is the current state of Islam. Our planes aren't in danger because of the existence of explosives or box cutters or even shoulder-fired Stinger missiles. These are just tools. The threat comes from killers inspired by their faith to use these tools to end their lives in a fireball of death and fear.
Unfortunately, this is a problem we're not allowed to discuss, much less address. President Bush says "Islamic fascists," and the Council of American-Islamic Relations launches a press jihad against him. Point out that the only commonality between the terrorists in Indonesia, Thailand, Spain, Canada and London is their faith, and the accusations of bigotry fly. Beg your fellow Americans who happen to be Muslims to step forward and do something about the killers operating in their name, and these "moderates" denounce your ignorance and intone: "Islam is a religion of peace."
And so we are stuck — in long lines, with fussing, frustrated children and frazzled, put-upon TSA agents, all "solving" the problem of terrorism, one harmless tube of lipstick at a time.
Will it do any good? Of course not. But for the moment, we'd rather have the problem of Islamist terrorism than the solution.
URL for this story: http://dining.charlestoncitypaper.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A16287
I'll have to remember to pack my infant son's buttpaste in the checked baggage and not in the diaper bag.
The only solution for me is NOT to fly on a commercial carrier. Have not done so since 9-11. Besides killing the airline industry, the smoke and mirrors of the present security system does little to curb possible breaches.
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If you can tell the difference between a Pakistani, a Hindu, or a Sikh, by just looking at them, great, but 99.9% of American's can't. I can't.
Hint, the turban probably means the guy's a Sikh, NOT a threat.
If you think you can tell someone's religion just by looking at them, my suggestion is that you're a moron.
So, let's single out all the men and women with darker skin, darker hair, and funny names?
And anyone who has contact with them.
I think several of the British suspects were converts.
How do you pick a Taiban Johnny out of the group?
Dern, I can't seem to find my violin. I guess that is to be expected since it is, after all, the world's smallest one.
I predict its "fall," soon after the Apocalypse.
I posted an opinion soon after the banning of all liquids in that I believed that the Terries had "won," even if they had not achieved their goals of exploding any airplanes.
Anytime "they" manage to disrupt our daily lives in order to conform and react to some new threat, "they" in fact have achieved a measure of success.
What next? Will we all be required to disrobe and board aircraft wearing a see-thru, plastic bag-like garment and be handcuffed to our seats for hours on end and be provided with catheters and bed pans to relieve ourselves; while all luggage is transported by special military transports under heavy guard?
As for myself, I, who spent 8 years in the USAF (and several as a crew chief flying around 1/2 the world and measuring time spent in the air in thousands of hours) and had traveled extensively in civilian life, who "used to" love to fly, (and has been around long enough to to have flown on propeller-driven aircraft; remember when we could smoke anywhere, on airplanes; did not have to so much as show any form of identification; could share and sell our unused tickets at will, to whoever, etc.) have given up, and now, will ONLY fly under the most serious and emergency conditions.
To whom is the world's smallest violin being played, the innocent airline traveler or the "put upon" Muslim people?
~ Blue Jays ~
And even if all the soft drinks are safe, what about the cargo? It hasn't all been screened, you know. There could be a bomb in there, or in some resourceful terrorist's checked luggage. Come to think of it, who's checking the folks who check our bags?
Me too. ...and for what it's worth, the more of this crap we get, the sooner it will fall. Liberals are a very impatient bunch.
Dern, I can't seem to find my violin. I guess that is to be expected since it is, after all, the world's smallest one.
Michael Graham is making an excellent, albeit, subtle point. What passes for airline security in the US is, at best, a "smoke-and-mirrors" joke. From a number of incidents over the past 20 - 30 years, there is hard historical evidence to indicate that the biggest perpetrators of terrorism against the west are Muslim men between the ages of 17 and 40. It isn't a question of pulling all dark skinned people out of line and giving them a second look, it's a question of giving all Muslim men between the ages of 17 and 40 a second - and 3rd, and 4th, and 5th - look.
If a caucasian man, 5' 10" tall, 225 pounds, blond hair, wearing a Bob Marley tee-shirt robs your store, should the police focus on men who match that description, or 70 year-old grannies in wheelchairs and 4 year-old, red-headed Irish girls??
This is the idiocy perpetrated by the TSA in the name of political correctness and "not offending" or profiling the people whose single-minded focus in life is the complete and total destruction of western, non-Islamic civilization. Does this make ANY sense whatsoever NOT to profile those who match the criteria of the people trying to eradicate us from the face of the earth?? Would it make any sense for the police to drag a 40 year-old asian woman who is 4' 8" tall into court and charge her with the robbery that the 5' 10" tall caucasian male committed?
Until we actually come to our senses and start profiling those who match the criteria, we will see this idiocy proliferate right up to the moment when we draw our last breath in a death caused by some Muslim male, 17 to 40 years of age.
It's long past time for us to stop pretending that we actually have a security system and only do "feel good" things that give the flying public a veneer of "safety".
Buttpaste PING!.........
Ask passengers if they're muslim. I suspect the vast majority of born muslims and near all of the converts would admit to it. At least give it a try. All muslims are suspect. The government should require that the names of mosque members be provided. All muslims in this country should be identified. We have to realize that the current WOT is an extension of the past 1,400 years of muslim aggression on the west.
Their very religion is a threat to these United States.
Ya'll flame away.
Until blond-haired, blue-eyed cats wearing priest outfits start bombing planes, works for me.
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