Posted on 11/13/2010 5:55:29 PM PST by JLWORK
WorldNetDaily’s Bob Unruh reports today that Barack Obama gave instructions to the Homeland Security Department to spend one billion dollars on purchasing airport electronic body scanning equipment – the same devices that conduct de-facto strip searches for viewing by TSA personnel. The alternative to the strip search is a pat down search that includes touching of the passengers’ genitalia. So, what’s really going on, folks? Here’s Unruh’s story in its entirety:
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=227489
Some brief excerpts I’ve culled are here:
“…”Legislation has been proposed to mandate full-body scanners and make them the primary screening method in all U.S. airports by 2013, but Congress has yet to act on it,” John Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute, wrote in a new commentary…”
“…in the wake of the bumbling underwear bomber’s botched Christmas Day attempt to blow up a Detroit-bound plane, Obama directed the Homeland Security Department ‘to acquire $1 billion in advanced-technology equipment, including body scanners, for screening passengers,’” he continued…”
“…”We’ve gotten tons of e-mails, mainly from females about the invasions of the body scanners,” Whitehead said. “In one case, a mother [told how] her 12-year-old daughter was pulled out of the security line, and [TSA] did touch her breast and vaginal areas.
“This is an unreasonable search and seizure,” he said…”
Perhaps. The Courts are the final arbiter of what constitutes an unreasonable search. My question is, what lies beneath the obvious here?
As airlines passengers we have two choices, both of them very unpleasant and demeaning – humiliating might be the appropriate word: Virtual nudity or having TSA agents’ hands on our private parts – perhaps down inside our pants, as one pilot in Unruh’s story described. Here’s what I believe could be in play:
1) Will these policies discourage people from flying? I believe they will. I, for one, refuse to participate in the madness and will not fly anywhere.
2) Would a significant loss of profits from decreased air traffic put the airlines into deeper financial trouble? I think so.
3) If the airlines industry were to financially collapse, would Obama consider seizing it and nationalizing it? We already have the deceased General Motors and Chrysler Corporations as precedents.
4) Could this airport security gambit be one part of the over-all scheme that Obama is working to induce a total collapse of the economy? If you listen to Rush Limbaugh’s theories, you can begin to believe that all of this current economic chaos is deliberate and part of the larger plan – to create a catastrophic failure of our financial system and plunge us into complete disorder.
So, yes – I can believe that Obama wants to bust the airlines industry, too.
Thanx, teach. Now may bee eye kin get won of thoz govermint jobs an eye kin loock at sum of thos gerlz
The Airport Scanner Scam
James Ridgeway
| Mon Jan. 4, 2010 11:45 AM PST.
Editor’s Note: For a different take on body scanners, check out Kevin Drum’s post on the subject.
Scan, baby, scan. That’s the mantra among politicians at all levels in the wake of the thwarted terrorist attack aboard a Detroit-bound passenger jet. According to conventional wisdom, the would-be “underwear bomber” could have been stopped by airport security if he’d been put through a full-body scanner, which would have revealed the cache of explosives attached to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s groin.
Within days or even hours of the bombing attempt, everyone was talking about so-called whole-body imaging as the magic bullet that could stop this type of attack. In announcing hearings by the Senate Homeland Security Commitee, Joe Lieberman approached the use of scanners as a foregone conclusion, saying one of the “big, urgent questions that we are holding this hearing to answer” was “Why isn’t whole-body-scanning technology that can detect explosives in wider use?” Former Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff told the Washington Post, “You’ve got to find some way of detecting things in parts of the body that aren’t easy to get at. It’s either pat downs or imaging, or otherwise hoping that bad guys haven’t figured it out, and I guess bad guys have figured it out.”
Since the alternative is being groped by airport screeners, the scanners might sound pretty good. The Transportation Security Administration has claimed that the images “are friendly enough to post in a preschool,” though the pictures themselves tell another story, and numerous organizations have opposed them as a gross invasion of privacy. Beyond privacy issues, however, are questions about whether these machines really work—and about who stands to benefit most from their use.
As I documented in my book The Five Unanswered Questions About 9/11, airport security has always been compromised by corporate interests.When it comes to high-tech screening methods, the TSA has a dismal record of enriching private corporations with failed technologies, and there are signs that the latest miracle device may just bring more of the same.
Known by their opponents as “digital strip search” machines, the full-body scanners use one of two technologies—millimeter wave sensors or backscatter x-rays—to see through clothing, producing ghostly images of naked passengers. Yet critics say that these, too, are highly fallible, and are incapable of revealing explosives hidden in body cavities—an age-old method for smuggling contraband. If that’s the case, a terrorist could hide the entire bomb works within his or her body, and breeze through the virtual strip search undetected. Yesterday, the London Independent reported on “authoritative claims that officials at the [UK] Department for Transport and the Home Office have already tested the scanners and were not persuaded that they would work comprehensively against terrorist threats to aviation.” A British defense-research firm reportedly found the machines unreliable in detecting “low-density” materials like plastics, chemicals, and liquids—precisely what the underwear bomber had stuffed in his briefs.
Yet the rush toward full-body scans already seems unstoppable. They were mandated today as part of the “enhanced” screening for travelers from selected countries, and hundreds of the machines are already on order, at a cost of about $150,000 apiece. Within days of the bombing attempt, Reuters was reporting that the “greater U.S. government shift toward using the high-tech devices could create a boom for makers of security imaging products, and it has already created a speculative spike in share prices in some companies.”
Which brings us to the money shot. The body scanner is sure to get a go-ahead because of the illustrious personages hawking them. Chief among them is former DHS secretary Michael Chertoff, who now heads the Chertoff Group, which represents one of the leading manufacturers of whole-body-imaging machines, Rapiscan Systems. For days after the attack, Chertoff made the rounds on the media promoting the scanners, calling the bombing attempt “a very vivid lesson in the value of that machinery”—all without disclosing his relationship to Rapiscan. According to the Washington Post:
Chertoff’s advocacy for the technology dates back to his time in the Bush administration. In 2005, Homeland Security ordered the government’s first batch of the scanners—five from California-based Rapiscan Systems.
Today, 40 body scanners are in use at 19 U.S. airports. The number is expected to skyrocket at least in part because of the Christmas Day incident. The Transportation Security Administration this week said it will order 300 more machines.
In the summer, TSA purchased 150 machines from Rapiscan with $25 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds.
The Washington Examiner last week ran down an entire list of all the former Washington politicians and staff members who are now part of what it calls the “full-body scanner lobby”:
One manufacturer, according to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, is American Science & Engineering, Inc. AS&E has retained the K Street firm Wexler & Walker to lobby for “federal deployment of security technology by DHS and DOD.” Individual lobbyists on this account include former TSA deputy administration Tom Blank, who also worked under House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
Chad Wolf—former assistant administrator for policy at TSA, and a former aide to Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Tex., a top Senate appropriator and the ranking Republican on the transportation committee—is also lobbying on AS&E’s behalf.
Smiths Detection, another screening manufacturer, employs top transportation lobbying firm Van Scoyoc Associates, including Kevin Patrick Kelly, a former top staffer to Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., who sits on the Homeland Security Appropriations subcommittee. Smiths also retains former congresswoman Helen Delich Bentley, R-Md.
Former Sen. Al D’Amato, R-N.Y., represents L3 Systems, about which Bloomberg wrote today: “L-3 has ‘developed a more sophisticated system that could prevent smuggling of almost anything on the body,’ said Howard Rubel, an analyst at Jefferies & Co., who has a ‘hold’ rating on the stock.”
In forecasting the fate of the full-body scanners, we can turn to recent history, which saw the rapid rise—and decline—of the previous “miracle” screening technology. In the years following 9/11, dozens of explosive trace portals (ETPs) were installed in airports across the country, at a cost of about $160,000 each. These “puffer” machines—so called because they blow air on passengers to dislodge explosive particles—were once celebrated as the “no-touch pat down.” But in a Denver test by CBS in 2007, a network employee was sprayed with explosives and then walked through the airport’s three puffers without any trouble. The machines also set off false alarms, and they frequently broke down, leading to sky-high maintenance costs.
After spending more than $30 million on the puffer machines—most of them purchased from GE—the TSA announced earlier this year that it was suspending their use. Only about 25 percent of the machines were ever even deployed at US airports. A report last month from the Government Accountability Office found that the TSA had not adequately tested the puffers before buying them.
What will happen if the full-body scanner goes the way of the puffer? Well, there’s always the next generation of security equipment: the Body Orifice Security Scanner, or BOSS chair. This contraption, which has an uncomfortable resemblance to an electric chair, is used in prisons, mostly in the UK, for tracing cell phones, shivs, and other dangerous contraband that’s been swallowed or inserted into body cavities by inmates. So far, it only detects metal, but you never know.
Give me a friendly German Shepherd any day.
James Ridgeway is a senior correspondent at Mother Jones.
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/01/airport-scanner-scam
I know it’s Mother Jones but it’s a great article. Their wasteful spending is beyond the pale.
Stephen Lynch (MA-D) is also very enthusiastic about them - he wants them deployed everywhere.
That does it, Harold. My daughter is staying home now, for sure!
JW
Yikes!
JW
“Yesterday, the London Independent reported on “authoritative claims that officials at the [UK] Department for Transport and the Home Office have already tested the scanners and were not persuaded that they would work comprehensively against terrorist threats to aviation.”
A British defense-research firm reportedly found the machines unreliable in detecting “low-density” materials like plastics, chemicals, and liquids—precisely what the underwear bomber had stuffed in his briefs.”
Didn’t anyone in the government money department check before ordering more failed tech scanners? The puffers didn’t work and it appears these scanners won’t either.
This BS is all due to political correctness. We should be profiling and let those who fit the profile get scanned burhka or no burhka
80. Wonder how much longer...................
JW
I understand that genital groping is the alternative to submitting to the full body scan. One problem with this is that there is a far better way to hide a small amount of explosives in a “private” area (use your imagination as to where this might be). I assume this area isn’t thoroughly searched, so we’re not accomplishing much anyway.
Profiling works much better—”Take off your towel and your underwear, bend over and spread ‘em”.
none of the TSA workers are medically trained to give invasive exam's of a persons genital area, and to do this in public with thousands able to view what is happening is totally uncalled for, and more than likely people will be filming this invasion that can be posted on the Internet with out the persons permission..
I am 68 years old and due to fly to Atlanta, Georgia in ten days, I also have a cochlear implant, there fore can not go through the scanner and must be hand checked...I'm actually sick on my stomach thinking of this, especially the return flight from Atlanta to Pittsburgh... I'm very close to canceling and eating the $200.00 cost of my ticket.
If I do go it will be my last time flying, I will not subject my self to this public humilitation.
YORKIE...that is absolutely brilliant!
You’ve come up with a great solution. LOL
Children born today will never know the FUN and JOY of growing up in America, they will never have memories to treasurer in their Senior years. We live in fear daily from ‘thugs’ who break into private homes to rob people of their possessions that they have worked for and the thugs refuse to work for, to thieves in our very own Government, and Terrorist who want to control our Nation... I weep for my Country that it once was, One Nation under God. With Liberty and Justice for ALL...
“but that would be profiling.”
Profiling is better than dying in a fiery explosion...
Let’s think about who will benefit it!
Union will benefit most. Also they are indirectly forcing the airline industry going out of business, so every one will use speed train for traveling, one stone kills two bird. Clever!
This is an example of the federal government providing a billion dollar gift that keeps giving. Recall that Clinton created a program to put a million or so additional policemen on the street using federal funds. But when those funds dried up the states and local agencies inherited the headcounts, salaries, and benefit responsibilities. That is why most states rejected that gift, not that they didn't have crime to deal with.
Unions love this kind of gift, and, like the windmill and solar plant contracts to GE, Immelt gets a big sale and unions get headcount which the taxpayer also pays for. Obama and the Politburo get powerplants whose most important attribute is to further drain the productivity of what was the world's most productive nation, since only redistributing the wealth - subsidies - keep foolish Utopian dreams afloat.
The imaging and sensory technology in physical security is amazing, but TSA has been a bottleneck by design, keeping masses of government employees happy with salaries and pensions well above the industry standards in the private sector; it has an incentive to impose more and more regulations, bureaucratic overhead, and thus delays.
Obama is showing a firm grasp of graft, a qualification which may be regarded, now that guardians of our living Constitution have done away with natural born citizenship, as the new presidential qualifications - 35 years, 14 years resident, and a natural born con man. He has far outstripped the last old pro, Kofi Annan, his son, and relatives, who ran the UN, stealing from the rich and the poor, rich, and middle class to benefit his rich friends and relatives, while claiming to be redistributing in the reverse direction. The last estimate was that "Oil for Food" was worth about 80 billion dollars to his friends, though it didn't much help Saddam.
What Israel does better than most nations is profile. Israel is also a major source for many of the high tech solutions used in physical security. If we had leaders who really wanted to build a fence, Israeli companies have effective technology on the shelf which is very well tested.
This is an example of the federal government providing a billion dollar gift that keeps giving. Recall that Clinton created a program to put a million or so additional policemen on the street using federal funds. But when those funds dried up the states and local agencies inherited the headcounts, salaries, and benefit responsibilities. That is why most states rejected that gift, not that they didn't have crime to deal with.
Unions love this kind of gift, and, like the windmill and solar plant contracts to GE, Immelt gets a big sale and unions get headcount which the taxpayer also pays for. Obama and the Politburo get powerplants whose most important attribute is to further drain the productivity of what was the world's most productive nation, since only redistributing the wealth - subsidies - keep foolish Utopian dreams afloat.
The imaging and sensory technology in physical security is amazing, but TSA has been a bottleneck by design, keeping masses of government employees happy with salaries and pensions well above the industry standards in the private sector; it has an incentive to impose more and more regulations, bureaucratic overhead, and thus delays.
Obama is showing a firm grasp of graft, a qualification which may be regarded, now that guardians of our living Constitution have done away with natural born citizenship, as the new presidential qualifications - 35 years, 14 years resident, and a natural born con man. He has far outstripped the last old pro, Kofi Annan, his son, and relatives, who ran the UN, stealing from the rich and the poor, rich, and middle class to benefit his rich friends and relatives, while claiming to be redistributing in the reverse direction. The last estimate was that "Oil for Food" was worth about 80 billion dollars to his friends, though it didn't much help Saddam.
What Israel does better than most nations is profile. Israel is also a major source for many of the high tech solutions used in physical security. If we had leaders who really wanted to build a fence, Israeli companies have effective technology on the shelf which is very well tested.
a: "WorldNetDaily’s Bob Unruh"
Prove that to me...that Muslims are exempt.
Well, I got in my email - so I can’t take credit.........But it IS BRILLIANT! LOL!
Muslims can’t go through these machines because there is no end to these pr!cks.
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