"The system worked."
Posted on 06/26/2010 9:45:45 AM PDT by JoeProBono
WESTLAKE, Ohio, - The name of a 6-year-old Ohio girl wound up on the U.S. Homeland Security Department's "no fly" list, her parents say.
Alyssa Thomas of Westlake found herself in that unwanted company when the family took a trip from Cleveland to Minneapolis recently, Cleveland's WJW-TV reported Friday.
"We were, like, puzzled," said her father, Dr. Santhosh Thomas. "I'm like, well, she's kinda 6 years old and this is not something that should be typical.
"She may have threatened her sister, but I don't think that constitutes Homeland Security triggers."
Despite the snafu, the family was allowed to complete its trip and the Thomases later contacted Homeland Security to clear up the matter.
The TV station says Alyssa got a letter from the government, notifying her there really was no problem because the watch list only started applying to domestic flights this month. A Transportation Security Administration representative wouldn't comment on the specifics of her case but noted "the watch lists are an important layer of security to prevent individuals with known or suspected ties to terrorism from flying."
They should just go to Mexico and walk back across the border and claim to be illegals and all will be well.
No government agency will touch them from that point on and they’ll get all kinds of free handouts.
I was on a flight recently where a woman let her 2 year old do whatever she wanted because if she tried to belt the girl in for take off and landing, the girl screamed bloody murder.
So the mother let her crawl around the seat during landing and the flight attendants turned a blind eye.
I could see who is in charge in that family.
Spoken like a dyed in the wool socialist, nanny stater.
Do you also favor convicting people of crimes they MIGHT commit just because you are suspicious of them?
Why don't you go back to DU where that kind of support of big government interference and control is welcome?
And there is way too much of that going on, IMO. My children were taught discipline and respect. Just like I was.
"The system worked."
You need to read someone’s posting history.
And if that’s not enough, I can provide some real eye opening material.
Think it through.
Said close relatives of that child should be on the no fly list themselves already. There’s no need to put the child on a no-fly list if his close family already is because it’s highly unlikely that he’d be traveling like that without them.
Plus, considering the size of your average six year old, just how *full of explosives* can you pack one of them?
Now, theoretically, any six year old with terrorist relative connections that is being send on a flight all by himself that looks unusually bulky, lumpy or padded, ought to raise red flags with whatever security agency is screening passengers, but that is presuming that the security agency is capable of exercising common sense and admittedly, that is a bit of a stretch.
No, I wouldn’t want to fly on a plane with terrorists, but like I pointed out, THEY - the adults- should already be on the no fly list. There’s no need to put a six year old on in that case.
I appreciate the freedom related issues, but I just think the fact that a child is that age doesn’t preclude them from being a potential security threat. They might not fly with the parents, they might fly with someone else.
Probably “no fly” would be too much, unless the person was in the family of an actual suicide bomber. Is there an “additional layer of security” list, that doesn’t go as far as “no fly”?
I don’t have a problem that if the parents are on the no fly list, their children would be by default, but that’s primarily presuming that the children would be flying with the parents in the first place. If the child ISN’T flying with them at that age, it should send up red flags and be much more thoroughly screened.
I guess my point is that if the parents aren’t on the no fly list, the six year old child shouldn’t be either. This situation that the thread is about, shouldn’t come up.
I can’t wait until a “John Smith” is put on the no-fly list :-)
Put myself on there in about 1992 when things started to get silly.
I don't even go to the airport to pick people up who are stupid enough to do that anymore. All the primer residue lights me up.
You folks who want to get on a commercial airplane just carry on.
A nation has the right to secure its borders and decide who enters and who does not ... so a no-entry list seems reasonable to me. But, on some level it really bothers me that I can't just buy a ticket a board a train or a plane without all this identity check business. It seems to me there should be a better way to maintain safety.
She's a girl; why would she need a fly?
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