Posted on 12/06/2004 2:52:00 PM PST by Angry Republican
Helen Chenoweth-Hage had a simple request. The former Idaho Congressman had been pulled aside at the Boise Airport for secondary screening to include a physical pat-down. Chenoweth-Hage had sailed through the metal detector without problem, but TSA officials wanted to scrutinize her some more.
The former Congressman simply asked to see the regulations that permitted TSA officials to pat her down. They refused. And she refused to allow them to pat her down. So they booted her off her flight.
Incidents like this have happened so many times that it is beyond absurd. The regulations of TSA, which should stand for "Thousands Standing Around," are cloaked in secrecy. In this case, a 66-year old former Member of Congress is told to submit to further scrutiny for reasons of political correctness and to inflate inspection numbers.
According to aviation industry sources, the TSA intentionally targets individuals for further scrutiny not because they pose a threat, but because their profiles fit those the least likely to complain. Groups getting extra scrutiny include government employees and the military. Other national security threats reportedly requiring further scrutiny in the past include former Vice President Al Gore and longtime Congressman John Dingell.
The two-part problem is this. First, inspecting people who clearly do not pose a threat distracts attention from those who could pose a threat. Second, the notion that TSA can subject the public to regulations that are not made public is ludicrous. It's like citing a motorist for speeding with the speed limit signs all covered.
The Transportation Security Administration has not provided real and responsible security to our nation's airlines and airports. Playing hide and seek with the regulations and subjecting innocents to absurd inspections in the name of political correctness is simply a waste of time and money.
And that's the Point.
I'm Mark Hyman.
"The former Congressman simply asked to see the regulations that permitted TSA officials to pat her down. They refused. And she refused to allow them to pat her down. So they booted her off her flight."
Nitwit.
How so?
nitwit x 2
I agree. Norman Mineta IS a nitwit!!
She was a fantastic Congresswoman. Her question about the TSA's legal authority is a valid one.
Security only works if it's applied to EVERYONE equally. Probably left out of that article is the quote where she told the TSA people, "Do you know who I am?"
???
Does El Al normally not check Irish lasses?
I thought El Al had the tightest security in the world. Is this incorrect?
When did this incident take place? Links?
I agree. Question authority at every opportunity. Otherwise, we are no different than peon zombies in some banana republic dictatorship.
And it's too bad we don't adopt the El Al methods here. When I flew home from Israel (after Dophinarium and before Sbaro bombings) they asked me a few questions and I was done. It was clear that the person asking the questions knew what he/she was looking for and I wasn't it. Our people here don't seem to have a clue what they are looking for and think that by pretending that they do, they will make us all feel better.
Security isn't about feeling better.
ML/NJ
Yes, I always appreciate people who question authority while I'm waiting in line behind them. Like the people at the supermarket who only reach for their money after the total comes up on the register as if they were holding out hope that the groceries were free.
If she wanted to question authority, she could have done it in a letter when she got off the plane.
Anyone whose job requires him to pat down Al Gore deserves every penny of his salary.
"Does El Al normally not check Irish lasses?"
That is the point, they check everyone.
"They point to an attempt in 1986 by a Jordanian to send his Irish girlfriend on to an El Al flight with a bomb concealed in her hand luggage without her knowledge.
The woman, Anne-Marie Murphy, was preparing to board an Israel-bound flight at London's Heathrow airport, when she was quizzed by a ticket agent trained to screen passengers.
Since the agent thought her story didn't add up, screeners re-examined her baggage, which an X-ray had cleared and found seven pounds of explosives in the lining."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2097352.stm
"In 1986, Nezar Hindawi, a Jordanian national then residing in Britain, told his pregnant Irish girlfriend to fly to Israel from London and that he would meet her there via Jordan. Before she boarded the El Al jumbo jet in London, it was discovered by airport security that the false bottom of her hand luggage concealed a bomb powerful enough to blow the jumbo jet out of the sky. She told authorities that the hand luggage was a gift from her fiancé Nezar Hindawi and that she could not believe that he would knowingly endanger her or his own unborn child. When Hindawi was arrested he revealed that he was a paid agent for Syria and claimed that he had been specifically instructed by Syria to romance and then impregnate a naive woman who could be utilized as a completely unwitting human bomb and thereby more likely avoid detection by airport security (who then operated according to standardized terrorist profiles). So convincing was the evidence of Syria's hand behind this attempt to obliterate a civilian passenger plane that Britain suspended diplomatic relations with Syria for a number of years thereafter."
http://www.rosenblit.com/ADC_letter.htm
Learn to use Google.
IIRC, the feds put her husband through hell over a property dispute.
It seems the federal government doesn't like people who think the government should actually follow the Constitution.
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