[sam_paine]

After scouring images of license plates at the airport parking lot and matching them to passenger lists, Port Authority detectives identified Jiang as a suspect and went to his home in Piscataway, NJ, at 7:30 p.m. yesterday.

IOW, after determining that there never really was any malice, they threw down on this guy to make a public spectacle in retaliation for him inadvertantly uncovering the government incompetence.

[Travis McGee]

Exactly.

Rule number one: Don't ever make Big Brother look incompetent in the new USSA, comrade!

[alice_in_bubbaland]

“they threw down on this guy to make a public spectacle in retaliation for him inadvertantly uncovering the government incompetence.”

Poor guy, he should have come forward asap. He embarrassed the TSA, now they are going to come down on him like a ton of bricks.

[erman]

You are correct. The government pencil pushers don’t like it when you show the public that they’re essentially a make work program for the skill deficient idiots in our country. If they could really “do something “ they wouldn’t have to work for the government.

[thackney]

IOW, after determining that there never really was any malice, they threw down on this guy to make a public spectacle in retaliation for him inadvertantly uncovering the government incompetence.

BTTT

[sam_paine]

With apologies, I think your private response needs to be aired, because if your opinion were to be held widely and applied, then we could also justify any number of anti-constitutional anti-liberty retribution on "people who should know better."

He knew he was breaking the law and he deliberately broke the law by waiting until the incompetent guard wasn’t looking.
He’s 28 and a PhD student - not just a dumb kid. He was fully aware that he was breaching airport security and as a frequent international traveler he was fully aware of the implications of that breach. He just didn’t care.

• malice - desire to inflict injury, harm, or suffering on another, either because of a hostile impulse or out of deep-seated meanness

No. No malice.

He broke a rule. Had the TSA agent been there, they could've asessed the situation and merely told him no. Or, they could have perhaps even detained, or maybe arrested and charged him. Quietly, off camera, etc.

They are now trumpeting his 'capture' in order to save bureaucratic skin, to close the ranks...not to serve any security purpose. This effort is designed as a "long arm of the law" lesson for regular citizens. The "plenty of security holes available" for potential terrorists is long gone by, and didn't need this incident to show them that.