Posted on 11/13/2010 5:36:46 PM PST by BulletBobCo
Anyone who has followed the TSA – whose core mandate appears to be “no Muslims will be offended on OUR watch” – for any length of time will hardly be taken aback by its latest initiative to inflict maximum inconvenience and degradation on the flying public while providing little or no additional security. What is surprising, and to those of us on this side of the aisle encouraging, is that this time around this same flying public is doing something more about it than merely milling about their pens and mooing a lot.
The issue at hand (pardon the terrible pun) is the imposition of “naked” body scans on all passengers and the use of full body pat downs (after a public announcement, and who knows maybe some strobe lights and a Klaxon) for anyone who chooses to opt out. “Full body” apparently includes all sexes, all ages and all body parts. Given the laughable absence of any meaningful background checks in hiring TSA personnel it also means all kinds – as in it takes “all kinds to make a world,” including pedophiles – of people actually doing the patting down.
To the great chagrin of Janet Napolitano (who must never, ever submit to a naked body scan even to prove to the public it’s no big deal) the same travelers who have hitherto meekly acquiesced to removing shoes, hauling laptops out of their bags, parting with cigarette lighters and nail files, segregating travel size liquid toiletries into quart size Glad bags, and every other pointless rule and instruction issued by security staff, have drawn the line at being irradiated and/or felt up for no apparent reason by people who under normal circumstances would be asking them if they wanted to super size their fries.
Accordingly Napolitano now faces a threatened boycott of these procedures by at least five pilots and travel associations and a flight attendants union, and credible reports that a growing segment of the American public is reconsidering flying in all but emergency circumstances.
The backlash has also been characterized by new cases of individuals being abused at the hands of the TSA, stories which continue to pour in on a daily basis.
[…]
“We have received hundreds of e-mails and phone calls from travelers vowing to stop flying,” said Geoff Freeman, an executive vice president of the U.S. Travel Association, which set up the meeting with the Obama administration officials.
“You can’t talk on the one hand about creating jobs in this country and getting this economy back on track and on the other hand discourage millions of Americans from flying, which is the gateway to commerce,” he said.
There is no word from the White House yet as to how the wholesale destruction of the airline industry will affect their “jobs saved or created” numbers.
In the inevitable meetings to follow Napolitano will doubtless remind the participants of the threats these measures are intended to address and invoke the specter of future acts of terrorism that will occur in their absence. What she won’t mention is virtually all of these breathtakingly stupid and ineffective measures are made necessary because political correctness takes the obvious and effective ones off the table. (My colleague John Hawkins outlines some of the common sense procedures of El Al airlines in his larger piece “An Open Letter To Republicans In Congress: Put An End To Strip And Grope Airport Searches” here.) Since our government refuses to name and target its real enemy it is reduced to reactive, tactical solutions.
Thus, when Muslims (see, it’s not that bad – try it sometime Janet, it gets easier with repetition) try to bring down an airplane with an exploding shoe we ban lighters and make everyone take off their shoes, when Muslims try to bring down an airplane with liquid explosive we ban liquids altogether for a while and then relent with quantity restrictions and Glad bags, when Muslims try to bring down an airplane with exploding underwear we snap on the latex gloves and “examine” anyone churlish enough not to consent to nude photos.
It never seems to occur to our guardians – check that, they don’t permit it to occur to them – that all of the scenarios above, and literally hundreds of others, have one thing in common, and by focusing on that one thing we could perhaps devote our resources in a manner that would actually save a few lives as opposed to just humiliating and inconveniencing a bunch of them.
Otherwise, we are betting our lives on countermeasures that are not only always one step behind, but are frequently obsolete before they are even implemented. Even 7th century cave-dwellers know enough to change tactics once the people you are trying to kill alter their defenses. At best they won’t work going forward, more typically they wouldn’t have worked in the first place. Case in point: Unless ink toner cartridges become fully ambulatory, buy their own plane ticket and have the ill fortune to try to board a flight in the United States with full body scanner equipment and/or frisky TSA personnel, it is difficult to see how the grope and change initiatives in question would’ve prevented the last terrorism attempt.
Where such countermeasures unquestionably succeed is advancing terrorist aims. Make no mistake, the enemy would prefer to kill us but if in the interim he can demoralize us, reduce our faith in our own government and institutions, inconvenience us, impoverish us and diminish our quality of life that’s not a bad day’s work either. Implementing a moronic and manifestly unconstitutional practice such as indiscriminate full body scans and searches achieves precisely that.
So it’s a good thing that people are finally saying “hold, enough.” Such policies are the penultimate price we pay for political correctness. The ultimate price for those of us unfortunate enough to be in the wrong plane or the wrong building or even the wrong city while those charged with our security, by sheer force of will, ignore the obvious will be much more immediate and final.
Does anyone remember when we , at least somem complained about the quality of the privately paid screeners. We must do something!!! What did the Gumment do? Federalize the same bunch of scanner, Triple the wages, make ‘em fireproff with civil service benefits. I am glad I am retired and no longer have to ever go near an airport. Most business travel can be replaced by Go to Meetings.com
Wake-up people, if this is allowed, you can kiss any hope of remaining free good-bye!
Frequent travelers are going to be accumulating a lot of X-Ray radiation dosage, so be aware!
If you opt out of the radiation dosage, demand that your private parts not be touched, and that it be done in a private area.
Put together some handout flyers, organize your Tea Party friends, and go to the local airport Nov 24 to pass them out. The flyers should be simple, direct and warn about the medical effects of radiation, legal rights not to be groped, and ask travelers to opt out as a protest.
Has anyone see or know of a source that could tell u what the dosage of radiation that is being absorbed on average with a full body scan?
I mean, you are shielded with lead filled blankets when you get a tooth X-Rayed, doing the whole body must equal 10K X of a tooth X-Ray.
Proudly so if you are as well endowed/engourged as the fellow in the 2nd scan picture.
They're the only ones who think body-borne explosives and detonation is a religious experience/duty, yet we gotta offend EVERYONE but them.
Use the method described in a popular email, where a phone-booth style armored enclosure is entered by EVERY passenger (so no one is singled out and offended), but no body scan, feeling-up, etc. is needed. If you have explosives on or in you, they are detonated in the booth, and then there will be a vacant seat on the plane, for the next Standby passenger.
I wonder how Ron copes with TSA.
He may have some good insight on how to handle the poofy fluffers.
Nothing will change until entire flights of passengers refuse.
Search
Americans
Please hit the abuse button and send us the working link to the article above. Thank you.
Amen and Amen. Perfectly stated
Wow, you’re right; fast food workers could and would never treat people the way the TSA’s do.
My friend says he wouldn’t mind if it was in a private area and only beautiful TSA agents could pat him down.
I quit flying 30 yrs ago, and haven’t looked back, and I left a job that required representing the corporation.
Now I just take a little more time, use a comfortable car, driver, train, boat, ship, or anything, but NOT an airplane.....I have never looked back, and my life is so much better.
I was on two different planes back then, that made my decision easy, one that missed the runway, and the pilot said “we would circle around, and try it again”. Obviously we made it, but it wasn’t my stop, and I had to go on with that moron to my destination. Then on another flight the drunk pilot was handing out drinks, because we had run into turbulation, and everyone missed their cocktails....HA.
I had just spent several days trying to keep a wandering President of the Board of Directors, from embarrassing all of us. Not my idea of fun. I changed careers, and all it took was adding a little more education.
This bunch of zeros are not making flight safer, but more dangerous. Travel by car with at least one other driver, and enjoy the music, conversation, quiet, or whatever....no stranded on tarmacs, no bad food, no terrorists, unless they try to get in your car, and you can protect yourself in your own vehicle.
It is the journey for me, and not just the destination. I can stop to see things that interest me, and I can have two or three great trips a year vs ten terrible ones, that depend on other unprofessional wackos, who make grandma a priority to search, and don’t the jhadist.
You made the right decision about not letting employees waste money on hotels, food and planes....with all the online meeting forums, it is just common sense.
Today I saw a scroll on Fox News that said, “since AZ law was announced, over 100K hispanics have left AZ, for sanctuary cities......sounds like success to me, I doubt they took a plane.
U may be right, but I’m still not flying.
Based on an article, “The Airport Scanner Scam” [http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/01/airport-scanner-scam]
by James Ridgeway – Mon Jan 4, 2010 - as found on “Mother Earth” website:
Manufacturer’s are:
California-based Rapiscan Systems, represented by former DHS secretary Michael Chertoff,
AS&E (American Science & Engineering) – retained DC-based Wexler & Walker to lobby for them, as well as Tom Blank, who worked under House Speaker Newt Gingrich
Smiths Detection – employs the transportation lobbying firm of Van Scoyoc Associates, which includes Kevin Patrick Kelly, a former staffer of Sen Barbara Mukulski, D-Md (Homeland Security Appropriations Committee) and former congresswoman Helen Delich Bentley, R-Md.
L3 Systems – represented by former Senator Al D’Amato, R-NY.
All the DC-scanner relationships stink.
I’m not sure whether to take an OD of viagra or if I should write an uncomplimentary message to the screener in body paint on my belly before passing through security. Why not have some fun with it?
everybody should pee when yelled at, and then pretend to cry. After 1000 “cleanups on aisle 5” per day and the smell, something will change
That's the truth! **ALL** of our vacations are planned with the. “We will get there by car.”, attitude.
The airlines have already lost thousands upon thousands just on my husband's and my decision to avoid flying.
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