Don’t want to go through the TSA’s full body scan or porn-o-scan? The TSA has an alternative: “enhanced” pat-downs. These pat-downs gropings have one objective – coerce you into going through the body scanner.
T-shirts with the logo on the left are available here.
If a significant number of passengers choose to opt-out of the body scanners, the time required to do a normal pat-down would cause such delays that travelers would find alternatives to flying. The airlines would raise hell. To prevent this, the TSA has resorted to the terror tactic of “enhanced” pat-downs.
There is big money at stake here. Former DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff actively lobbies for the scanner manufacturer Rapiscan via his firm the Chertoff Group. Each unit has a price tag of $25 million and the Obama administration has provided $1 billion in stimulus money for the purchase of scanners.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has filed a petition for review and motion for an emergency stay with District of Columbia Court of Appeals. EPIC said that the program is “unlawful, invasive, and ineffective.” With this much money at stake, the Fourth Amendment doesn’t stand a chance.
I expect members of Congress to act outraged, hold hearings wherein they act outraged, and then do nothing. Politicians will use this opportunity to get their sound bites on the evening news, then something else will come along and distract us.
If you decide to go the “enhanced” pat-down route, you could pull a Meg Ryan:
Also: Pronoun choice is dictated by subject. Attacking me personally instead of arguments requires the usage of “I”. I’ll say it again real slow so you can understand . . .
You can attack me, which only makes me giggle at your ineptitude, or you can address the TSA trampling your civil rights. A prolonged campaign trying to smear me will net you nothing but my amusement.
lottakatz,
Thanks for the information (comment and link). Many don’t know the half of what’s already going on domestically. They’re tracking people like dogs… harassing and destroying lives. Say the wrong thing, irritate the wrong person, you’re on their list and watch out.
As you said, “seems like old times.” Only it’s worse.
Mo,
It’s not “them” that we have to worry about. It’s “us.”
badtroll,
Then you shouldn’t give me lines from jingoistic crap films.
Swarthmore mom:
He is worse than Palin. But it is not about protecting the women folk from the black man, it is about protecting everyone from an intrusive government going beyond it’s constitutional mandate.
The government has used 9/11 and the ensuing years as a terrible power grab. We are being ruled by bureaucrats whose sole function in life is to expand their turf and reduce our freedom.
Repeal the Patriot Act and start rolling back the bureaucracies. Start dismantling the nanny state before it becomes to big to dismantle.
Mo My comment was not about airport security. It was about how Huckabee was using it to make a statement about protecting his wife and daughters from Obama. I wonder what group he is trying to appeal to in the primaries. He might even be worse than Palin.
Swarthmore mom:
The bottom line is that airport security in this country is a joke. And is an assault on our Constitutional rights. The pat downs/grope outs are being used to get people to insist on the body scans. Have you seen the movie Total Recall with Arnold Schwarzenegger? It is about a future society that has extreme security because of terrorists.
The government is using this to no good end, it is not keeping us safe and it is infringing on our rights. How much do we need to take? We are just about a totalitarian state as it is already.
We are at war with Islam or at least a segment, when you and others realize that it will be a good deal easier to actually take care of the threat. They are, for the most part, 7th century barbarians guided by the “will” of Allah or by those clerics who seek power in the “name” of Allah.
Here are some thoughts from: The Closing Of The Muslim Mind: How Intellectual Suicide Created The Modern Islamist Crisis by Robert R. Reilly, 2010
“There is no nature, only Allah’s moment-to-moment creation and destruction of everything. Man can count on nothing in the material universe, not even an acorn developing into an oak tree. Allah might will a different than usual “effect” at any moment. I say “effect” because, without identity, there is no causality. Oak trees are not an effect of acorns. Allah happened to will this acorn and that oak tree but there is no causal relationship.
There can be no compromise with people for whom everything is a mere creation of Allah’s irrational will. The only absolute is Allah’s will.”
People who think like that are beasts and will never stop coming. You must either destroy them or change their philosophy. You cannot live in peace with a wild beast bent on your destruction.
Swathmore mom when they realize that the aggressive pat downs need to be made at the border is the day when we can move to really making this country safe. See the OTM video, Other Than Mexican above. Thats what people are upset about. I have to be screened and screened again while a certain percentage can walk across the border unchecked.
I give him a line out of a movie. Cue the music for the movie and then he proceeds to tell us how he’s the best of the best of the best of the best. Then backs it up with I,I,I,I,I,I. Makes reference to Mikey Mouse. How bout Fog Horn Leg Horn ?
Bdaman:
those posts were very funny.
I was ROLFLMAO as well but for different reasons.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2010/11/lurid_and_corrupt.php?ref=fpblg You are right bdaman that the right wing is all over this. Huckabee dares Obama to take his lily white wife and daughter to the airport and give them an aggressive pat down.
Next step for body scanners could be trains, boats, metro
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says terrorists will continue to look for U.S. vulnerabilities, making tighter security standards necessary.
“[Terrorists] are going to continue to probe the system and try to find a way through,” Napolitano said in an interview that aired Monday night on “Charlie Rose.”
“I think the tighter we get on aviation, we have to also be thinking now about going on to mass transit or to trains or maritime. So, what do we need to be doing to strengthen our protections there?”
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/130549-next-step-for-body-scanners-could-be-trains-boats-and-the-metro-
lottakatz you beat me to it. You do know that Canada Free Press is a self identified conservative newspaper.
Apparently if you refuse the backscatter scan or, as part of the media, encourage others to do so they are opening a file on you as a “domestic extremist”.
From article link below:
DHS & TSA: Making a list, checking it twice
By Doug Hagmann Tuesday, November 23, 2010
“Following the publication of my article titled “Gate Rape of America,” I was contacted by a source within the DHS who is troubled by the terminology and content of an internal memo reportedly issued yesterday at the hand of DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano. Indeed, both the terminology and content contained in the document are troubling.”
***
From article further along:
“For individuals who engaged in such activity at screening points, it instructs TSA operations to obtain the identities of those individuals and other applicable information and submit the same electronically to the Homeland Environment Threat Analysis Division, the Extremism and Radicalization branch of the Office of Intelligence & Analysis (IA) division of the Department of Homeland Security.
For “any person, group or domestic alternative media source” that actively objects to, causes others to object to, supports and/or elicits support for anyone who engages in such travel “disruptions” at U.S. airports (as defined above) in response to the enhanced security procedures, the [applicable DHS administrative branch] is instructed to identify and collect information about the persons or entities, and submit such information in the manner outlined [within this directive].”
****
Watching the politicians and administration officials running to all the talk shows the last 4-5 days has been interesting. The government is acting really scared of even a handful of citizens saying (by action) that they are sick of government intrusion and humiliation. I’m not sure if it’s a reaction to the airline lobby calling their political handmaidens over the potential expense of any disruption of their business of if the prospect of citizens having and demonstrating an anti-government-policy attitude has gotten them going. Probably both.
This is specially interesting because many people will opt out because of medical conditions and if that’s part of the info that gets logged and passed on then there are record keeping requirements imposed on holders of such information. Maybe even requirements to disclose that the information will be held in a system of records etc.
If the article is true though it didn’t take long for the DHS, with the backing of the administration, to develop a policy that labels the citizen an “extremist” and puts them on the ‘enemy’ side of the line. Seems like old times. J Edgar, wearing his prettiest pink tutu with a leashed rent-boy in tow, must be smiling up from his little corner of hell.
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/30286
Full-body scanners popping up at courthouses
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101124/ap_on_re_us/us_courthouse_scanners
To dumb to realize it’s a movie line.
Ok if you say so Drill Sar-gent
Airline passengers aren’t the only ones complaining about the Transportation Security Administration’s new enhanced security procedures. Many TSA employees aren’t too happy, either . . .
TSA workers face verbal abuse from travelers
It couldn’t possibly be because people don’t like being groped and strip searched in violation of their 4th Amendment rights!
Next up on See You In Court!
Robert Dean Cites 4th Amendment Violation, Sues TSA Over Full-Body Scans
Let’s play Follow The Money!
Fear Pays: Chertoff, Ex-Security Officials Slammed For Cashing In On Government Experience
So, was that “the best” you were sending against me, badtroll?
lol
roflol
ROFLMAO
That word “best” you keep using? I do not think it means what you think it means.