The attempt by Texans to resist the controversial TSA security measures, including groping adults and children, has resulted in an astonishing threat by U.S. Attorney John E. Murphy who is threatening to turn the entire Lone Star state into a no-fly zone if a bill passes the legislature. HB 1937 allows for “prosecution and punishment for the offense of official oppression by the intrusive touching of persons seeking access to public buildings and transportation; providing penalties.” With the return of stagecoaches to Texas, you may want to book now — seats are scarce and there are a lot of blackout dates.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has steadfastly supported the intrusive searches that have appalled citizens and parents across the country while TSA refuses to heed calls by scientists for the need of new tests on the possible harmful effects of body scanners.
Now, Murphy is threatening to shutdown flights to Texas:
“If HR 1937 were enacted, the federal government would likely seek an emergency stay of the statute. Unless or until such a stay were granted, TSA would likely be required to cancel any flight or series of flights for which it could not ensure the safety of passengers and crew.”
It is an extraordinary threat, particularly given the strong arguments that can be used in court to bar the enforcement of the laws as a matter of federal preemption.
Kudos: Alpha Dog
Jonathan Turley
Otteray Scribe: “Want to terrorize the rail system? Do it by sabotaging the rails, and you do not have to talk someone into being a suicide bomber. This is old news to the Resistance fighters of WW-II.”
—
Right, T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) spent a good deal of his time in Arabia doing just that to the rail lines used by the Turkish army. Worked well.
Rand Paul’s opposition to the PATRIOT Act may be like walking into a buzzsaw operated by both parties. After the GG mention I did check out the floor speech. Articulate and carefully packaged.
It strikes me, the root cause of the conundrum in which we find ourselves, is steeped in our collective abhorrence of professional criminal profiling.
I’m not sure exactly when “profiling” became the curse word de jour. But the fact is, in the absence of just this type of logical inference, we’d fail miserably at driving our cars, or indeed successfully chewing meat.
So in our zeal to look “fair & balanced” in airports, we force millions of innocent citizens to be treated like intake at the county jail; as “protective authority” bends backwards to not insult any particular group whatsoever. The result was predictable: now we insult every creature that wiggles, and are reduced to diaper checks & grandparent pat-downs.
I can’t say with any certainty that we are not – as a result – simply driving those who would do us harm into darker shadows, impossible to police.
I can say that – were I a terrorist hellbent on blowing up something American – I’d find great glee in the current U.S. logistical nightmare.
In the end, we are mastering new applications of the law of diminishing returns in reverse, wherein we try so hard not to do something, we end up doing it.
I hope someday Mike A. will write a post about how the govt. itself is dangerous.” -Jill
Ditto.
TX is correct. This isn’t a safety measure by the Federal govt., it is a police state control measure over our population. A safety measure would be something that had been proven effective in achieving safety. None of what TSA does falls into that category.
There are many police state actions happening right now. Here are examples: “WASHINGTON – May 20 – The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) suit against the Department of Justice (DOJ), demanding the release of a secret legal memo used to justify FBI access to Americans’ telephone records without any legal process or oversight.
A report released last year by the DOJ’s own Inspector General revealed how the FBI, in defending its past violations of the Electronic Privacy Communications Act (ECPA), had come up with a new legal argument to justify secret, unchecked access to private telephone records. According to the report, the DOJ’s Office of the Legal Counsel (OLC) had issued a legal opinion agreeing with the FBI’s theory. That legal opinion is the target of the FOIA lawsuit filed Thursday.
The Inspector General’s report is heavily redacted, concealing which part of the surveillance statutes the FBI and OLC are relying on to reach their dangerous conclusion and to what types of records this new purported exception to the law applies. However, the report does show that the Inspector General had grave concerns about the FBI’s interpretation of the law.
“Even officials within the Justice Department itself are concerned that the FBI’s secret legal theory jeopardizes privacy and government accountability, especially considering the FBI’s demonstrated history of abusing surveillance law,” said EFF
Senior Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. “Secret law has no place in our democracy. Congress can’t even consider closing this dangerous surveillance loophole until we understand the FBI’s legal argument, yet the Department of Justice is still hiding it from Congress and the public.”
Earlier this year, the DOJ denied a FOIA request from a journalist seeking disclosure of the secret OLC opinion and in doing so revealed — perhaps inadvertently — the specific portion of the law on which the FBI’s aggressive legal theory relies. Based on its analysis of that particular ECPA provision, 18 U.S.C. 2511(2)(f), EFF fears that the FBI and OLC have wrongly concluded that national security investigators are free to obtain records of Americans’ international communications without first obtaining a subpoena or any other legal process. With this additional information about the contents of the OLC opinion, EFF filed its own FOIA request, but the DOJ has continued to stall its release.
“Congress is currently debating how to reform surveillance statutes like the PATRIOT Act and the Electronic Communications Privacy Act,” said EFF Senior Counsel David Sobel. “If the FBI is claiming that it has the right to secret, unchecked access to Americans’ communications records, Congress and the American public need to know that now.” (EFF)
“ACLU Testifies Before Congress Against Unconstitutional Detention of Immigrants
WASHINGTON – May 24 – The American Civil Liberties Union today told Congress that immigrants should not be detained for indefinite or prolonged periods of time without a judicial hearing before an immigration judge.
In testimony presented to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement, Ahilan Arulanantham, deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California said a bill introduced by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) Monday that would dramatically overhaul the current immigration detention system is unconstitutional. The bill would authorize the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to strip people of their most basic form of due process – a bond hearing before an immigration judge to determine whether they pose a danger to society or are a flight risk. The bill would also expand DHS’s authority to lock up people who have final removal orders indefinitely, that is, potentially for a lifetime, even when the government cannot return them to their country of origin.” (ACLU)
“Sen. Rand Paul is among the few in Congress to oppose the 4-year extension of the misnamed PATRIOT Act, which violates the 4th Amendment against baseless and warrantless search of personal effects.” (Juan Cole from Glen Greenwald’s twitter)
Also at Glenn’s twitter, a pesky subpena to James Risen for reporting govt. wrongdoing, signed by Holder himself.
So there is a pattern by the govt. here and it isn’t a happy one for those concerned about the rule of law. This is a dangerous govt. and I hope someday Mike A. will write a post about how the govt. itself is dangerous.
Forgot to attach the video from CNN.
It is cheaper to train and retain “gropers” than it is to train and keep profilers. El Al has been doing a superb job for many decades and look at their safety record. Knowing what I know, it would not be that hard to get past one of the “gropers.” We have been fortunate that the terrorists, with the exception of the 9-11 group, have been laughably incompetent.
I think it is funny that Chuck Schumner proposed intrusive passenger searches and a “no ride list” before boarding trains. Too bad Sam Kineson is dead–this is perfect material for one of his routines. Want to terrorize the rail system? Do it by sabotaging the rails, and you do not have to talk someone into being a suicide bomber. This is old news to the Resistance fighters of WW-II. The media is doing a good job of selling this latest bit of unrealistic nonsense. Perfect example in this CNN piece. What are these people thinking? Notice the sheeple on the train as will. I wish they had asked me.
I don’t know…..There seems to be some gray area where local law enforcement is allowed to police the airports….They have allowed the intrusion….now the attitude is whatcha gonna do bout it….
This is probably the only time in my life I’ve had occasion to say this but, I’m with Texas on this one.
There has never been adequate testing of the backscatter x-ray machines by independent testing groups or scientists and results of the tests by TSA on the machines in situs are not made public or are so heavily redacted that they are meaningless.
The machines do not have regular, frequent maintenance and testing for checking the radiation levels and may or may not be in compliance with their own standards. In any event the FDA isn’t worried about that:
“Are they going to break? Possibly. Eventually. Am I really worried there’s going to be a significant dose as a result? Not really.”
– Daniel Kassiday, FDA specialist on radiation hazards
The standards themselves are still in dispute.
If you don’t want to be x-rayed then you get a full-body pat down. I’m not even going to argue that except to say that a demand for intimate touching by a civil servant (or government contractor) as a precondition for some goods or service they provide or authorize would be considered criminal.
That fact is supposed to go away when the majik word “Security” is invoked. I see that in the same light as I see pedo-priests telling alter boys that Ghod wants them to be fondled. There’s nothing but faith/fear and conditioning propping up the statement.
Texas. Geeze, I have to agree with Texas. I never thought I’d see the day… 🙂
http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2006/12/airport-x-ray-machines.html
3 part Wired article:
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/02/scanners-part1/
And what Buddha said…
Security.
Theater.
FACT: The logistical requirements of simply running an airport make them impossible to secure.
The TSA is a useless, expensive, intrusive and oppressive government organization that simply terrorizes citizens.
And what Mike A. said.
Looks like our betters are serious about us complying with their edicts. We peons had better kneel and avoid eye-contact when they pass.
I’m disappointed in my fellow commentators’ lack of support for this bill. Isn’t this blog a place for civil libertarianism to flourish?
Absurdly intrusive “groping” searches without the slightest suspicion is simply unacceptable, and THAT is precisely why they do it. The purpose is NOT to improve safety.
Every year the government conducts covert tests to see if weapons can get through the security checkpoints. This is supposed to help discover what works and what doesn’t. Not surprisingly, the hightened agressiveness of screeners has no effect on these tests. If anything, agents are even more successful at getting stuff through.
If they could point to clear evidence that these groping really work, then I would shutup and sulk, but since the opposite is true…
Groping people before they go on an airplane is what’s absurd. The idea that the TSA has to pat down every individual, especially children is disgusting. Maybe some sheeple like 1984 an all the fine orwellian police state measures the US is taking, but without probable cause the searches are simply another way to control people and further’s the US’s tyrannical view on how to treat it’s citizens.
Its about time we started treating that third world shit hole as a hostile entity.
I wish they had picked one of their more ridiculous causes to take a stand on. TSA is a joke but the Texas rabid stupidity extends to other areas too.
This is what happens when national paranoia confronts absurdist views of the Tenth Amendment.
The idiots who put Governor Secession into office year after year need to be taught what exactly those threats would mean if carried out. John Murphy is simply showing Texas one of the many potential consequences of such threats.
Perhaps next time Texans will be a little more thoughtful about who they elect to be their political representatives.
http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/politics/entries/2011/05/24/senate_fight_over_intrusive_to.html I have four trips planned. They can’t keep me here in the summer.
Texas: Charging headlong into the nineteenth century.