the IDIOT

Reuters:

Hundreds of U.S. air travelers have lodged complaints over use of full-body security scanners in the past year, charging they violate personal privacy and may be harmful to their health, documents released on Tuesday showed. [...]

goons to the rescue with bullshit:

[...] The TSA downplayed the complaints, saying only 600 of more than 4 million air travelers had lodged objections — an “infinitesimally small” 0.015 percent — and stressing that passengers could opt for an alternative form of screening. [...]

as with most things goon related, bring on bastiat and discuss what isn’t seen. for example, i’m not complaining to the lickspittle fed fucks, since in 2003 i, a pilot since the late 80s, stopped flying as passenger or pilot because of the relentless incompetent bullying from TSA and associated fools/brigands. so they hear nothing from me and consider it evidence that they’re on the right track.

sure.

of course, this all goes back to consumer “service” fuckup number one, which is to reply to any complaint with some variation of “well, you’re the only one who’s said something about it.”

classic narcissistic tactic from — shocker — career sociopaths.

Wanted: TSA Anal Examiners:

[...] And the tragic thing is that if the TSA put an ad in the New York Times or USA Today wanting to hire people to do anal exams, it would probably be flooded with applicants.

becky akers nails it:

[...] That bought off Leviathan, but not Sharon Brown. She realized that a very wealthy woman had treated her like the flight attendant that she is — and this in neoconservative Amerika. We serfs may persist in seeing Sharon and her co-workers as little more than sky-high waiters and waitresses, but that only shows we don’t understand the miracle of 9/11. They do. They know it transformed them from menial employees whose jobs depend on pleasing customers into high-ranking officers in the Feds’ War on Terror. Mere passengers no longer dare question nor cross them. And so Sharon is suing Victoria for 10% of her net worth. The case went to court last week. [...]

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i’m going to be seething all night after reading this article linked from becky akers’s latest.

it was bad enough reading becky’s excellent pinning of the state’s indecency. but to read how that poor woman had her nose and dignity ground into the dirt, for the sake of a scoundrel. i am about as pissed as i’ve been in a while. these shitbirds are losing it. i read about phyllis dintenfass when she was arrested, but never caught this vile finish:

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probably no secret if you visit here that i think most liberty-circle writers suck. i mean, i think some of them really suck. some i’ve met and gotten to know well enough are borderline-to-full-fledged skudge neurotics. seriously. and here you might be asking what sort of healthy specimen i am. let’s ignore that for now and get on to the subject of this post:

recently i’ve become a big fan of becky akers. i don’t know who she is, if becky is her real name, or even if “she” is a female. she writes like a laser-spitting pit bull, and man do i dig that.

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ah, what a folksy story of those detailed, tattlin’, ministry of transportatin’, jackasserific fuckfaces with the embroidered shirts.

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ho hum:

Security at U.S. airports is no better under federal control than it was before the Sept. 11 attacks, a key House member says two government reports will conclude. The Government Accountability Office – the investigative arm of Congress – and the Homeland Security Department’s inspector general are expected to soon release their findings on the performance of Transportation Security Administration screeners.

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william beck

…Yes. Well, like I said: I was tired and cranky. And by the time I got home, I was just tired, and not interested to fight about it.

Then, I gets this link in e-mail.

These fucking assholes. These motherfucking shitbag cocksucking punk-dog dick-drips. I cannot wait for them to get to Hell. Honest to bleedin’-Jesus: I will be happy to greet them at the gate with a chainsaw in order to hack the snouts off their pig faces, one by one, as they arrive.

If that were to be my gig throughout eternity, I could dispatch it always with a song in my blackened heart.

End the War on Freedom

that should be the TSA’s official motto. it’s essentially what this guy got in response to subpoenas in his case where TSA puke contractors had to dig down deep into his checked and packed medicine bottle to find the pot there. why? because in the same bag as the pot he had some novelty gloves with wires in them (and some other harmless stuff). who knows what would happen if those two items combined.

or, as explained to him by some turd, if he had taken da pot, he may have endangered the flight. forgive me if i’m a little flaky on the details; i can’t take reading any more of this government nonsense.

eventually, we all will be heads mounted on benches and connected to plumbing machines, doing something important for “the state” (whoever that is).

they are the last (we hope) frontiers of the USG in its unending quest to save you from those nasty terrorists (you know — the ones who kicked the asses of the same people who still have jobs to “protect” “the people”). think i’m joking? they have the external parts covered. by “law”. ha!

…In late September, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) began allowing security checkpoint screeners to manually pat down women’s breasts and the genital and derriere regions of both sexes during searches. The point is to find hidden explosives while machines that might perform the job are still being tested. “I know it’s not pleasant,” says Rep. John Mica, chairman of the House aviation subcommittee, “but until we get the technology, what are the options?” …

this clearly doesn’t go far enough. and as for technology… well, i think i covered what’s required quite well in this post. fucking sheep. you’re getting what you asked for! go read your history books, submissive bastards. run to the voting booth and seek refuge. pull out your nail clippers and zap ‘em!

i’d change the title of this post to “ignorant pussies”, but it might be seen incorrectly as double entendre.

LRC

recommended — federation of american scientists

Last month, Helen Chenoweth-Hage attempted to board a United Airlines flight from Boise to Reno when she was pulled aside by airline personnel for additional screening, including a pat-down search for weapons or unauthorized materials.

Chenoweth-Hage, an ultra-conservative former Congresswoman (R-ID), requested a copy of the regulation that authorizes such pat-downs.

“She said she wanted to see the regulation that required the additional procedure for secondary screening and she was told that she couldn’t see it,” local TSA security director Julian Gonzales told the Idaho Statesman (10/10/04).

“She refused to go through additional screening [without seeing the regulation], and she was not allowed to fly,” he said. “It’s pretty simple.”

Chenoweth-Hage wasn’t seeking disclosure of the internal criteria used for screening passengers, only the legal authorization for passenger pat-downs. Why couldn’t they at least let her see that? asked Statesman commentator Dan Popkey.

“Because we don’t have to,” Mr. Gonzales replied crisply. [more]

Plug Nickel Times

when a regular guy gets caught taking a gun through a TSA “security check”, his motives are questioned, he’s borderline terro, and his life is fucked for years.

a government pig does it (still illegal), and he gets a pass. it’s treated as an amusing incident — “a good reminder” of how easy it is to forget “correct procedure”.

“It was an oversight.”

fuck all these government hypocrites. notice that the prick eventually gets his gun back. read this article!

The head of the Police Department’s counterterrorism bureau was “extraordinarily embarrassed” for being detained after trying to board a flight with a loaded gun in his luggage.

John Miller, commanding officer of the Critical Incident Management Bureau, was off duty and heading to New York with his family when security officials at Los Angeles International Airport discovered the .38-caliber Smith & Wesson in his bag about 12:10 p.m. Thursday, Transportation Security Administration spokesman Nico Melendez said.

Miller is authorized to carry the weapon, but he failed to disclose he was traveling with the gun.

Police Chief William Bratton said he spoke with Miller, who was “extraordinarily embarrassed” by the incident.

“It’s a human mistake that was made,” Bratton said. “John is certainly wishing it didn’t happen.”

Miller was briefly detained before he and his family were permitted to board their scheduled flight. The gun was confiscated and will be released to the Police Department.

“He knows the airport procedures. … He didn’t realize he had it,” said Lt. Horace Frank, an aide to Miller. “It was an oversight.”

Bratton, who hired Miller as his spokesman when he was New York City police commissioner, then recruited him to come to Los Angeles, ordered an administrative investigation. Under federal rules, Miller could face a civil fine up to $3,000.

Police officers may only travel on an airplane with a weapon if the officer is on duty and has a department letter authorizing them to travel, said Larry Fetters, the TSA federal security director at LAX.

Miller was on his way to New York to tape a farewell message to ABC’s Barbara Walters, who is retiring. Before joining the LAPD, Miller co-anchored the network’s “20/20″ news magazine with Walters.

Bratton said the incident should be a reminder to all law enforcement officers to be more conscious about where they carry their weapon. He also said that he had no doubt that Miller made a simple mistake.

The police chief, who called the incident an embarrassment to the department, said jokingly “that I hope he and his family were not planning to hijack and fly off to Cuba or some place.”

The TSA has confiscated more than 2,000 guns at airport security checkpoints Since February 2002.

how many of those 2,000 guns were handed back? note also that “the perp” wasn’t on duty.

yeah, his government buddies make a bunch of preschool, paternalistic comments about this screwup, but it’s only cover until interest dies. he’s good to go, and you can count on that.

this double standard may seem to be government as usual. it’s also one of the clearest signs of tyranny. normal people are criminals, and government “employees” are presumed to be good. trusted. sacred. untouchable.

slavery.

…The airlines will have 30 days to comment on the proposed order, which Congress gave the TSA authority to issue. Air carriers will then have 10 days to turn over data that it gathered in June, called passenger name records. …

ahh, but who, or what, gave congress the authority to give TSA authority? not the constitution. be assured that the airlines already rolled over behind the scenes.

the gloves have come off.

Two major airlines are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy while another struggles to pull out of it three years after the September 11 terrorist attacks sent the already hurting industry into a tailspin. US Airways is likely to file for bankruptcy as soon as tomorrow while Delta Air Lines is hoping to avoid a bankruptcy filing through labor concessions from its pilots. United Airlines went into Chapter 11 protection in December 2002 and is facing an employee revolt as it tries to end its pension plans. …

they deserve every ounce of pain. any of these foundering former giants could immediately trounce the market by loudly denouncing TSA and refusing to allow any federal harrasment of its passengers. that means no TSA thugs at their gates — no TSA involvment in any way with the airline or its customers. would they be allowed? simply shove the US constitution straight up the ass of every protester, federal or otherwise — loudly and without apology. and don’t bother appealing to the supreme court. simply refuse.

will never happen.