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Post by gailkate on Nov 4, 2011 0:31:21 GMT -5
I thought so, too, Joe, given the Israeli model. I would also hope that the people selected for the chat-downs would be higher calibre than your average TSA agent.
I wish we could learn more about the body languge cues, but I suppose telling us would give away the secret. Some cues I've read about have been disputed - e.g. looking away when telling a lie. When I lie I look the lie-ee straight in the eye. But maybe that's the kind of variation a trained screener would recognize. Surely stumbling over pronunciation of your destination couldn't be a clue. If one has an accent, one shouldn't automatically be suspect. What if someone said he was going to Ewe Claire? Or Butt? Or Ar-kansas?
And who would imagine a quartet of aging coffee-drinkers at a Waffle House might really be plotting mass murder? How would even the most perceptive screener spot one of those guys? "Sir, are those beans in your plastic bag?' "Yep, them's just lima beans." "Okey-doke, you're free to board."
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Post by doctork on Nov 4, 2011 0:37:58 GMT -5
If the chat-downs were in the place of universal gropings/nude photos, that would be preferable. and if the chat-downs were performed by skilled professionals, that too would be preferable. But the chat-downs are in addition to the scope & grope, so they slow down the lines. And the TSA "professionals" have had a total of 4 days of training, which is not adequate.
Although no security precautions were violated on 9/11, only one red flag was raised that day - by a ticket counter agent who said that the hi-jacker to be seemed odd and gave her the creeps. She had had years of experience, plus good judgement and it showed, but there was no recourse for her suspicions at the that time.
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Post by doctork on Nov 8, 2011 21:15:49 GMT -5
Chris Elliott has an excellent column today on 10 suggestions for the TSA on its 10th anniversary:
//No one was surprised by this week’s report that the Transportation Security Administration glossed over the health risks of its airport X-ray scanners.
The investigation found that anywhere from six to 100 U.S. airline passengers each year could get cancer from the machines — a hazard critics have warned about ever since the devices were quietly deployed in many airports almost two years ago.
The real shocker, coming on the eve of the TSA’s 10th anniversary, is when you combine that fact with a lesser-known one: For whatever reason, and with greater frequency, TSA agents have been insisting that airline passengers walk through the dangerous scanners, despite agency rules that make using the machines optional.
The agency charged with protecting the nation’s transportation systems turns 10 on Nov. 19. It’s also the one-year anniversary of the pat-down controversy, when the TSA arbitrarily decided that selected airline passenger had to either walk through the airport scanners or get patted down at the security checkpoint. Who can forget that?
Let me disclose my bias right up front: I’m no fan of the TSA’s current practices and it is doesn’t particularly care for me, either. The agency has lied to me, threatened me and served me with an illegal subpoena that would have forced me to name a source. (I declined.) But I support the idea of professional airport screeners, and I believe the TSA’s next decade can be a lot better than its first.
Here’s how.
1. Stop scanning passengers. It’s already plainly obvious to everyone except the TSA, Rapiscan and the lobbyists over at the Chertoff Group, that scanning airline passengers is an awful idea. The existing scanners haven’t stopped any terrorism attacks and, if the reports are to be believed (and I do) then they’ve put the lives of countless passengers and TSA agents in danger. Never mind the alleged privacy violations. The TSA needs to stop radiating us like produce before we board the plane. Now.
2. Deploy some common sense. It’s difficult to know exactly what the TSA was thinking when its agents reportedly forced a wheelchair-bound, terminally ill grandmother to remove her adult diaper. Or when it patted down a six-year-old. To its credit, the agency revised some of its rules when these incidents came to the public attention. But it’s not enough. Passengers continue to complain about invasive and unnecessary pat-down and screening procedures. Those need to end immediately.
3. Enough with the chat-downs and liquid bans. The TSA recently began testing a system of interrogating passengers at the screening area, better known as “chat-downs.” It will probably expand the system to other airports soon, perhaps in time for the busy holiday travel season. It’s a silly idea. There is no evidence that a jihadist has ever been caught by a security chat-down. Nor is there any hard proof that the preposterous restrictions on lotions and potions have made air travel safer. Unless there’s a compelling argument to the contrary — and I believe there isn’t — we should jettison both.
4. Know your place. The TSA likes to think of itself as the last line of defense in the war against terrorism. That’s nonsense. It is nothing more than a minor but expensive cog in the homeland security wheel. The TSA replaced the underpaid rent-a-cops employed by airlines before 9/11, and they will never be anything more than security guards with no law enforcement authority. They should make their peace with that and try to treat air travelers like the taxpayers who fund them, not criminals who are guilty until proven innocent.
5. Beware of mission creep. Despite its mission statement that the agency is supposed to protect the nation’s transportation systems, the truth is that the TSA is focused on airport security. The agency’s recent incursions into road travel with its controversial and unconstitutional Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response program — yes that’s right, it goes by the unfortunate acronym “VIPR” — is making some travelers uncomfortable. The blueshirts were out in full force in Tennessee recently, randomly inspecting cars and trucks with the help of bomb-sniffing dogs. Many Americans stopped flying in order to avoid the TSA. And now this.
6. No more secrets. The TSA is so secretive, it often can’t even tell travelers if its own rules have changed. These classified directives, called Sensitive Security Information (SSI) are applied to almost everything the TSA does, so that it ends up being accountable to almost no one, because no one knows what it is doing. We deserve to know what the rules are when we fly and we deserve to know when they change. SSI is more like something an unimaginative bureaucrat pilfered from a dystopian novel he read in high school. That’s not the America I want my kids to grow up in.
7. Obey the law. The TSA routinely defies the law, whether it’s holding public hearings on body scanners (which it didn’t do) or showing up to a Congressional hearing. How can we expect to take an agency seriously that doesn’t respect the law of the land and routinely thumbs its nose as the constitution?
8. Deal with your little PR problem. Despite its claims that the agency enjoys near-universal support from the American public, the truth is that air travelers have little confidence in federal screeners. I know because I talk to passengers every day. They don’t trust the agency and often go to great lengths to avoid dealing with it. That’s a massive problem for the American tourism industry, which generates $1.8 trillion in economic output and is heavily dependent on air travel. Travelers would take an average of two to three more trips per year if the airport hassles could be reduced without compromising security, adding $84.6 billion in travel spending and support 888,000 additional jobs, according to the U.S. Travel Association.
9. Engage your critics. The TSA is too quick to dismiss its detractors, even those that make reasonable and valid points. Just ask someone like Bruce Schneier, who, even when he lands an interview with an official, gets the brush-off. I’ve tried to interview TSA Administrator John Pistole several times — he’s always “too busy.” Hiding in your office is no way to deal with someone who disagrees with your policies. What’s more, it further cements your agency’s reputation for being unresponsive to the concerns of its own customers.
10. Lose weight now. If I had told you 10 years ago that the TSA would devour $8 billion a year of the federal budget, you probably would have laughed out loud. The TSA budget for that year? Just $1.3 billion. Do we get eight times the security for that — or eight times the hassle? I think you know the answer. The agency is too bloated for its own good — and ours. It needs to downsize, to do more with less. We’re screening passengers for weapons, after all, not saving the planet.
Some of you hawks out there are probably saying to yourself, “Hang on! If we stop scanning passengers, let the grannies through security and start being accountable to the American public, won’t that open the door for another act of terrorism?”
Actually, no.
Although the TSA claims its greatest accomplishment in the last decade is preventing a 9/11 repeat, we simply don’t know if all the elaborate precautions and alleged civil liberties violations have protected us, or would continue to protect us. We aren’t letting our guard down as much as we are taking a more reasonable approach to aviation security.
That said, I’m optimistic about the next 10 years. I think the TSA is slowly getting the message from an increasingly angry traveling public. There’s evidence of that everywhere, from its recent move to a more risk-based screening system, to the witty posts by Bob Burns, its resident blogger who often seems to appreciate the irony, if not the humor, in this troubled agency.
But the TSA has a long flight ahead. It will have to overcome a well-earned reputation for being intransigent, invading the privacy and dignity of air travelers and general incompetence.
At least it has one thing going for it: Things can’t get much worse.//
I am not as confident as Chris that things can't get much worse since I never would have imagined that pax would have to get either nude photos or be felt up in order to board a domestic aircraft. But I hope he is right
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Post by gailkate on Nov 9, 2011 17:14:28 GMT -5
Who is he? I just googled and learned that he writes a column that appears in various news outlets, but does he have the authority to make some of these statements?
Not that I don't sympathize, but where is the documentation? "No hard evidence" that the lotions restrictions have made us safer sounds right to me, but the DHS doesn't tell us a lot. Maybe that's because there's nothing to tell - they seem to love making a huge deal out of anything remotely suspicious - but maybe it's because they don't want to give criminals ideas.
[If this weren't an open thread, I'd tell you my easy-peasy recipe for creating possibly fatal gases in an enclosed area.]
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Post by doctork on Nov 9, 2011 19:51:46 GMT -5
Chris Elliiot is a pretty well-informed and respected travel writer; FWIW, a number of bona fide security experts support his statements. There is also plenty of evidence to support most of them (an abundance on the non-viability of binary explosives to destroy aircraft, and the easy availability of many easier and more effective methods), but it's a column, not a scientific journal article.
As for the liquids - it's common sense. 6 three-ounce bottles in a plastic bag are safe (but 6 such bottles not in a Zip-Lock bag are not safe), but one 18 ounce bottle is not? Or 10 terrorists carrying 18 ounces each in 60 little bottles is OK...
And these rules are so super-secret they can't be revealed to the public who must comply, yet the TSA hires people so stupid they publish the secret rules on the internet.
Ionizing radiation is a known carcinogen, yet TSA swept this under the rug in its zeal to perform security theater, enlarge their fiefdom, enrich Michael Chertoff, and get professional politicians re-elected. IMHO it is a crime that TSA forces pregnant women and young children to go through the backscatter X-ray, often by denying that it is ionizing radiation. Fetuses and young children are far more susceptible to adverse effects of radiation, and it is especially scary when these X-rays are performed by untrained people on equipment that is not subject to any quality control.
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Post by gailkate on Nov 10, 2011 1:02:40 GMT -5
I know, K, we've been over this, and no one thinks it's acceptable. But not long ago we got wound up in when one can or cannot trust Wikipedia. I'm just saying that assertions aren't facts, no matter how many times they're repeated. There was plenty of evidence for WMD until it all fell apart.
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Post by doctork on Nov 10, 2011 20:51:16 GMT -5
There are some (well-founded) opinions or assertions, yes, but this isn't wikipedia when it comes to the carcinogenic effect of ionizing radiation, as there is an abundance of long-standing evidence in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
That mountain of evidence is the reason that states have strict regulations regarding X-ray equipment, the reason that the Fukushima plant explosion is a disaster, the reason that people treated with radiation therapy for cancer (especially children) are at increased risk for second cancers later in life, the reason that Thom McAn quit providing foot X-rays in their shoe stores.
The APA (Administrative Procedure Act) and NPRM (Notice of Proposed Rulemaking) are federal law, which TSA violates regularly by refusing to publish proposed changes in the Federal Register, accept public comment, and incorporate in in the Final Rule. All other federal agencies are required to follow this law and procedure.
I like the story because it is a neat summary of the problems with TSA, easily understood by those who are not policy wonks or frequent flyers. But the science and law behind points #1 and #7 are straightforward, and the facts about the number of employees, the cost, and the results (no terrorists caught by TSA in 10 years of operation) are published by TSA itself, although you could certainly debate if the effort is "worth it."
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Post by joew on Jan 24, 2012 11:23:21 GMT -5
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Post by doctork on Jan 24, 2012 19:28:29 GMT -5
Perhaps now that a Senator has publicly come out against the TSA, and his story has garnered a lot of ink and electrons, other members of Congress will pay attention, Mostly they have been spineless fear mongers, concerned that when the next terrorist attack occurs they will be voted out of office as "soft on terror."
Meanwhile at least John Mica, significantly responsible for the creation of TSA, has stated that is it a worthless boondoggle. And Ron Paul has stated TSA should be abolished. But our President makes jokes about it, and allows its expansion as well as other spying, snooping, warrantless searches and wiretaps, and various other infringement of our liberties.
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Post by doctork on Jan 25, 2012 14:33:15 GMT -5
A little more on the story comes out.
After passing through the MMW (millimeter wave) version of the Nude-O-Scope and causing the TSA to note a knee "anomaly," Senator Paul asked if he could be re-screened as he had experienced in another recent airport excursion. (The MMW has a very high false positive rate of 25 - 75%, so it often does not enable you to avoid being groped).
He was told it was dangerous to re-screen him, though the TSA has repeatedly said the machines are safe. The MMW does not use ionizing radiation so it may indeed be "safe", and though it takes a nude picture, the image on the screen is a cartoon figure with highlighting of the suspect anomalous area. It is also policy that children who alarm the machine are allowed to be re-scanned, but not adults, as it is only the groping of young children (and elders) that has led to viral YouTube videos.
The TSA official procedure is to grope only the suspicious area. But because Senator Paul used his cellphone to call his schedulers to inform them of the delay, he was designated to receive a full-body groping as punishment, not the checking of just his knee. TSA denies that they perform such retaliatory gropings.
The TSA also denies that they "detain" pax, but what they did was place him in a cubicle and tell him he could not leave. Meanwhile they had possession of his carry-ons, so even if he stated they could not detain him, he would have had to leave without his laptop, briefcase, whatever else he had brought.
This trick is very effective in detaining pax even though TSA claims they never detain pax. TSO's are not law enforcement officers so they actually have no legal power to detain pax.
Ron Paul has stated he would eliminate the TSA. He is apt to get my vote.
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Post by gailkate on Jan 25, 2012 20:04:01 GMT -5
Oh wow, K, I hope this doesn't become a single-issue litmus test for you. Paul is not at all the sort of candidate I'd expect you to consider.
It sounded infuriating for sure. Did you read anything about what the knee thing was - does he have any metal from a surgery? I don't know what I expect the treatment should be for a member of Congress, but I'm pretty irked about today's announcement that there will be special privileges for selected frequent fliers. Even though it makes a kind of sense, it's insulting to people who are every bit as upright and free of suspicion as somebody who travels a lot. If we are all Americans accepting this indignity in the name of security, i think special treatment is offensive. Anyone so important should maybe hire a private plane. And as for the phone, there should be rules. I can see that a bad guy might want to alert his fellow bad guys that there's been a hitch, so maybe TSA had reason to be concerned. But suppose any of us wanted to tell a worried relative not to meet us. What about a guy flying home to be there for his wife's delivery, or someone going to a family funeral? Anyone should be able to make a call, not just VIPs with a speech to give. But I particularly don't see Rand Paul as nearly so important as he obviously thinks he is. I think he's a puffed-up righteous jerk. Maybe he really pithed them off.
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Post by doctork on Jan 25, 2012 21:09:02 GMT -5
I will consider voting for Dr. Paul and I have made a campaign contribution at his "Abolish the TSA" website. I lean Libertarian, and I prefer a strict Constitutionalist candidate in today's environment, even if I don't agree with all that candidate's views. There is nothing more important to preserving our nation than the Constitution.
While Senator Paul may indeed be all those uncomplimentary adjectives you use, he was not pulling the DYKWIA card (do you know who I am). He was explicit that he was not asking favors, that he wanted all travelers to be treated fairly and the same - no exceptions for members of Congress. Good for him! Any traveler should be allowed to notify others of their delay.
Senator Paul does not have any foreign bodies in his knee, and he had passed through the MMW on previous flights without problem. Later that same day, he was successfully cleared through security, thanks to the "consistency" of TSA screening.
I did not appreciate the White House's obvious political dig in its gratuitous announcement that TSA had performed Senator Paul's security screen correctly.
If you want to use Pre-Check at MSP, I believe you do need to be a DE FF. However, you don't have to be a frequent flyer to receive expedited screening; you can use Nexus or Global Entry, which are open to anyone who wants to pay the fee and give up a whole lot of personal information to an unreliable government agency known to have criminal elements.
I will not be participating in any of those.
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Post by joew on Jan 25, 2012 23:20:22 GMT -5
… But I particularly don't see Rand Paul as nearly so important as he obviously thinks he is. I think he's a puffed-up righteous jerk. Maybe he really pithed them off. I think United States Senators are all pretty important. But however that may be, being pithed off does not excuse bureaucrats deciding to stick it to the person who pithed them off. If they can't rise above it and treat the person like everybody else, they don't belong in public service. And they should treat everybody (except maybe Al Franken ) better than they treated Rand Paul.
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Post by doctork on Jan 26, 2012 9:26:25 GMT -5
Thanks. Couldn't have said it better Joe.
Except I have nothing against Al Franken.
And frankly, I think I am deservedly pithed off when some high-school drop-out government thug feels entitled to squeeze my breasts and poke at my vagina, all for the alleged crime of wanting to board a commercial aircraft. They disgust me, and I am grateful that Senator Paul speaks up for me and for others in the same plight - those who want to travel by air domestically without unnecessary, ineffective and offensive intrusions.
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Post by gailkate on Jan 26, 2012 9:58:29 GMT -5
I think you're both inferring things about the agents that we don't know (as I was inferring about Rand's self-importance).
What I don't understand is why this is such a big deal just because he's 'important" enough to rate a lot of media coverage. This sounds like exactly the policy that developed as the screening technology changed and the "enhanced patdown" was somewhat modified. I understood that, if one set off the scanner, a patdown was required or you just didn't fly. Harsh but not specific to Rand Paul. We all hate it and we all run that risk every time we fly.
I am very tired of people like Ron Paul (maybe Rand, too, just don't remember) braying about how we live in a police state. We do not even remotely live in a police state and I find his rhetoric inexcusable.
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Post by doctork on Jan 26, 2012 10:37:05 GMT -5
The presumed policy & procedure - and it is "presumed" because TSA keeps all this secret, even though we pax are supposed to comply - is that since the advent of MMW, the resolution of the anomaly was supposed to be through attention only to the high-lighted area, not a full-body search. However, the TSO's are free to perform retaliatory full body pat-downs to those who challenge their "authori-tah," without any recourse or punishment for violation of TSA policy, and worse, the TSA seems to employ a lot of criminals and inadequate personalities and under-educated thugs who can't resist abusing the small scrap of power they are given.
Not to mention that in the first place, there should be no requirement for nude pictures or full-body searches in order to travel. Accepting that "this is just the way it is" is wrong in my book.
This is always a big deal when it happens to me, or to any Joe Six-pack, because it violates our Constitutional rights, which are actually limitations on government actions. Our right to be free from unwarranted searches is a human right. The story gets media coverage because Rand Paul is a US Senator who gets media coverage no matter what he does, just like the other 99 senators.
Senator Paul is also unlikely to be charged that $11,000 civil fine for leaving the checkpoint without completing the screening, as I would be charged for doing the same, because his protest at such unconscionable behavior would be publicized and would embarrass the TSA, while mine wouldn't. I'd just get the bill. If I had a few hundred dollars to hire an attorney to write a sternly worded letter to John Pistole, TSA would 'settle" in order to avoid setting a precedent in court - just as they have handled all the other protests against their crimes.
Sorry it offends you gk, but I am glad that Senator Paul's incident brings these offenses to light again, thus helping to protect me
Secret policies you cannot know but must obey, secret blacklists where you cannot find out who put you on the list, why, or how to get off, warrantless wiretapping and searches, checkpoints at airports, bus and train stations, random highway searches, demands by government agents at airports to state your purpose of domestic travel and how long you will be away and with whom you will be meeting and why, unlimited CBP searches within 100 miles of the US border or an international waterway such as the Mississippi River - those are all characteristic of a police state.
If you don't travel, and if these events are not happening locally or are occurring and are not publicized, it probably does seem like exaggerated rhetoric. To me the bottom line is that the government agents should have probable cause or reasonable suspicion before conducting these dragnet searches. It's not rhetoric to me to ask that government agents follow the Constitution. That is what should protect us from becoming a police state.
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Post by joew on Jan 26, 2012 14:10:19 GMT -5
Amen, Kristin. … Harsh but not specific to Rand Paul. We all hate it and we all run that risk every time we fly. Nobody said it was specific to Rand Paul, and nobody here has said that he should be exempt because of his status. What we are saying is that under the circumstances they shouldn't treat anybody the way they treated Rand Paul. None of us should have to run the risk of an uncalled-for "pat down"/molestation. But on further thought, I think that Senators (even Al Franken ), Members of Congress, federal judges, and people at cabinet and sub-cabinet level of the federal executive should be exempt from these procedures. Putting them through security procedures is an obvious waste of time. It is wasted effort by the screeners and an unnecessary delay for all the other passengers.
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Post by doctork on Jan 26, 2012 19:56:52 GMT -5
It doesn't make sense to do gropings or nude pictures of anyone unless it is done as a secondary, as TSA has not caught a single terrorist in its entire 10 year, $50 billion history. WTMD and ETD (explosive trace detection) detect metal and explosives that are otherwise missed.
But the main reason for not excluding elected and federal officials is because unless they too have to be subjected to this disgrace, they will not speak up on our behalf. Like most other Americans they will think it's important and effective, and "not a big deal" - until they get strip searched or detained for an hour.
Obama thinks the process is joke-worthy because it is not his young daughters or wife being groped by a pervert.
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Post by gailkate on Jan 26, 2012 20:43:21 GMT -5
I must withdraw. Even in these more peaceful times than the old CB, we can't talk about certain topics.
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Post by rogesgallery on Jan 26, 2012 22:21:14 GMT -5
A return to the old law of the jungle would be great — You buys yer ticket and takes yer chances". It lent an air of adventure to travel, made me feel... Manly. Kinda like what Twinkies® do for a Vegan. Bring it on — Bad boy! Bad boy bad boy, watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do when we come for you. Class warfare that's what this is! Us unfrequent fliers having to pay to protect impatient people.
So now I'm stuck with ground transportation and who knows when the James gang will get back together.
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Post by doctork on Feb 22, 2012 23:31:27 GMT -5
Not exactly TSA but a Victim Impact Statement by attorney Kurt Haskell detailing how the "Underwear Bomber" was likely a "false flag" perpetrator, placed specifically to accomplish government aims by putting at risk the lives of nearly 300 people on the flight, including Mr. Haskell and his wife: haskellfamily.blogspot.com/2012/02/victim-impact-statement.htmlI followed this story very closely back at its beginning because my son left the next day for Europe so naturally I had some concern if this attempt was representative of a soon-to-be rash of terrorist efforts. And I've been at the AMS gates where US-bound flights depart; they are staffed by security professionals and they were already using MMW equipment, at the time thought to be more advanced. So how had this "Underwear Bomber" gotten away with it? With a little help from his government friends of course.
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Post by joew on Feb 23, 2012 0:19:21 GMT -5
Wow.
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Post by gailkate on Feb 23, 2012 0:47:10 GMT -5
I am too sleepy to look into this, but I found one story that contradicts what haskell says on his site. www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/12/30/world/main6037474.shtmlWhile I believe some people in some of our national security agencies are capable of trickery and dirty tricks, I'm not sure I buy this blanket condemnation of "the government."
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Post by doctork on Feb 23, 2012 4:59:37 GMT -5
I don't buy a "blanket condemnation of the government" either, as I believe the US government employs many who had nothing to do with this. But I followed this news story contemporaneously, and the events with Patrick Kennedy and Michael Leiter unfolded just as Haskell says, and as reported in multiple reputable news sources. Senate hearings were held with sworn testimony from officials involved, backing up the activities that Haskell reports.
Abdulmutallab should never have been allowed on the plane, as it was well-known that he was a security risk. The State Department had asked that his visa be revoked, but the CIA thought otherwise, so he was allowed to continue to the US. Like anyone who is a suspect, Abdulmutallab should have had a detailed secondary search with exam of his bags and ETD, which would have sounded the alarm that he was carrying explosives (Despite the quote from Kip Hawley, the MMW probably would not have detected the underwear bomb, as per the GAO).
DHS and TSA have long lists of suspects and I think those travelers should be carefully screened at security checkpoints to be sure they do not bring weapons, explosives or incendiaries ("WEI") on the plane. These are the very people who should be considered for MMW ("Nude-o-Scope") and pat downs as secondary screening when the initial screen is worrisome, or when the traveler is known to have studied in Yemen where he associated with AQAP operatives such as Anwar al-Aulaqi.
The US has a powerful security apparatus and is aware of many risks with regard to air travel. I'd like to see the apparatus used to protect air travelers, not deliberately put them in danger.
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Post by doctork on Mar 1, 2012 11:10:37 GMT -5
Here is an interesting blog piece by Steve Moore, a pilot and former FBI agent with extensive counter-terrorism and airline security experience. I think he knows whereof he speaks, and the piece seems spot-on. gmancasefile.blogspot.com/2012/01/tsa-fail.htmlHere is a segment that struck me on the size of the TSA workforce - more than 5 federal departments combined. I'd have thought the Department of State would have more important work, and thus more employees than TSA, but no.... The report [of DHS Inspector General] goes on to state that the virtual strip search screening machines are a failure in that they cannot detect the type of explosives used by the “underwear bomber” or even a pistol used as a TSA’s own real-world test of the machines. Yet TSA has spent approximately $60 billion since 2002 and now has over 65,000 employees, more than the Department of State, more than the Department of Energy, more than the Department of Labor, more than the Department of Education, more than the Department of Housing and Urban Development---combined. TSA has become, according to the report, “an enormous, inflexible and distracted bureaucracy more concerned with……consolidating power.”That Disneyland is mentioned in passing reminded me of the fact that last year at least 16 TSA employees, all of whom allegedly passed extensive background checks, were arrested and convicted of child sex offenses. Some questioned how many sex offenders would be arrested and convicted within any organization of that size (at the time, approximately 55,000 employees). DisneyWorld in Orlando has about 55,000 employees and NO sex offenders known to be arrested for any sex offense. One of my former employers also had 50,000 employees and I never heard of a single sex offender arrest, though it is true I wouldn't necessarily know. I find it discomfiting to realize that there were this many known sex offenders within TSA, where the full-time job consists of fondling childrens' bodies including their genitalia, and viewing their naked photos.
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Post by joew on Mar 1, 2012 21:18:28 GMT -5
Maybe we should rename TSA. Call it FBI. Then maybe the ACLU and other civil libertarians would begin to worry.
And of course we'd have to call the FBI the TSA (Total Security Agency), and civil libertarians wouldn't have to think about it anymore.
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Post by doctork on Mar 1, 2012 21:42:18 GMT -5
I think the objection to TSA is bipartisan, though politicians are largely quiet lest when the next attack occurs they be labeled "soft on terror."
And of course imposition of the police state in general is also bipartisan - starting with GWB and continuing unabated, in fact expanding, under BHO.
Sad. I watched the film "United 93" a couple nights ago and was struck by the fact that airplane hi-jacking really ended less than an hour after the first plane hit the towers. But if the government can keep us skeered enough, they can continue on.
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Post by doctork on Mar 3, 2012 1:08:07 GMT -5
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Post by joew on Mar 8, 2012 11:09:10 GMT -5
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Post by doctork on Apr 25, 2012 23:08:44 GMT -5
Here are some surprising stats about TSA that I found on the TSA Blog website:
The TSA currently has a total of 58,400 employees. This means the TSA is:
Larger than the largest law enforcement agencies in the US: 1. NYPD (51,500) 2. Chicago PD (15,400) 3. LAPD: (12,800) 4. LA County Sheriff: (15,800)
Larger than the number of non-US NATO troops in Afghanistan (40,000) (and almost as much as the total number of US troops over there: 68,000)
Even though I have long thought TSA was excessively bloated I am still surprised to learn that there are more TSA employees than in 4 of our largest urban areas, and only a little less than all the police department employees in our 3 largest cities combined.
And nearly as many TSA as US military fighting in Afghanistan - what gives?
For all that, the TSA has not caught a single terrorist. In fact, of the numerous terrorist plots that have been foiled, they have been largely averted through - drum roll please - diligent police work.
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