Yeah, I know, it took me a couple days to get to it, but just when I thought the Seattle Times editorial board couldn’t get any more condescending, of course, they do:
THE rage about body scanners and aggressive pat-downs at airport security has reached a feverish pitch — an absurd one. All it would take is one underpants bomber with explosives buried in his clothing to remind travelers how dicey this situation can be.
Um… a dicey situation for the “underpants bomber” no doubt, who, if memory serves me, succeeded in little more than lighting his own dick on fire. But the real absurdity here is the notion that this single, clumsy, failed crotch-bombing attempt is reason enough to spend $2.4 billion of taxpayer money to treat me and my 13-year-old daughter like criminals, every time we choose to fly.
So perhaps the Times’ editors can explain to me why their lede shouldn’t be dismissed as mere alarmist, fear-mongering bullshit… and lazy, alarmist, fear-mongering bullshit at that?
Recent introduction of body scanners at 69 airports throughout the country — and more thorough pat-downs for those who decline being scanned — are a necessary inconvenience.
Oh, I see… it’s a “necessary inconvenience.”
“Inconvenience,” of course, in this context being the soft-fascist way of describing the forced surrender of our Constitutional right against “unreasonable searches” without “probable cause.” And this exception to the Fourth Amendment is apparently “necessary,” the authoritarian apologists at the Times tell us, because… well… I suppose that brings us back to the crotch-bomber again.
See, forget for a moment that what the crotch-bombing attempt really represented was a massive intelligence failure… that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s own father had gone to the US embassy in Nigeria to warn officials of his son’s worrisome activities, that the National Security Agency had picked up intelligence that Al Qaeda in Yemen planned to use a Nigerian in an attack on the US, and that the NSA had actually intercepted communications between Abdulmutallab himself, and a phone used by Yemen-based radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki… and yet Abdulmutallab still wasn’t marked for extra security screening, even after suspiciously buying a ticket with cash, and checking no luggage on an international flight. And while we’re at it, let’s just totally ignore the fact that even if the TSA’s newly invasive pat-down procedures had been in place at the time, they still wouldn’t have caught Abdulmutallab, because his flight originated in Amsterdam, and thus he never even saw a TSA security line.
No, according to the Times, it’s not improved intelligence that’s needed, or TSA officers trained like their Israeli counterparts to discern the real risks from the frivolous (for example, a cash-paying, baggage-less Nigerian with known terrorist connections, vs., you know, some random 13-year-old girl). Rather, the only way to possibly deter another attempted crotch-bombing, we’re told, is $2.4 billion worth of porno scanners and invasive, junk-grabbing pat-down procedures that were they to occur in the classroom, would amount to sexual assault.
As if the risk of, say, lighting your own dick on fire isn’t deterrence enough. I mean, what’s a martyr to do with 72 virgins, and a burnt off dick?
But the Times goes even further. For not only do they urge us to surrender our civil liberties for the sake of security theater, they actually abuse and belittle those of us who dare to complain about it.
Other travelers, for now, should steer clear of ridiculous opt-out protests and endure security procedures currently in place. A shortsighted protest whereby travelers refuse the scanners on Wednesday, one the busiest days of the year? Who invents such nonsense?
A busy holiday weekend is not a reasonable time to express personal exasperation with the only security program in place. Adjustments will come but you have to be a pretty miserable traveler to wish ill of those working to protect passengers.
So… um… when exactly would the Times propose we stage our protest? During the wee hours of an off-peak travel day? At the TSA’s pleasure? Or maybe we should just limit our efforts to indignant tweets and polite, if pointed, letters to the editor… you know… if that’s not too inconvenient? I mean, do the Times’ editors have any fucking idea of how a protest actually works?
Or perhaps we should just be banned from voicing our disagreement altogether, considering how many innocent lives the porno-scanners have already saved…?
TSA spokesman Dwayne Baird says since the scanners began arriving last March, security officials have found 130 prohibited items artfully concealed under clothing. Aren’t you glad that stuff wasn’t on your latest airplane trip?
What sort of prohibited items? Guns? Knives? Explosives? Live tigers? Or are we just talking about nail clippers, pocket knives, (gasp) bottled water and the other prohibited items that travelers sometimes not so much “artfully conceal,” as forget they’re carrying? Weren’t items like these routinely carried onto plans without incident before the scanners were installed, and dontcha think if the scanners had foiled 130 terrorist attacks since March—as the Times’ wording artfully implies—we might’ve heard something about it before now?
So no, I couldn’t really give a shit whether a fellow passenger managed to sneak aboard one of those notoriously dangerous souvenir snow globes. And no, these new procedures don’t make me feel any safer.
TSA is constantly evaluating and updating screening procedures to stay ahead of evolving threats.
Yeah, like the way they secured cockpit doors after 9/11. And the way they started inspecting shoes after the attempted shoe bombing. And the way they banned liquids and gels after the alleged liquid bombing plot. And the way they started feeling up 13-year-olds after the attempted crotch bombing.
Hey… great job of staying ahead of evolving threats, TSA!
The goal is to employ state-of-the-art procedures to protect the flying public. Passengers who cannot handle these methods are not forced by anyone to travel. They should opt out, all right … of flying.
You know, in the same way that African Americans have the option of not driving through white neighborhoods if they “cannot handle” being stopped for a DWB, or Latino Americans have the option of not driving through Arizona, if they “cannot handle” being arrested for failing to carry their papers.
Don’t like it? Don’t fly, the Times arrogantly suggests. And whatever you do, don’t you dare inconvenience us. To which, the only reasonable, measured response is: fuck you.
And you know what? Nobody’s forcing the Times’ editors to travel either, so if they “cannot handle” people like me exercising our right to protest yet one more post-9/11 indignity, then perhaps it is they who should shut the fuck up and opt out of flying? Yeah, I know, if too many of us refuse the scanners and choose the pat-down, it will only slow down the security lines for everyone else… but for those of us who truly love the Constitution, well, I guess that’s what we might call a necessary inconvenience.
Indeed, I’d go so far as to say that the greater threat to our nation and our way of life is not Abdulmutallab or al-Awlaki or even Osama bin Laden, but rather the quaggy, condescending cowards like those at the Seattle Times who would eagerly surrender the very rights that define America in the name of defending it. And for what? An infinitesimal reduction in our already infinitesimally small chance of being victims of a terrorist attack?
To put this issue in perspective, even if a 9/11 sized attack were to occur on American soil every year, one’s risk of being a victim would still be about 15 times less than being killed in a motor vehicle accident. But of course, history tells us that these—or any—sort of terrorist attacks haven’t occurred every year, or every decade, or even every half-century, suggesting that our actual lifetime risk of being killed by terrorists—less than one in 60,000—lies somewhere between being stung to death by bees, and being struck by lightning.
So tell me, how exactly do these slim odds, combined with a single, failed crotch-bombing attempt, make a virtual strip search or invasive pat-down of my daughter necessary? How much liberty and dignity should we be compelled to yield in order to calm the hyperbolic fears of the caterwauling old cranks at the Times?
I mean, where does it stop?
One would-be terrorist clumsily manages to light his dick on fire on board an international flight, and America responds by suspending the Fourth Amendment and spending $2.4 billion on unproven scanners with unknown health effects. So with this precedent, what happens when, say, the next terrorist succeeds in smuggling explosives onboard by shoving them up his ass? Is the Times ready to run the headline: “Anal cavity searches a necessary inconvenience,” while smugly dissing those of us who object? Are we really prepared to become a nation that denies tens of millions of its citizens access to X-ray scans and colonoscopies at the doctors office, while spending billions of dollars to enforce these same procedures at the airport?
Al Qaeda may yet bring down another airplane or two, and nobody is arguing that we shouldn’t remain vigilant. The threat of terrorist attack does indeed present a real risk to air travelers—as real, if statistically less likely a risk, as pilot error, act of nature or mechanical failure. But no amount of vigilance can eliminate this risk entirely.
So the question is, where do we draw the line? At what point, we must ask ourselves, does the cost in blood, treasure, dignity and personal freedom exceed the marginal return in increased security? And while reasonable people might disagree on the answer, it is far from “absurd,” “ridiculous” or “shortsighted” to suggest that this line has already been crossed.
Fuck the Seattle Times and fuck the Blethens.
Indeed – soft fascism. Do what you’re told. Don’t ask questions. Confine your complaints to “Free Speech Zones” – Newspeak if ever there was such a thing.
Good diary on the subject at DailyKos, referencing an op-ed in the NYT by Roger Cohen.
As the diary says, the real danger is the sinister drumbeat of fear, and what people can be cowed into with such relentless fearmongering. Oh, and that dangerous ass Chertoff is making bank selling us these scanners – lovely.
WHAT WE CAN ALL BE THANKFULL TO CONSERVATIVE AMERICA FOR THIS HOLIDAY SEASON
Although it is the day after Thanksgiving, I was thinking that today in the spirit of conciliation and acceptance of our fellows that the holiday season represents, I should try to think of something that we can all thank conservative America for.
I could not think of a thing until, while reading today’s Seattle Times, I came across a statistic in a column concerning health care in America. The statistic that I found was that 45,000 Americans per year die as a direct result of not having health care insurance.
That statistic made me realize that what I have to thank conservative America for this year is the unnecessary death of 250 Americans on both Thanksgiving and Christmas and 3,750 in between the two holidays.
So, thank you, conservative America, for this irrevocable gift, and I can only hope that you will share in its consequences in a very personal way this holiday season.
………..:)
Very nice post.
Beating Pudpuller to the punch, the dogma says you get a resurrected dick. That’s how the ones that are successful in actually blowing themselves into a fine red mist still get their 144 legs (twice 72).
Still, a great line, Goldy.
What I still don’t get is why any terrahist bother with the airlines. You asked the right question: Where does it stop? Ahead of of the terrahists?
Note to jihadis: The Fashion Center Mall in Arlington, just across the river from DC, is full of decadent American consumers celebrating Black Friday!
Scanners and pat downs at the mall would be bad for business!! Throughput is money, Sheeple!
It’s all bullshit and the airport stuff is sick fascist theater.
Wait a minute, didn’t Goldy tell us to vote for Obama?
From Liberal Scientist’s post:
“…the real danger is the sinister drumbeat of fear, and what people can be cowed into with such relentless fearmongering.”
Which only proves that the members of the Seattle Times editorial board are all CLOSET NAZIS! Remember these infamous words spoken by Hermann Goering (Hitler’s reichmarshal) at the Nuremburg trials in 1945:
“Of course the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country that determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, or a parliament, or a fascist dictatorship, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country”.
Just fake security theater to make stupid people (ie. the public) “feel safe”. Pointless. If someone wants to do sneak in explosive you just hide them…er…internally. nuff said. Uncomfortable? Sure. But if you’re determined to die in the attempt, that’s the least of your problems. So that means…the ONLY way to stop that…full body cavity searches coming up next!
If you don’t do “internal” searches of all passengers, the terrorists could win!
Paying cash for airline tickets is a commonplace in sub-Saharan Africa.
Hmm, what if the government finds that Al Queda is secretly sending messages encoded in newspaper articles and that all newspapers need to be prescreened by the NSA before being published. Would the Times go along with this “necessary inconvenience”?
Goldy,
You forgot about banning printers being shipped from Yemen AFTER they loaded the printer cartridges with PETN rigged to explode in flight.
All this while the continued (until recentlty) to demand that pilots be screened. I know a commercial pilot and the TSA confiscated the batteries for her noise canceling headset (you know…the one she wears when FLYING THE FUCKING AIRLINER). Noise canceling headsets not only make life more pleasant, they improve the ability to HEAR RADIO FUCKING COMMUNICATIONS!!! This is nothing more than security theater. Al Qaeda has already won. They turned us into pussies.
Best rant ever.
(Standing ovation)
I am looking forward to he reaction by the TSA when somebody attmpts an attack with explosives shoved up their ass.
“THE rage about body scanners and aggressive pat-downs at airport security has reached a feverish pitch — an absurd one. All it would take is one underpants bomber with explosives buried in his clothing to remind travelers how dicey this situation can be.”
Cancel @13. That’s a mis-post.
Pssst, Goldy, the candidate you told us to vote for is doing this to us. Shouldn’t we be blaming YOU for this mess?
“”All it would take is one underpants bomber with explosives buried in his clothing to remind travelers how dicey this situation can be.”
An asteroid or comet would do it, too.
When the TSA starts groping women’s cleavages for hidden explosives I’m gonna apply for a screener job.
Oh shit, here comes Mrs. Rabbit with the saute pan — the big one — I’m outta here — !!!
[hopping noises]
@15 When you stick your head up your ass, do you ever find any explosives hidden in there?
@12, Quick, a great investment opportunity; endoscopic scanners (“Bend over and grab your ankles, please”). The free market can solve anything. It’s easy.
“the only security program in place”
I can think of at least three other security programs in place: CIA, FBI, NSA.
@6
I don’t know if they’re Nazis, but it’s probably not helpful to use that as an epithet, even if it were formally true.
What I think they are are worshipers of power. I think it’s the core of corporatism, the ‘ism’ of the plutocrats and kleptocrats who have captured nearly all of the branches of government – including all of the Republicans and many/most of the Democrats. An essential feature of that process is the silencing or marginalizing of dissent, and that entails making protest or even possessing personal integrity or exercising autonomy over ones own body more and more difficult.
@18
thank you for that
Al Qaeda may yet bring down another airplane or two,
hahaha. see this is why we are where we are. this=left. sad.
The Japanese comedy shows are having a good laugh at the TSA’s expense.
Good job this time around, Goldy.
‘Cept, if you protest for a day and then get on the plane anyway and the next day everything gets back to normal you wont change anything. Whatever you do has to be a sustained effort.
Good post, Goldy, but nowhere did I read the words “Obama Administration”. If a Republican were President, you’d have no problem (and rightfully so) pointing at the White House. Why not the same standard here? Why does the Obama Administration get a pass here?
@26
I think that’s a good and valid question.
My main complaint about Obama is what I perceive to be his lack of aggressiveness, of boldness, in pursuing my liberal agenda.
I think he’s surrounded himself with the corporatist hack wing of the party (Rahm, Geitner, Summers, etc), has not confronted (or confiscated) Wall Street, has naively/insanely pussy-footed around the ‘thugs in Congress with Broderian pleas for bipartisanship, and has more often than not dropped the ball on civil liberties (DADT, Patriot/spying, “looking forward” rather than prosecuting torturers, allowing TSA to careen forward, etc).
So I’m with you there – Obama is simply not leftward enough for me, and civil liberties are a central part of that criticism.
Imagine if you will, a gaggle of Al Qaeda leaders sitting in their little bungalow just north of Islamabad, drinking tea and smoking the hookah, watching Fox News on the satellite.
Laughing their asses off.
Did they spend millions of dollars training crack squads of razor-sharp operatives, loading them with the most advanced technology and armaments? No.
They got a couple of brain-addled devotees to load their loafers and their knickers with explosives and board a plane. And get caught.
Air fare to America $1200; three lbs of cheap explosive, $50; watching the result on Fox News – priceless!
@27: What you said.
But what I really fault O for and ought to terrify all of us is that it’s still (largely) Bush’s and (Chertoff’s) bureaucracy at DHS/TSA, and most of the (corrupt Rove crony) US attorneys, and the DoJ (Monica Goodling’s Liberty University grads), lots of key Pentagon posts, CIA, DEA, etc., etc., etc. They systematically burrowed in.
@26: This booty scanner idea goes back to the post-9/11 Bush administration, and it hasn’t been lost that the X-mas dick-lighting affair was ripe for exploiting by politicians (and emeritus homeland security officials turned lobbyists) and the booty-scanner corporations that own them.
http://motherjones.com/mojo/20.....anner-scam
Goldy doesn’t mention connections with either Bush or Obama admins. But look for a return of Total Information Awareness (brought to you by Oracle) as soon as there is the right catalyzing event, Spaghetti Monster forbid.
@30
Yup – over and over and over – the basic tenets of Disaster Capitalism – exploit shock and uncertainty to systematically advance a corporatist/fascist agenda.
@29
I totally agree – I’m sure the bureaucracy is riddled with moles – once again, they rewrite the rules, this time about partisanship versus competence and the difference between political and non-political appointments, and we’re stuck with the shit to clean up.
However, given that, it still doesn’t excuse him (Obama) from responsibility about using his bully pulpit more forcefully and effectively, or of whom he has surrounded himself with.
@26
Because Goldy told us to vote for Obama, and he wants us to forget that. I haven’t.
Perhaps if our response as a nation to the underwear bomber (and his ilk) had been condescending disdain and taunting more like this, rather than running and hiding and torturing ourselves in the process of eliminating our own most valuable assets like civil liberties, we might be in a better place.
Dickless. Wouldn’t have been just excellent if Obama had gotten on a podium and taunted the now dickless terrorist and his handlers, for being figuratively and literally dickless?
Priceless.
(I think we need Murry and Ackroyd in government.)
hahahah Goldy is only outraged by TSA because it’s inconvenient to him. But 60% of Americans support the pornoscanners and molestation to keep us safe!
Meanwhile, Mythbuster’s Adam Savage flies to SeaTac after being screened by the TSA and discovers that he forgot he was carrying 2 12 inch razors and that they didn’t set off any alarms. But at least the planes are flying on schedule, like they ought in a well-ordered state.
Troll, no doubt Senator McCain would never ever limit any Real American’s freedoms had he been elected. But you are correct that the one we elected ought to be called on this poorly thought-out policy, like the rest of his Bush-without-Bush policies.
Oops, meant to include the link of Adam Savage talking about his travel oops to a crowd of geeks locally-
news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-20023820-71.html
Does it ever occur to our folks in government that if we stopped fucking around in these Muslim countries and supporting Israel no-matter-what that the terrorists who attempt this shit would give it up? Maybe we’re the biggest part of the problem with our policies of getting involved in stupid adventures all over the world. Why don’t we just stop this craziness and let the world get by on its own?
I heard that 92% of Afghans never heard of the 9-11 incident and have no idea why foreign troops are there in Afghanistan now. I’d say that’s about par for the course for our governemnt.
Let me see if I follow Goldy’s logic.
1) Goldy tells us to vote for Obama.
2) Obama wins.
3) Obama takes away our 4th amendment rights.
= The Seattle Times is to blame?
@ 5, 15, 32, 38
Why do you keep saying the same exact inane thing over and over?
At least be interesting with your criticism, be insightful, be provocative, then perhaps someone might respond.
The way you’re approaching things, you seem like a child stamping his feet and having a tantrum demanding to be listened to, saying over and over the same silly thing you find brilliant and everyone else finds tedious.
Obama’s jack-booted thugs must be stopped. Maybe the next administration will respect the Constitution? The last two sure haven’t.
@39
Because he hates America and wants the terrorists to win…
Nah, it’s because he’s a “troll” and that’s what trolls do.
@34 “60% of Americans support the pornoscanners and molestation”
Rightwing voyeurs’ wet dream come true.
@39…
It’s messaging.
The same thing the p’dumbski, (the excrable)mot and MISTER Cynical-ASS-Klown do. Say the same over and over and over and over and think nobody will notice that each/any one of them is a tone-deaf one trick pony.
More’n likely, the Saudi backers of al Queda became charter shareholders in Chertoff’s company, waaaaay back in 2007 when Cheney and Skeletor put the wheels in motion to implement all of this.
So, congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Middle-Class American Taxpayer: You not only paid for the Airport Porn Generators and to get your own naughty bits groped–you paid for the incendiary stuff that poor misguided clown used to light his on fire.
In fact, you probably paid for Troll to sit stroking his own pud while posting stuff here that everyone else ignores.
Perhaps trollers should read the Rapiscan various award contracts for the scanners, dating back to 2007. The latest contract was in late December 2009, authorized by Congress, using stimulus funds. Obama really has nothing to do with it; and the GOP could have easily stopped it all had they wished to do so, with a cloture vote. But no, they love this sort of law & order stuff.
Very nice post. This whole TSA thing is absurd and you deconstruct that wonderfully. I posted a few thoughts about this on my husband’s blog, too: http://hulshofschmidt.wordpres.....eir-harms/
I’m still trying to understand how Obama taking away our 4th amendment is the Seattle Times’ fault.
If I were Karl Rove I’d hire a bunch of mentally ill people with low IQ to sit at their computer all day and repeat Republicaan talking points over and over.
Sounds a little boring. Wonder whether people like Troll spice things up by switching to something more, ahem, lively? Or must they work in an office where their productivity is being monitored?
@48…
I think you nailed it.
@37…
I’m sure it does occur to our folks in government, but admitting this would risk cutting into the profits of those who financially support them, and we can’t have that now can we?
@50,
I guess not.
What’s amazing is how the leftist pinheads run amok on this blog attacking whomever except the correct peeps on this thread when it’s:
Odumba in the whitey house
Napolitano in the HS
Holder holding Justice
Any attempt at blaming this on Bush when Odumba put his own cronies in these offices is laughable Goldy sycophants. Once again we notice Goldy goes on a rant when the Seattle Times agrees with Odumba.
And rujax you dumbASS… again you run with the jackASS pack…
Hey Goldy your preznit said…
So you attack the Blethens for Odumba’s evolving policy?
What’s so strange here is how many HA leftists were put on the spot when Puddy asked if they wanted another terrorist attack on GWBush’s administration. Now we see the leftist progressives claiming it’s the right who wants to see an attack on Odumba’s watch. Butt there are factual errors in this article. Did The Nation clear them up? Nope you dopes.
Nope. Puddy doesn’t want any attack. So why do you leftist hate Americans?
[Deleted — see HA Comment Policy]
[Deleted — see HA Comment Policy]
?
The airport crap is beside the point. The real threat is unchecked (mostly) cargo containers, and unchecked (mostly) packages in plane’s cargo holds. That’s the real threat. $2.4 billion could do something about that.
….and(mostly)unscreened tarmac workers.
Why does everyone think that the TSA and the United States are the only ones doing this?????? Other countries have had them for a while. Quit being so dang egocentric.
Britain
Spain
Japan
Australia,
Mexico
Thailand
And the Netherlands have them.
Canada has ordered some, and that Italy have them as well.
WE ARE NOT ALONE
I wonder if it’s a sign of the impending apocalypse that I agree with Goldy on an issue?
More importantly, how much common ground is there? What could be accomplished if left and right worked together on this?
Great rant, Goldy. One wonders what a newspaper which does not speak out for civil rights and human dignity is good for.
If you do choose to fly commercial, refuse the body scan, and take the pat-down. The radiation these new scanners direct at your skin has not been proven harmless, and you’re about to ascend high into the atmosphere (35-43 thousand feet, on a flight of more than a few hundred miles), where you will not have the benefit of those layers of air to protect you. “Pre-loading” your radiation exposure is the worst thing you can do before flying high; your skin won’t have time to recover from the jolt it just got from the scanner.
Statistically speaking, more Americans may die from these body scans than from terrorism.
“Those who would give up their liberty for security deserve neither and shall have neither.” Benjamin Franklin
not once does goldy mention the obama administration..
goebbels would be so proud of our little goldy.
I think we can catagorize this as a “lie by omission”…..what do you think goldy?
I chuckle when I remember the leftist outrage over Bush’s NSA telephone screens but hear nary a peep out of them about Obama’s TSA wanting to look in their underwear.