Airport Security; Junk cost 11k

[JimJoe]

I just saw on the news that the guy who refused the xray body scanner and then said they could pat him down but if they touched his junk he would have them arrested, is NOW being investigated and will be fined $11,000.00 for failing to complete security. According to the report, once you enter the security check point area, you have to be xrayed or touched. If you refuse both, you get investigated and fined $11,000.00. Is that crazy?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2627761/posts

It is time to get serious about airplane security. Do the checks based on relevant security factors and forget the politically correct random checks. They are worthless. I want to know how many bombs they have found. From what I can find out, NONE.

[Walt.]

Would it surprise anyone if it turns out that the manufacturers of the scanning devices are large contributors to political campaigns?

[mulligan]

Actually, GE makes some of the equipment. I've installed some at Logan.

[RichieLion]

Would it surprise anyone if it turns out that the manufacturers of the scanning devices are large contributors to political campaigns?

You are really, really close in your suspicions Walt. In fact, the manufacturers of these machines are employing former government staffers, who have ties to Homeland Security, to lobby for and promote their product.

Former Dept. of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, is now head of the Chertoff Group which represents one the leading manufacturers of whole body imaging machines, Rapiscan Systems. He has appeared on many news shows promoting scanning systems without revealing his own connections to them.

Another manufacturer is American Science & Engineering, Inc. who have retained the K Street firm Wexler & Walker to lobby for them. Individual lobbyists on this account include former TSA deputy administrator Tom Blank.

Smiths Detection, another manufacturer, employs transportation lobbying firm Van Scoyoc Associates, employs Kevin Patrick Kelly, a former top staffer to Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., who sits on the Homeland Security Appropriations subcommittee.

We're all being manipulated and used, in more ways than one, by politicians and lobbyists hunting for their fortunes.

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/01/airport-scanner-scam

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania (1759)

[JimJoe]

I am male. Why can't I have a lady do the search? They say the intimate searches are performed by someone of the same sex but doesn't that assume gays customers or gay employees do not exist?
This intimate search stuff is a mess.

[bigalibaba]

How about if we all go into a chamber that will detonate any explosives we may be carrying. Short of that, the searches and the X Rays may just save your life. Why do we keep complaining that we should have the right to die at the hands of some fool who has no idea why he wants to blow up innocent people, let alone himself.

[otherbruddaDarrell]

Here is a thought...................if you do not want to do what they require you are welcome to drive, walk, take a bus, train or ride a bike to where you want to go.

[JimJoe]

I am not against reasonable security precautions.. but what we are doing is all in the name of politcal correctness... and she shoe and underware bombers are not the problem. SHIPPING is the problem....
Watch some videos of the pat downs.. there is NO way they will find anything hidden in a rectum, between the buns, a padded bra, etc etc.
It is all for show, and that is not safety.

[swrinfla]

Sorry, but my view is pretty much an anti-Governmental agency one. The folks at TSA are government employees. I suspect that, for the most part, the ones you encounter at the airport are low-pay-grade individuals, for whom the possibility of "power" may well be exciting!

I don't mean to demean all government employees, but it has long seemed to me that those who most frequently have direct contact with the public are also the ones who delight in making life difficult for the public!

I frankly count my blessings that I almost never fly anywhere anymore!

SWR
:beer3:

[elevatorman]

I was recently in Las Vegas and was asked to go through the full body scanner. They only asked a few people to do this. They asked me to remove evarything from my pockets and take off my belt I did. I forgot there was a hand wipe in one of those small sealed packet in my pocket. The machine saw it and the TSA man asked me to check my pockets again. I took out the wipe and then was told I had to have a search done by hand. It took a few seconds and was not intrusive. I went on my way. It was no big deal.

[RichieLion]

Here is a thought...................if you do not want to do what they require you are welcome to drive, walk, take a bus, train or ride a bike to where you want to go.

Seriously?

Is this really your response to this overreaching action by our government?

Are you one of those people who do not question authority, but follow blindly?

You don't see the outrage by opponents of these new invasive tactics as having a justifiable point?

Do you accept that the irradiating of your body every time you fly will have no lasting effects on your health?

[GatorFan]

If it helps prevents another Sept 11, I am all for it. It is not perfect but if it prevents just one person from getting on a plane with box cutters and slicking the throats of flight attendants, pilots, co-pilots and crashing planes into public buildings and killing thousands of people, then I for one do not care how any of you feel about your privacy being violated. I do remember 911 everyday because it effected me personally.

[otherbruddaDarrell]

Seriously?

Is this really your response to this overreaching action by our government?

Are you one of those people who do not question authority, but follow blindly?

You don't see the outrage by opponents of these new invasive tactics as having a justifiable point?

Do you accept that the irradiating of your body every time you fly will have no lasting effects on your health?

1. yes
2.no
3.yes I see the outrage and I also do not like having to be searched,scanned touched, questioned, but I also do not like crash landings or things that go boom in an airplane.
4. then do not fly.
There are lots of things I do not like or agree with but understand the need in doing. This is one of them.
If I decide I need to fly then I will comply with the security measures. If I don't want to comply then I will find another mode of transportation and not hold up those that will comply and fly. IMO

[K9-Lovers]

Seriously?

Is this really your response to this overreaching action by our government?

Are you one of those people who do not question authority, but follow blindly?

You don't see the outrage by opponents of these new invasive tactics as having a justifiable point?

Do you accept that the irradiating of your body every time you fly will have no lasting effects on your health?

RichieLion, if you don't agree with these new security measures, do you have an alternate solution to offer?

[Walt.]

Does anybody remember how politicians insisted that luggage screening must (in the name of safety) be done by American government employees? Over 30,000 low wage luggage screeners quickly became federal employees (with salaries jumping). It was then decided that (in the interest of fairness) they would just keep the people already there. So, net result being that nothing changed except that the airlines no longer have to pay for screening and a lot of people who couldn't get a good job are grandfathered into good paying, benefit loaded government jobs.

Everybody pretended that having the Feds run the screening would have prevented 9/11. Actually, nothing "slipped by" the screeners on 9/11. If they had come across the box cutters they wouldn't have done anything about them as they were not prohibited at the time.

The new scanners are in the same category as the "virtual fences" along the border. Metal detectors and bomb sniffing dogs would do just fine.

[cologal]

I was recently in Las Vegas and was asked to go through the full body scanner. They only asked a few people to do this. They asked me to remove evarything from my pockets and take off my belt I did. I forgot there was a hand wipe in one of those small sealed packet in my pocket. The machine saw it and the TSA man asked me to check my pockets again. I took out the wipe and then was told I had to have a search done by hand. It took a few seconds and was not intrusive. I went on my way. It was no big deal.

Was this since October 30th? If not then you didn't get the new enhance search.

[RichieLion]

RichieLion, if you don't agree with these new security measures, do you have an alternate solution to offer?

I would do what the most successful country at thwarting terrorism has done. That country is Israel, and they have trained personnel stationed at their airport who observe each prospective passenger and question those who fit their profiling directives pertaining to their identity, their flying status, their suspiciousness, and other factors.

We have trained personnel to do similar things, but have deployed them incorrectly to just observe on the sidelines where they don't interact with fliers. A useless tactic. Israeli agents check you in, review your identification and papers and ask you questions. They have been very successful without utilizing the theatrics of our ridiculous tech prevalent system that treat every passenger as guilty until proven innocent.

I'm astonished at all the sheeple who blindly go along with the growing degradation of our freedoms and our dignity and the personal privacy of our bodies and our children's bodies for such a dubious result.

[cologal]

I would do what the most successful country at thwarting terrorism has done. That country is Israel, and they have trained personnel stationed at their airport who observe each prospective passenger and question those:agree::agree: who fit their profiling directives pertaining to their identity, their flying status, their suspiciousness, and other factors.

We have trained personnel to do similar things, but have deployed them incorrectly to just observe on the sidelines where they don't interact with fliers. A useless tactic. Israeli agents check you in, review your identification and papers and ask you questions. They have been very successful without utilizing the theatrics of our ridiculous tech prevalent system that treat every passenger as guilty until proven innocent.

I'm astonished at all the sheep who blindly go along with the growing degradation of our freedoms and our dignity and the personal privacy of our bodies and our children's bodies for such a dubious result.

:agree::agree::agree:

I have flown in and out of Israel, they use a layered security approach. When I was leaving for home as I approached the metal detector I said I will set this off. The guy with me just smiled.....it did not go off as I went through. They have really good metal detectors with software which eliminates implants as a threat. No groping at that airport nor at the hospital in which I worked for 14 years....they have the very same metal detector in the ER and I don't set it off.

So here is a couple of questions for all of you safety first people....

Does the TSA screen cargo and packages on airplanes? Y/N
Does TSA screen mail on airplanes? Y/N
How many aircraft has Israel lost to a bomb? 0,1,2,3,4

I await your answers....

[Walt.]

Perhaps they are making the "pat down" so gross and unpleasant so that people will actually end up insisting on the full body scan.
The government could then just "give the people what they want."

[kentucky blue]

I was recently in Las Vegas and was asked to go through the full body scanner. They only asked a few people to do this. They asked me to remove evarything from my pockets and take off my belt I did. I forgot there was a hand wipe in one of those small sealed packet in my pocket. The machine saw it and the TSA man asked me to check my pockets again. I took out the wipe and then was told I had to have a search done by hand. It took a few seconds and was not intrusive. I went on my way. It was no big deal.

I have to agree.After my annual physical and having a prostate exam each year, this was a piece of cake.It was less than no big deal, but i would have preferred Halle Berry as my TSA agent.