Too Much To Dream

Ya know, I do increasingly wonder what the hell good the TSA does, especially when it comes to the airport security procedures. But to act like this is an assault on civil rights... gah!

There's this little word "unreasonable" in the 4th amendment, as in "unreasonable search and seizure." Do you think these folks are aware of it?

Ooh ooh ooh! Can some of them take them through the metal detectors in schools too? No one is required to fly, but all the kids are required to go to school.

Answer for Dean: no. They rarely read the actual Constitution.

I'd just like to SEE one of the toddler-heads come on-line with one of these in a crowded airport this holiday season.

I can almost guarantee you there will be violations of their civil rights beyond what they could imagine, on the part of the passengers who get stuck in line behind their little "tantrum"

feh. this sort of crap is why I take Amtrak, even though it's chronically late and the level of variability in employee helpfulness and cheerfulness is appalling.

I loved that quote from the Doctorow link:

"In checked luggage, where security may find it while I'm not around and decide to punish me for being clever..."

Here we have, dare I say, the Root Cause™ of the problem. These people actually believe they being clever.

Hmm. Do these people ever travel? I'm thinking they sound like they rarely leave their mothers' basements.

I've been doing this for months, except I use a Desert Eagle with the second amendment written on it.

Penn Gillette carries one of those (of Penn and Teller)

Airline passengers may carry metal, as long as it's not in the form of a weapon. A flat sheet of printed metal would be easy for security to check, so there'd be no need to ostentatiously throw it away at the gate. So what's the point? I don't get it.

I don't get it, either. The one in the ad wouldn't get confiscated at an airport gate, since as noted above sheets of metal are not on the proscribed items list.

It did get me thinking, though. Wouldn't liberals get a rash from one of these that included the 2nd amendment? A really good "liberal edition" wouldn't be metal. It would be printed on a sheet of foam rubber, allowing it to be bent and twisted to fit the situation.

Um, I think for some people the point might be that it's stupid to frisk little old ladies from Peoria, when the potential terrorists are young men from Saudi Arabia. Excessive and intrusive airline security is not the price we pay for terrorism; it's the price we pay for our own politically correct refusal to discriminate.

Thanks for the link!

If one carries it in one's pocket, then "forget" to put it in the little tray, that's supposed to be when the "fun" starts.

The point is to get themselves searched at the gate, so that afterwards they can go and write their little blogstories about how "In BusHitler/Ashkkkroft's Amerikkka, carrying a copy of the Bill of Rights gets you marked as a suspected terrorist!"

Alan:

Al Qaeda deliberately recruited Saudis because they weren't being checked carefully. You really think that if the US only concentrated on Saudis, they wouldn't try to find new people to use? Including, say, making a deal to get personnel from some eco-terrorist group, IRA splinter, or whichever?

Craig, if they do that & manage to pull it off, that'll be the end of the eco-terr movement. The IRA (even its truly loony sections like the Real IRA & the Provos) are sensible enough to know that helping Al-Queso like that would be the end of the line for them. They rely too much on funding from irish-americans who's knowledge of The Troubles comes from the songs they hear on March 17th down at their local. The deep greenies, on the other hand, I can see them doing something like that. Their funding base are just the sort of moonbats who'd support that sort of direct action against the bushitler.

Craig - most of the prisoners in Guantanamo are also Saudi, because al Qaeda is a Saudi financed and (mostly) Saudi-run paramilitary organization.

That said, the greenies and some western fascist groups hate the American govt. & Bush as much as al Qaeda does. They probably wouldn't mind helping out a bit.

Cyber - the most prominent wing of the IRA are the Provos. The two main splinter groups are the Real and the Continuity IRA. The Provisionals split with the Original IRA - the IRA of Michael Collins - in the late 60's. The OIRA went on to become the Workers Socialist Paradise Organization or some garbage like that and later disbanded entirely. Just so you know.

I've always wondered, Craig, if a Mideast terrorist group didn't do exactly that in Oklahoma City. That ended the militia movement as a mainstream force and ensured Clinton an easy 1996 win.