In How America is snooping on YOU … and may soon be snooping a whole lot more, “This is London” describes a lawsuit by Dutch Liberal MEP Sophie In’t Veld in which she seeks to find out why the US government keeps pulling her over for security searches at airports.
The article claims that this is the first lawsuit of its kind. Can that really be so?
Feminist Law Professors says, Flying With a Young Child This Summer? Here's a Book To Buy.
I think it's a joke, but who knows these days.
Boing Boing reports that TSA is now requiring that you remove all electronic devices from your carry-on bags, including cables etc. and place them in a separate bin to be scanned at the security checkpoints. I could hold the line up ten minutes myself given all the gear I travel with…
No word at present about this new assault on air travel at TSA's new oh-so-friendly PR blog (“Liquids cover 70% of the earth and they also make up a good percentage of our comments from the traveling public.”).
Don't let the smiling faces fool you: the more we engage in security theater and 'protect' against minimal threats to look good while diverting resources from things that matter, the more that any hypothetical enemies are laughing.
This hits the nail on the head:
Racial Profiling at U.S. Airways – TalkLeft: The Politics Of Crime Six imams attending a conference in Minneapolis took time to pray at the gate before boarding a U.S. Airways flight to Phoenix. A passenger handed a note to a flight attendant pointing out the “6 suspicious Arabic men” on the plane. Disturbed by their “unsettling” behavior — which apparently consisted of praying and asking for seat belt extensions — the crew told the police that the imams needed to be removed. They were escorted from the plane in handcuffs and detained for five hours before authorities conceded that they posed no threat.
U.S. Airways refused to book the imams on another flight to Phoenix. According to the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Muslims (both passengers and airline employees) have more complaints about U.S. Airways than other airlines. The incident prompted the Council and the NAACP to ask for Congressional hearings on racial profiling in airports.
Can you imagine the outcry from the religious right if six Christian pastors were removed from a flight because they prayed together at the gate? U.S. Airways would be deservedly out of business in a week.
It’s a movement. A subject on which I hope to have more to say soon. Meanwhile, enjoy this Boing Boing: HOWTO make a “Kip Hawley is an idiot” Freedom Baggie:
KipHawleyIsAnIdiot.com gives you instructions for making your own “freedom baggie” with your opinion of the TSA chief.
I flew from SFO to LAX yesterday morning, and was robbed at gunpoint by a TSA agent, who stole my cologne, face-wash, and moisturizer. She said that my moisture baggie could only contain vessels of 3 oz or less’ worth of moisture. I pointed out that all these vessels did have less than 3 oz’ worth of moist substances in them, as they were all half-empty, and she said yes, but the vessels were capable of holding more than 3 oz. Apparently, the risk is that a hair-gel bomber will take to the skies, and use a syringe to refill the tube of face-scrub through its tiny little aperture, somehow mixing some kind of moisture-bomb in the plastic tube without melting it. Apparently, liquids acquire magical explosive properties when they are in quantities of more than 3 oz.
A TSA supervisor took me aside and asked me why I was so upset. I said that my family left the Soviet Union to escape arbitrary authority, and the seizure of property by the state. She suggested that I send in a report to the TSA complaining, and I laughed and asked her how many of those people get added to the No-Fly List.
Of course, this is all a hollow joke. The risk of someone mixing a binary hair-gel explosive has been dismissed by chemists as a near-zero. Meanwhile, as KipHawleyIsAnIdiot.com points out, “air cargo is not screened and there is still no point-to-point baggage matching.”
“It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.”
— David Hume
Drip, drip, drip:
I was detained at the TSA checkpoint for about 25 minutes today: Yesterday, while discussing the new rules a fellow Flyertalker suggested we write “Kip Hawley is an Idiot” on the outside of our clear plastic quart bags. So I did just that.
At the MKE “E” checkpoint I placed my laptop in one bin, and my shoes, cell phone and quart bag in a second bin. The TSA guy who was pushing bags and bins into the X-ray machine took a good hard look, and then as the bag when though the X-ray I think he told the X-ray operator to call for a bag check/explosive swab on my roller bag to slow me down. He went strait to the TSA Supervisor on duty and boy did he come marching over to the checkpoint with fire in his eyes!
He grabbed the baggie as it came out of the X-ray and asked if it was mine. After responding yes, he pointed at my comment and demanded to know “What is this supposed to mean?” “It could me a lot of things, it happens to be an opinion on mine.” “You can’t write things like this” he said, “You mean my First Amendment right to freedom of speech doesn’t apply here?” “Out there (pointing pass the id checkers) not while in here (pointing down) was his response.”
Here, incidentally, is Kip Hawley’s official bio.
Jotwell Blenderlaw