Cogitamus

Documents Reveal TSA Research Proposal To Body-Scan Pedestrians, Train Passengers

From Forbes magazine:

Documents Reveal TSA Research Proposal To Body-Scan Pedestrians, Train Passengers

Giving Transportation Security Administration agents a peek under your clothes may soon be a practice that goes well beyond airport checkpoints. Newly uncovered documents show that as early as 2006, the Department of Homeland Security has been planning pilot programs to deploy mobile scanning units that can be set up at public events and in train stations, along with mobile x-ray vans capable of scanning pedestrians on city streets.

You can read the whole article here.

Thanks, America -- TSA Now Everywhere

As I've been saying for over a year now, these searches and gropefests were never going to stop at the airport.  They were always intended to be implemented at all transportation hubs, of all kinds, everywhere.  They were just "tested" at airports, to see how much crap people would put up with.  And the answer is in:  people will put up with anything.

Thanks, sheeple of America.  We are well and truly screwed.

(Here's another account, by National Geo and WaPo writer Christopher Elliott, this time of the TSA searching passengers after they got off the train.)

Life in the USA - A Photo Album

Napolitano Strikes Terror into Our Hearts

More predictable bullshit from the predictably incompetent Janet Napolitano and friends.  They must be getting ready to roll out some new abusive procedure.  Or mount another false flag operation à la Abdulmutallab the Crotch Bomber.  And the sheeple will fall into line.  Because they love it.  They love being terrified and they love to lick the authoritarian boot.

(Of course, if these were the boots, I might get on board.  But they don't sell these at Walmart.)

 

UPDATE:  Speaking of waste, fraud, and abuse . . . Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced the TSA’s proposed budget for fiscal 2012, which raises spending 5.7 percent, to $8.1 billion. Much of the $459 million increase would go to hiring another 3,270 employees, for a total TSA work force of 58,401, most of them screeners.  As I keep saying, employment in a down economy -- TSA molester, DHS spy, or soldier of fortune -- jobs, jobs, jobs -- the benefits of a permanent state of war!

DynCorp, Sex Slavery, and Whistleblowing

On the air right now, on the public radio program The Diane Rehm Show, former DynCorp employee Kathryn Bolkovac talking about how blew the whistle on UN peacekeepers in Bosnia who were engaged in sex trafficking and prostitution rings.  Wherever you live, if your local public radio station carries the program, you can listen.  (Audio will be on-line at the link later, after broadcast.)  Readers of Cogitamus might remember litbrit's recent post that exposed more of DynCorp's criminal behavior.  Bolkovac was also threatened after she blew the whistle; she talks about her experiences in a new book.

PSA from DHS & TSA

Year-to-date statistics on airport screening from the Department of Homeland Security:

Transvestites 1,133
Hernias 1,485
Hemorrhoid Cases 3,172
Enlarged Prostates 8,249
Breast Implants 79,350
Natural Blondes 3 
Terrorist Plots Discovered 0 

(H/T Penny in sunny Florida)

Bagel Crime, EPIC, and Ralph Nader

Florida Professor Ognjen Milatovic was removed from a US Airways flight this week for transporting a “suspicious bagel.”

Okay, okay, that's not entirely accurate.  One of Milatovic’s fellow passengers complained that his bag was emitting a “suspicious noise.”  But he was arrested and handcuffed for "disorderly conduct" and "interfering with the operation of an aircraft."  Those are the magic words, you know, no matter what you do, whether you behave like a dick or just have a hearing problem (Milatovic's father says he has a painful nerve condition and was trying to stand for as long as possible).  If you don't love, honor, and obey every command aboard an aircraft, you're outta there.

Here are three stories of the incident, so you can take your pick:

column from which I took opening line

Boston Globe

AOL travel news.

Gulet Mohamed Is An American Citizen

From Glenn Greenwald's harrowing article today, complete with audio, about an 18-year-old American held in a Kuwaiti prison:

. . . Mohamed was repeatedly beaten with a stick on the bottom of his feet and his palms, hit in the face, and hung from the ceiling.  They threatened him with both the arrest of his mother and electric shock, and told him that he should forget his family.

. . . Kuwait is little more than a subservient American protectorate, and the idea that they would do this to an American citizen without the American government's knowledge, if not its assent and participation, is implausible in the extreme.  

. . . All of this underscores the rapidly expanding powers the U.S. Government and law enforcement agents within the country are seizing without a shred of due process.  For the government to put an American citizen on the no-fly list while he's traveling outside the U.S. is tantamount to barring him from entering his own country -- a draconian punishment, involuntary exile, meted out with any due process.  In June, the ACLU filed a lawsuit on behalf of several citizens and legal residents who -- like Gulet Mohammed -- have been literally stranded abroad and barred from returning with no hearing, simply by being placed secretly on the no-fly list.  Add to that the growing seizures of the laptops and other electronic equipment of American citizens re-entering the country without any warrants -- or even yesterday's ruling from the California Supreme Court that police officers can search and seize someone's cell phone without a warrant when arresting them -- and (even leaving aside the administration's ongoing due-process-free prison camps and assassination programs) these are pure police state tactics . . . .

Gulet Mohamed is an American citizen.  He has committed no crime.  He is being imprisoned abroad and was tortured.  This is going on under the Obama administration, not Bush.  What is Obama going to do about it?

Bhutan and Penis Worship

Well, the world is a wild and wacky place.  Above is one of the more artful photos in this story from Truthdig, called The Land of a Thousand Penises.  Click through to read the fascinating story and see the best and brightest of phallic exemplars.

Bag search opponents swamp DC Metro Riders Advisory Council meeting

The inane and abusive "random bag searches" in the Washington DC metro, about which I've written before, have prompted a backlash.  The Montgomery County Civil Rights Coalition is on top of things, as you can see from their report about the Metro Riders Advisory Council meeting that just took place.  Many people in attendance nailed their objections with pithy, pointed comments about the worthlessness of these searches, the money being spent on them to the detriment of actual crime-prevention techniques, and the assault on our civil liberties.  Martine Zee was especially good.  Some info:

• Each hand-held Sabre 4000 trace detection unit used by Metro Police costs $25,000, and a GAO report suggests they have difficulty detecting several types of explosives.  (Gee, wonder who's making money on this? Answer: Smiths Detection)
• the Metro PD officers agreed that someone who refused a bag screening at an entrance to a Metro station would not be prevented from boarding a bus with the same bag
• the Metro PD officers implied at one point that those refusing bag screenings in Metro “free areas” would be scrutinized in other, unnamed ways.
• Police chief Michael Taborn and General Manager Sarles approved the new policy on their own authority without seeking WMATA Board approval — after their predecessors were turned down on prior occasions.

A woman named Sommer Gentry wrote a little playlet dramatizing the stupidity of these searches.  She also comments frequently at longtime consumer advocate Christopher Elliot's travel blog.

But the TSA and Metro Transit Police propaganda continues apace.

If you ride the DC Metro and come across one of these officious bozos who wants to root around in your bag, refuse.  They can't do it if we don't let them.  If we do, we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Library Book Returned -- Finally, Some Good News!

For 64-year library delinquent, return is better late than never

Charming story in today's Baltimore Sun about an 84-year-old just-post-WW-II veteran who's been living abroad all these years and is finally returning a book to the Enoch Pratt Free Library (first free library system in the country).

Reminds me of the hilarious Library episode from Seinfeld, where this actor, Philip Baker Hall, as "Bookman," does one of the best comic monologues in the history of television:

(Oops -- the embed code has been disabled, so you'll have to click on this link, which takes you directly to YouTube, to watch it.)

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Father Christmas at the North Pole.  Well, at the Arctic Ocean, anyway -- close enough.  If that isn't one fab Santa outfit, I don't know what is.  I bet even Tim Gunn would approve!  Merry Christmas, everyone!

Rape Victim Refuses TSA Breast Grope; Handcuffed, Arrested by Police

Claire Hirschkind couldn't go through the stripsearch scanner because of a pacemaker-type device in her chest.  So she was taken to a female TSA officer to be groped.

"I told them, 'No, I'm not going to have my breasts felt,' and she said, 'Yes, you are,'" Hirschkind told KVUE in Austin.

After refusing to acquiesce, she was arrested.

"The police actually pushed me to the floor, and handcuffed me," she said. "I was crying by then. They drug me 25 yards across the floor in front of the whole security."

Hirschkind had planned to visit friends in California for Christmas.  Now she's banned from Austin-Bergstrom International Airport.

Pilot Punished for Pointing Out TSA is a Farce

Sacramento area pilot punished for YouTube video

SACRAMENTO, CA - An airline pilot is being disciplined by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) for posting video on YouTube pointing out what he believes are serious flaws in airport security.

The 50-year-old pilot, who lives outside Sacramento, asked that neither he nor his airline be identified. He has worked for the airline for more than a decade and was deputized by the TSA to carry a gun in the cockpit.

He is also a helicopter test pilot in the Army Reserve and flew missions for the United Nations in Macedonia.

Three days after he posted a series of six video clips recorded with a cell phone camera at San Francisco International Airport, four federal air marshals and two sheriff's deputies arrived at his house to confiscate his federally-issued firearm. The pilot recorded that event as well and provided all the video to News10.

At the same time as the federal marshals took the pilot's gun, a deputy sheriff asked him to surrender his state-issued permit to carry a concealed weapon.

A follow-up letter from the sheriff's department said the CCW permit would be reevaluated following the outcome of the federal investigation.

The YouTube videos, posted Nov. 28, show what the pilot calls the irony of flight crews being forced to go through TSA screening while ground crew who service the aircraft are able to access secure areas simply by swiping a card.

"As you can see, airport security is kind of a farce. It's only smoke and mirrors so you people believe there is actually something going on here," the pilot narrates.

. . . The pilot's attorney, Don Werno of Santa Ana, said he believed the federal government sent six people to the house to send a message.  "And the message was you've angered us by telling the truth and by showing America that there are major security problems despite the fact that we've spent billions of dollars allegedly to improve airline safety," Werno said . . . .

DHS and Walmart: A Match Made in Heaven

In a perfect melding of the Keystone Kops Meet O'Brien, Janet Napolitano is coming to a Walmart near you.  Her video, urging "If You See Something, Say Something," is rolling out at W emporia all across the country:

The message will be continuously looped on TV monitors at the 588 Walmarts in the U.S.  One can only imagine the hilarity that will ensue when one gun-buying customer doesn't like the looks of another.  But then maybe Napolitano doesn't really know the People of Walmart that well, after all.

"Report suspicious activity to your local police or sheriff.  If you need help, ask a Walmart manager for assistance.”  Ah, yes, ask a manager for assistance!  Next time you get in a tug-of-war with another customer over the last Game Boy in the store, just report that sucker to management for "suspicious activity."

TSA comes to your bus stop: DC Metro adopts random bag search policy

TSA Comes to your bus stop: DC Metro adopts random bag search policy

The security theater once exclusive to America's airports is now playing at a local Metro station.Washington's Metro Transit Police Department(MTPD) on Thursday announced new search policies developed in conjunction with theTransportation Security Administration (TSA). "It is important to know that implementation of random bag inspection is not a reaction to any specific threats toward the Metro system," MTPDChief Michael A. Taborn said in his announcement.

Espionage Act: How the Government Can Engage in Serious Aggression Against the People of the United States by Naomi Wolf

Ballgame just brought this column by Naomi Wolf to our attention in another thread, but I think it deserves its own post.  Excerpt (bolds mine):

. . . These two Senators, and the rest of the Congressional and White House leadership who are coming forward in support of this appalling development, are cynically counting on Americans' ignorance of their own history -- an ignorance that is stoked and manipulated by those who wish to strip rights and freedoms from the American people. They are manipulatively counting on Americans to have no knowledge or memory of the dark history of the Espionage Act -- a history that should alert us all at once to the fact that this Act has only ever been used -- was designed deliberately to be used -- specifically and viciously to silence people like you and me.

The Espionage Act was crafted in 1917 -- because President Woodrow Wilson wanted a war and, faced with the troublesome First Amendment, wished to criminalize speech critical of his war. In the run-up to World War One, there were many ordinary citizens -- educators, journalists, publishers, civil rights leaders, union activists -- who were speaking out against US involvement in the war. The Espionage Act was used to round these citizens by the thousands for the newly minted 'crime' of their exercising their First Amendment Rights. A movie producer who showed British cruelty in a film about the Revolutionary War (since the British were our allies in World War I) got a ten-year sentence under the Espionage act in 1917, and the film was seized; poet E.E. Cummings spent three and a half months in a military detention camp under the Espionage Act for the 'crime' of saying that he did not hate Germans. Esteemed Judge Learned Hand wrote that the wording of the Espionage Act was so vague that it would threaten the American tradition of freedom itself. Many were held in prison for weeks in brutal conditions without due process; some, in Connecticut -- Lieberman's home state -- were severely beaten while they were held in prison. The arrests and beatings were widely publicized and had a profound effect, terrorizing those who would otherwise speak out.

. . . I call on all American citizens to rise up and insist on repeal of the Espionage Act immediately. We have little time to waste. The Assange assault is theater of a particularly deadly kind, and America will not recover from the use of the Espionage Act as a cudgel to threaten journalists, editors and news outlets with. I call on major funders of Feinstein's and Lieberman's campaigns to put their donations in escrow accounts and notify the staffers of those Senators that the funds willonly be released if they drop their traitorous invocation of the Espionage Act. I call on all Americans to understand once for all: this is not about Julian Assange. This, my fellow citizens, is about you . . . .

Have Sari Can't Travel: TSA Faces Diplomatic Storm After Indian Ambassador to US Is Given Patdown

Meera Shankar, who dined at the White House just last month, was given one of the controversial searches after she was pulled from an airport security line in Mississippi. Today the Indian embassy in Washington protested to the White House about the incident. External Affairs Minister SM Krishna said: 'This is unacceptable to India.'

It was the second such search for Ambassador Shankar in three months.  Complete story from The Daily Mail here, or if you prefer The Economic Times, here.

Poetry by Liu Xiaobo

Though Liu Xiaobo won't be allowed to travel to Sweden to accept the Nobel Peace Prize (nor will his wife on his behalf), and though he is still imprisoned, his words are flying free:

from “Experiencing Death”

I had imagined being there beneath sunlight
with the procession of martyrs
using just the one thin bone
to uphold a true conviction
And yet, the heavenly void
will not plate the sacrificed in gold
A pack of wolves well-fed full of corpses
celebrate in the warm noon air
aflood with joy

Mars and Venus and Berlusconi

Ya gotta love this -- Italian Prime Minister and playboy-clown extraordinaire Silvio Berlusconi just spent a bundle of taxpayer money to add new body parts to an ancient statue of Mars and Venus:

Officials confirmed that a fake penis and hand had been added to Mars, the god of war and a fake hand had been added to Venus, the goddess of love after a consultation with Berlusconi's personal architect Mario Catalano.

Matteo Orfini, shadow culture spokesman for the opposition Democratic Left, stormed: 'This is absolute madness. It's as if we are back in the Middle Ages when the ruling regimes did whatever they wanted.'

Well, I guess it's better than adding "modesty curtains" at the Department of Justice.  (Though I think one can take issue with the Middle Ages bit, as we can see the ruling regimes doing whatever they want nowadays as well.)

Welcome to Your Police State - Grand Central NYC

Uh. Does anyone know why the TSA is performing random bag searches at the Grand Central Terminal subway hub?
posted by @metalia from Twitter for iPhone 23 hours 38 mins ago

Here's the URL.

UPDATE:  Well, this has been going since April.  But I guess since so few people give a shit, as you'll see from the chipper comments in the article, it barely caused a ripple.  Oh, well.  The horse left the barn long ago.

Colorado Lawyer Files For Injunction Against Janet Napolitano and TSA

Colorado Lawyer Files for Injunction Against Janet Napolitano and the TSA

Colorado lawyer Gary Fielder has filed for a Permanent Restraining Order in federal district court against Janet Napolitano, John Pistole, the Department of Homeland Security, and the TSA. Attorney Fielder made headlines earlier this year when he refused to go through a naked body scanner installed at a Colorado courthouse. He has now filed a Complaint for Injunctive Relief to stop the naked body scanners and enhanced pat downs at our nation's airports. 
In his complaint, he details his personal story of how he and his daughters were treated during an "enhanced pat down" by the TSA on a recent trip to San Diego, describing the TSA agents' behavior as "disgusting, unconscionable, sexual in nature, unnecessary, and a complete violation of his and his children’s constitutional rights." 
The complaint presented in full.

In the same vein, a California District Attorney has vowed to prosecute screeners who touch travelers inappropriately.  He says he'll charge them with sexual battery.

All Hail Rosa Parks -- and Civil Disobedience

On this date 55 years ago, December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a city bus.  She wasn't the first person to commit this act of civil disobedience -- other women had done the same thing --  but it did mark a tipping point.  Her act kicked off a boycott of buses by black citizens that lasted 381 days.  It brought a young minister named Martin Luther King, Jr. to national attention.  And it sparked the beginning of a finally strong, finally successful, civil rights movement.

Civil disobedience.  A proud, a noble, an effective practice.  We ignore it at our peril.

Scabies, Lice, Ringworm, MRSA, Fungal Infections, Hepatitis?

Gloved: TSA spreading infection? Latex coverings 'have been in crotches, armpits, touching people who may be ill'

TSA Groin-Searches Menstruating Woman

TSA Blog: Scabies at Boston Logan

FlyerTalk.com

Any other oubreaks?  Who knows?  No word yet on whether public health people and other medical professionals care about this.

(And yes, you have the "right" to ask an agent to change into clean gloves:  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, has issued this statement: "If you are traveling and are going to be searched, you can request that the TSA agent change his or her gloves."  Good luck with that.  Nah, that won't get you further harassed.)

TSA Harasses Woman, Forces Her to Miss Flight Over Breast-Milk

. . . After begging him to figure it out, they finally let me through. I called and complained to TSA and was instructed to travel with the TSA breast milk rules printed out and present them whenever there is a problem.

As my items come through security this time, I notice immediately that I was dealing with the same people from the week before. The woman tells me right away that my milk might have to go through the x-ray, and then I tell her I printed the rules. I go to grab the rules on top of my bag and she freaks out and pushes my arm away. Another guy comes over and calls for “back up” and they put in me back in the glass cage. Standing 50 ft away are the same manager and supervisor I had dealt with the previous week.

They will stall for 20 minutes before coming over to me.

Meanwhile, one of the guys comes over to me and tells me “to be quiet if I know what’s good for me.” At the end of this portion I have been locked up for just under 10 minutes. The whole ordeal takes just under 1 hour.

. . . In this segment, the TSA manager tells me I can leave security, redistribute the milk into half full containers (his completely made-up rule) and go through security all over again if I want to avoid x-rays on the milk.

With tears continuing to stream down my face, I did that.

I also missed my flight playing along with his ridiculous game. Curiously, my second screening video (another 20 minutes) has been erased . . . .

By Stacey Armato.  Read the whole thing here.

UPDATE:  Watch the video, which is now all over the web.  They make her wait over 40 minutes in the glass prison booth, then close the security line so no other passengers come through, then take her out and search her.  What can we conclude but that they do this so no one else can witness them harassing her?