Rand Paul Has a Quick Fix For TSA: Pull the Plug 1051
suraj.sun quotes from Politico:
"Rand Paul has a reform plan for the Transportation Security Administration: Scrap the whole thing. A personal message from Paul (R-Ky.) came atop emails this week from the Campaign for Liberty Vice President Matt Hawes, asking for readers to sign a petition in support of Paul's 'End the TSA' bill. A Paul spokeswoman said that legislation is being finalized next week. 'Every inch of our person has become fair game for government thugs posing as "security" as we travel around the country. Senator Rand Paul has a plan to do away with the TSA for good, but he needs our help,' reads the petition, which also asks signers to 'chip in a contribution to help C4L mobilize liberty activists across America to turn the heat up on Congress and end the TSA's abuse of our rights.' 'The American people shouldn't be subjected to harassment, groping, and other public humiliation simply to board an airplane. As you may have heard, I have some personal experience with this, and I've vowed to lead the charge to fight back,' Paul wrote at the top of a C4L fundraising pitch, according to blogs that received the email. 'Campaign for Liberty is leading the fight to pressure Congress to act now and restore our liberty. It's time to END the TSA and get the government's hands back to only stealing our wallets instead of groping toddlers and grandmothers.'"
It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
Sign me up. This security theater has got to stop.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Indeed. I feel like I am watching a BOFH episode play out in real life. [ntk.net]
Everything can be allocated behind the great white elephant [wikipedia.org] of national security.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Funny)
And I had important,(for me), things that needed to get completed!
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Informative)
I think the BOFH was their training manual. I can't say that the recent news that agents were arrested for facilitating drug smuggling in exchange for a cut of the profits did anything to improve my opinion. Stories from way back, for example one story on Slashdot where a former TSA agent claimed that their instructions were to allow guns through to avoid holding up the lines, also diminished what little regard I had for them. (The Slashdot claim mirrors claims by journalists at around the same time that around 30% of attempts to get a gun through screening succeeded, so I'm inclined to take the claim as more than just fluff.)
This is perhaps the first (and probably only) time I'm going to agree with R.P. on anything, he's normally 52 cards short of a full deck (all that's left are the jokers) but there really is no benefit in a security apparatus that offers no security but does offer a great deal of insecurity and hardship. The TSA has failed to demonstrate that it is competent or capable of dealing with any actual threat. Rather, it has an worryingly high failure rate and an even more worrying tendency to fix the wrong problem when something does go wrong - and usually badly.
There has been ONE attempt to put Semtex in a shoe, and the attempt could not have succeeded. It is extremely doubtful that passing the shoes through the scanner would have detected it. Compare that to the total number of hijacks that have succeeded due to firearms. Tell me, which of the attack vectors is a genuine threat more likely to pursue? The one that might work or the one that's stupid? So which does the TSA attempt to close? Yes, the one that's stupid. Yay. And "attempt" is about as far as it has probably got. I don't trust the TSA's competency at detecting Semtex, either in terms of finding a bomb detector that will spot it (it's notoriously difficult, which is why the IRA used it extensively) or in terms or recognizing that the detector has spotted anything at all.
No security is perfect, but if we're to believe (even a little bit) the Slashdot claim and the recent news stories, then it suggests that the TSA is not accidentally insecure but knowingly insecure. The people at the top probably didn't intend it to be that way, but the people at the top don't seem eager to fix the problems either. As such, it may not be their doing but it is their responsibility and they're failing.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:4, Informative)
The problem is that Rand Paul isn't suggesting that the groping stop. He's suggesting that it be *privatized*, with no government oversight or accountability at all (even less than there already is). So the only thing that will change is that the person grabbing your balls will wear a different logo on his shirt--and answer only to a private company.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
Unlikely. The airlines know the security theatre is costing them big $$$. They will scale it back.
Depends (Score:4, Insightful)
That depends on how their insurance think about the importance of passenger screening.
Re:Depends (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120405/04390118385/tsa-security-theater-described-one-simple-infographic.shtml [techdirt.com]
The probability of death from an air travel based terrorist attack is 1 in 30 million. I think the airline insurance carriers are going to be just fine with the risks.
Re:Depends (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
That would be true if they weren't liable for what happens. As long as the TSA does security they are are fault if something goes wrong. If the airport or airlines run security themselves they could be bankrupt from a single event. Not to mention the further damage that would be done from even a single incident of a half successful hijacking or the like.
Right now the airlines can rely on 'we don't like it either, but if you want to fly, those are the rules with everyone so tough it out'. I'd much rather the government trying to figure out to grope my balls without groping them than an insurance company demanding the airline minimize its liability for terrorist acts.
Security is a government problem. That doesn't mean the TSA, the US military or anyone else do a particularly good or bad job. But transferring security responsibility to private companies or individuals would make the problem worse, not better. If you don't want the TSA engaging in security theatre pass laws that prevent the theatre and demand actual security, which is what should have happened in the first place.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
The 9/11 strategy will never work again due to 1. Fortified cockpit doors 2. Most importantly, hostile passengers. The best you will get now is to blow up an airplane with a bomb and not use it as missle. There a million other vectors that a terrorist could use to kill about 300 people, not sure why air travel should be made such a pain for that. It's just a risk we have to manage. Also, if you figure in the fact that people are less likely to travel due to the invasive procedures at airports, the TSA has undoubtedly caused more deaths indirectly than the 9/11 hijackers.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:4, Insightful)
The fortified cockpit door doesn't help if the pilot or copilot employed by the airline is the terrorist. He kills the other occupant of the cockpit, if necessary, and flies the plane into the target. The passengers, even if they realize what's going on, can't do anything about it because they're locked out of the cockpit.
The changes make it more difficult. They don't make it impossible.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, they would.
Flight 93.
Of all the instruments of American power, the only one that saved lives on 9/11 was the action of average citizens.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
9/11 wouldn't happen today in a world where the assumption is that when a place is hijacked, everyone is going to die. At the time, the standard assumption was that the hijackers just wanted money and would land the plane somewhere, and everyone would go free after the negotiations, provided no one tried to act the hero.
After 9/11, that's no longer the default assumption. When you add in the extra cockpit security, hijacking a plane to crash somewhere is no longer an easy way to do a lot of damage. Putting billions of dollars into protecting against one, very specific and unlikely to succeed, avenue of terror is a misuse of security funds. Given the ease of hundreds of other avenues of terror, we're far better off investing in intellegence.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:4, Insightful)
He's suggesting that it be *privatized*, with no government oversight or accountability at all (even less than there already is)
....and no force of law behind their unlawful detentions? No more harassment that I have to put up with or be arrested? No more "VIPR" teams roaming the highways?
GOOD.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:4, Insightful)
But there is actually a law [tsa.gov]-
"Under the law that created TSA, the Aviation and Transportation Security Act, the TSA administrator is responsible for overseeing aviation security (P.L. 107-71) and has the authority to establish security procedures at airports (49 C.F.R. Â 1540.107). Passengers that fail to comply with security procedures may be prohibited from entering the secure area of airports to catch their flight (49 C.F.R. Â 1540.105(a)(2)."
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
This is incorrect.
By ending the TSA, airports will gain the flexibility to change their processes, and we will gain the ability to sue the shit out of said private companies when they grope us inappropriately.
What is it about "privatized" that makes you think there would be "no government oversight or accountability". And on the ground, how much less could there possibly be than there is right now??
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Funny)
But if it IS privatized, that means a private company can hire strippers to do the job. And I can choose to use that airline/airport.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
The groping and pornoscanners are a huge waste to convince the public that the government is protecting them from these ever-present, super scary terrorists that we need to elect them to fight. The terrorists are actually quite stupid and would never be able to pull off another 9/11. The only reason they succeeded is because the passengers thought it was in their best interests to go along with the terrorists. They were convinced there was a bomb on board, and if they waited, the terrorists would let them go. Everyone knows that is not the case anymore, AND the doors to the cockpit are locked now.
That is what has made us safer and only that. Everything else is just to convince the public that we're making progress, while preserving the fear-mongering that keeps certain politicians getting elected and keeps certain government organizations paid.
The airlines have little interest in fear mongering: it hurts them. Most people still fly, but the thought of some high school dropout molesting their children and/or TSA acting like al quaeda is around every corner hurts their business. Put it on them, even if the government pays for it, and they'll get rid of a lot of the security theater.
Not to say it would all be good. They'd no doubt use security as an excuse for their own purposes. Specifically, they'd raise the prices dramatically and start racial profiling like we haven't seen before.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
Before the TSA, most security at airports was private. The TSAs backscatter X-Ray machines have already been bypassed. Air Marshalls can be spotted a mile away on a plane. The "Freedom Gropes" we have to endure are completely insane.
Watching TSA agents detaining a woman because because she wouldn't let them x-ray her daughters breast milk is insane.
I will not walk through a backscatter x-ray machine for any reason. Personally, I'll not shower for a week and wear the same clothes. Then I'll pop 2 Viagra and request a freedom grope when I get to the TSA. Hopefully that will make the agent sexually assaulting me as uncomfortable as possible.
I'm going in on the 21st for a hip replacement. After that, my life is pretty much f*cked at airports. I will never be allowed to go anywhere without some type of enhanced pat down.
This insanity has to end.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Insightful)
Hey, remember before 9/11, when airport security was the business of the airport and the airlines, not the government? And nobody grabbed your nads or took pictures of you naked or made you endure a pat down to get on a plane? I do. It was way, way better than what we have now.
Then 19 assholes with box cutters fucked it all up, and the government jumped in and decided they needed to "make us safe." Fuck that, I'll go back to the box cutter risk, if it means I get to get on a plane without being molested.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:5, Informative)
The box-cutter thing is likely a myth. Also, it's "Trade", not "Trace".
"No one on United Flight 175, which crashed into the World Trade Center, reported anything about weapons or tactics. One flight attendant on American Flight 11, which also crashed into the World Trade Center, said she was disabled by a chemical spray, while another flight attendant said a passenger was stabbed or shot. On the Pentagon plane, American Flight 77, Barbara Olson reported hijackers carrying knives and box cutters but did not describe how they took the cockpit. And on United Flight 93, passengers reported knives but also a hijacker threatening to explode a bomb. The box cutter-knives story isn't demonstrably false, but it serves to divert attention from the other weapons and to mask the fact that we don't have any idea how the hijackings happened. "
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/hey_wait_a_minute/2003/09/what_you_think_you_know_about_sept_11_.html [slate.com]
And there is reason to be skeptical about the Barbara Olson story, since the only source is her husband, Ted Olson, who at the time was U.S. Solicitor General to a notoriously mendacious and criminal White House.
Re:It's about damn time (Score:4, Insightful)
That's okay. Most of what they do is for show anyway. At least this way, they'll be doing nothing cheaper and less invasively.
Yes! (Score:3)
But if anyone besides a small following was listening to Ron Paul, US might have repealed PATRIOT act and even bombed fewer countries with drones.
Re:Yes! (Score:5, Informative)
Rand Paul != Ron Paul
Re:Yes! (Score:4, Funny)
[randPaul isKindOf:ronPaul] == YES
Too bad his other ideas are bad (Score:3, Insightful)
Can we get a non-extremist pol who thinks TSA is a bad idea and has the power to do something about it?
Sad Day (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a sad day indeed when common sense is considered "extreme".
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Nice FUD.
I've been listening to Rand since 2009 (when he first announced his intention to run). His ideas are more "calm" than those of his father. I have yet to hear any Rand position that I would object to.
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
Still think that way?
Re:Sad Day (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes. If you're stupid enough to refuse to do business with someone, your competitors will get the business you refused.
A truly free market would stop that kind of discrimination faster than all the civil rights legislation ever proposed.
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
Then why didn't it solve the problem when it had a chance and before legislation had to be involved?
If the free market can solve all problems why do so many go unsolved for so long?
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Informative)
Then why didn't it solve the problem when it had a chance and before legislation had to be involved?
If the free market can solve all problems why do so many go unsolved for so long?
Because state governments would not let them. Jim Crow Laws were exactly that: Laws passed by state governments.
Separate facilities for whites and non-whites didn't exist because the business owners wanted them necessarily (though I'm sure there were some who did want them). They existed because the various state governments mandated it.
The free market was not allowed to function because of government coercion.
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the most absurd white-washing I've ever heard. Who do you think composed the onerous state governments who were so tragically oppressing the free market? It was the very citizens who owned those businesses, frequented them, and otherwise populated those states. Those communities supported, elected and funded the politicians who enacted those ideas into law. Trying to retroactively give the racist attitudes of the Jim Crow era an out by suggesting the state government was forcing them against their will into segregation is not only embarrassing but offensive. You would do yourself and everyone you know a favor to recognize that governments and laws do not exist in a vacuum.
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
And what a lovely idea, until one sees how things worked in the South until civil rights legislation passed. Since virtually no white restaurant would serve a black person, this whole "competition will kill racism" line suddenly looks pretty fucking retarded, no?
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
And if your competitor does business with that someone, they'd be called "nigger lovers" and run out of business, with everyone from the mayor and the sheriff down to the local Jaycees cheering them on. It's all a private transaction until you call the cops to throw a "trespasser" out of your lunch counter, or the cops refuse to arrest people who assault someone who dares sit at it.
Regulating public accommodations in CRA '63 was a practical solution to the problem of collusion between the local government and private interests. It made frivolous, racial government prosecutions for "loitering" and "trespassing" impossible.
Your theory works until people care more about being racist than making money, as if profits were able to buy off peoples prejudices. They don't.
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
Fantasies about the mythical market unicorn didn't solve the problem. Years of protests didn't solve the problem. LBJ solved the problem. And it has stayed solved. Show me one self-inflicted market reform that has ever worked as well.
Re:Sad Day (Score:4, Insightful)
Rachel Maddow in mid-2010: "Would you have voted for passage of the Civil Rights Acts?" Candidate Rand Paul: "Yes. Though I disagree with certain portions of it, I think overall the bill was a positive good, so I would have voted for passage of the bill." Note these are ot exact-quotes but quoting from memory. The video is on youtube if you need a cite. Being at work I cannot access youtube myself, but since you're an engineer I'm sure you can figure-out how to use their search engine. Peace. :-)
The tape says:
Let me be clear: I support the Civil Rights Act because I overwhelmingly agree with the intent of the legislation, which was to stop discrimination in the public sphere and halt the abhorrent practice of segregation and Jim Crow laws," he said.
Where is that "I would have voted for it" part you claim was there? Oh wait, it isn't, because he didn't say that. He has in fact repeatedly come out against the provisions of the CRA that require business that are open to the public to serve all comers regardless of skin color.
/for/ economic freedoms.
As for the rest of your noise, no I don't care that there are people that don't like white people and would please like to be able to keep them out of their churches. How is that relevant to your freedom to travel and live your life without being excluded from services made available to the public based upon the color of your skin? I thought you people were
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
He's a sham of a libertarian. A libertarian believes the government should stay out of your personal business all the time, not just when it suits his own political and/or religious beliefs. Someone who opposes same sex marriage, legalization of drugs, racial integration/equality, and abortion (even in the case of rape or incest) is NOT a real libertarian.
Re:Sad Day (Score:4, Insightful)
What's extreme about this? Every external inch of you is scanned by the TSA. And once al-Qaeda deploys their 'ass-bomber', the TSA will be obliged to anal-probe everyone...
Re:Sad Day (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know about that. Colloquially, "thug" can be used synonymously with "minion," "goon," etc... as a criminal in the service of powerful individual or organization ("The don sent his thugs..." etc...)
Considering that we get more and more reports every month of the TSA doing things that would be explicitly illegal for the citizenry, it seems like a pretty fitting term to me. Though maybe "government" should have been "government's," but that's more of a semantic nitpick than "extremism."
How is that inaccurate? (Score:5, Interesting)
Every inch of our person has become fair games for government thugs
"thugs" might be a little far, but there is at this point pretty much no point they are not allowed to inspect. Remember these guys are not even real law enforcement.
I would even argue that at this point "thugs" is not that far off the mark; I was made to wait at a security checkpoint as punishment for forgetting a water bottle held in plain sight on the outside of a laptop bag. Instead of them just saying "I have to throw this out" which I've had happen before and am OK with, they held my bag until they found some other winner in the "forgot I had water" sweepstakes, then we had to wait until an officer came over to snarkily ask us if we understood that we were not allowed to carry water through security, where merrily forgetting was not good enough an answer. Basically to him we were three year olds.
It's true that not ALL of them are thugs, I've met a lot of nice TSA people as well. But the structure in which they operate is one build to enable and protect true thuggery and that is why his statement is not as far off the mark as you would think.
It's much less vitriolic than it is accurate.
Mainstream politicians (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in the pursuit of justice is not a virtue" (Cicero, used by Barry Goldwater in his '64 acceptance speech).
Again, which of his positions do you find extreme? Protecting the Bill of Rights? Not bombing random countries willy-nilly? Supporting Internet freedom?
Or are you conditioned to have a knee-jerk reaction that any pol with an (R) next to his name is too extreme?
Paul B.
Political reality (Score:5, Interesting)
Can we get a non-extremist pol who thinks TSA is a bad idea and has the power to do something about it?
No. Next question.
Seriously, the TSA is going to have to do something horrendous to get reformed. (I mean like killing babies horrendous, not their usual baseline horrendous) Otherwise any politician who tries to change it will be accused of coddling terrorists. Sad but that's the political reality we live in.
Re:Too bad his other ideas are bad (Score:4, Interesting)
Are you benefiting from racial quotas or something?
Re:Too bad his other ideas are bad (Score:5, Insightful)
What is wrong with repealing it?
Plenty.
It wouldn't be overnight, but Jim Crow would come right back.
In before you claim that Jim Crow was *only* the government's doing. Without the backing of businesses and such, Jim Crow wouldn't have had a snowball's chance in hell of lasting as long as it did. There are places in the country which would drift right back were it not for federal legislation.
This is why Rand Paul's insistence that the Civil Rights act was bad is based on nonsense. He claims that a black person's dollar is the same as a white's and that businesses and such would see it that way in this "enlightened" era. To a lot of people, it's not. Even today.
But whatever, go back to Stormfront.
--
BMO
Petition link (Score:5, Informative)
Since all the submitter could be bothered to do was pump up Politico page views, here's the link to the > petition> [chooseliberty.org].
ulterior motive (Score:4, Funny)
I presume his bill will have a rider that ends the rest of the federal government also.
If I can not sex assault you..... (Score:5, Interesting)
The government only has the powers given to it by the People of this land. If I can not touch your breast or crotch, neither can the government.
BTW there's already a law that allows airports to remove TSA from their buildings. So far I've only heard of one airport that considered evicting them. (And the government responded by saying that airport would be removed as a travel destination, if it followed through.)
Government is not eloquence or reason: It is force and intimidation. See the medical marijuana users who, even though they followed California law, were arrested anyway by U.S. police violating the 9th and 10th amendments.
Re:If I can not sex assault you..... (Score:4, Insightful)
By that logic because I can't imprison you or execute you the government can't either. Because I can't tax you, the government can't tax you...
Thats starting to sound good to me..
The Campaign for Liberty Platform (Score:5, Informative)
Bear in mind that the Campaign for Liberty is about a lot more than opposing the TSA [campaignforliberty.com], some of which some people may not find all that palatable (e.g. free market fundamentalism, scrapping the Federal Reserve, dismantling most of the federal government, withdrawing from most international organizations).
Re:The Campaign for Liberty Platform (Score:5, Insightful)
To be fair, the Federal Reserve deserves to be scrapped as much, if not more than, the TSA.
Never jump on board a "do away with X" bandwagon until you know what they're planning to replace "X" with.
And this is news? (Score:5, Insightful)
The Pauls have a quick fix for everything, and it's usually some form of "pull the plug".
Ron Paul 2012: because quick fixes haven't screwed up the world enough already.
TSA does something very important (Score:5, Insightful)
Well... for politicians. The problem they have is that if another terrorist attack gets through they don't want to be held accountable for it. So the TSA was created and the security was made as annoying as possible without actually making it so annoying that the TSA is scrapped. It's a balancing act.
Anyway, if there is another attack they can point at the TSA and say " do you want it to be any more annoying then that?!" And if they've made it annoying enough everyone will agree it is almost unbearably annoying.
So they'll say "well, you chose not to make it any more annoying so that's on the American people and not your entirely blameless elected official."
And thus they can't be held accountable for anything that could go wrong.
If you scrap the TSA and there is another attack, they'll get blamed for it. That's not acceptable.
If they put in a better system that isn't annoying but is much more effective and there is an attack they could still get blamed even if they gave us a really good system. Why? Because unless it's really annoying someone somewhere will blame the system.
So here we are... and in a lot of ways it's all our faults.
I'm personally going through the pat down process every single time I travel. If more people were like me, the TSA would have disbanded about ten seconds after it stopped because logistically they can't pat everyone down.
Many people have messaged me in the past on this very site to tell me that they shouldn't have to go through that process and so they go through the scanner instead. That's fine. You're making it easy for them and it is because of people like you that the TSA gets away with it.
If you don't like the TSA then get a pat down or stfu.
Ron Paul can't do anything about it. The man has no power. He has one isolated seat in congress. Who votes with him in a block? No one. He's all by himself out there. So whatever you think of his politics, he's not really an effective response to anything. He won't be president and he's isn't even a relevant force in the house.
If you care about the TSA's abuse of the common traveler... never walk through the scanner. Always take the pat down alternative. If enough of us do it. We win.
Do not send money to the "Campaign for Liberty" (Score:3, Informative)
Although ending the TSA is an admirable goal, please do not send money to this group.
This group also has goals / ideas which are not as logical as the removal of the TSA.
Push your own congress critter to move forward on this, and work on legal petitions, not these fake online ones.
Re:Do not send money to the "Campaign for Liberty" (Score:5, Informative)
Example: I used to receive emails from them (via "Paramount Communications"). One day I started getting anti-gay-marriage emails (also via Paramount Communications) which I had never signed up for. I clicked the link and unsubscribed from those. Mysteriously, that seems to mean I unsubscribed from the C4L list. I fail to see how stopping gay marriage is a liberty-enhancing goal.
TSA freaked out over a roll of raffle tickets (Score:4, Informative)
MEH (Score:3, Informative)
I signed the petition (once I FOUND it, thanks Slashdot for not actually linking to the thing). I was then immediately hit with a "GIVE MONEYS PL0X" page. It really didn't feel right.
If I do give moneys, I'll also be supporting the campaign to repeal Obamacare (the petition for which I am intentionally not linking to), so no thanks.
To avoid groping, travel by land. (Score:4, Insightful)
Quick fixes (Score:3)
If there's one thing I've learned from programming, it's that quick fixes are always the best. Why bother trying to understand the details of a problem when you can just band-aid over it?
Won't happen (Score:5, Insightful)
The TSA employs about 58,000 employees.
The number one thing by far that voters in the US care about is jobs.
This will never happen.
Re:Some people seem to forget... (Score:5, Insightful)
If I set up an organization to grope people in libraries people have the option not to use the library, but that doesn't make my groping legal.
Re:Some people seem to forget... (Score:4, Interesting)
The TSA has no jurisdiction over you in a private car, and for that matter they don't have jurisdiction over you when you are using a private airport.
Yet. (Though remember their parent DHS claims jurisdiction and the right to search anyone freely at any point within 100 miles of the US border, which covers 90ish percent of the population, if I recall right.)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Some people seem to forget... (Score:5, Informative)
that air travel is a privilege, not a right
Oh, that is why we bailed out the airlines a few years back? You know, to ensure that people have the "privilege?"
The TSA has no jurisdiction over you in a private car
You do realize that the reason they cannot just demand that you open your car for an inspection is the same fourth amendment that should make nude scans and pat-downs unconstitutional, right? Your rights are not supposed to disappear just because you are in an airport.
Re:Some people seem to forget... (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.prisonplanet.com/tsa-invades-roads-highways-with-vipr-checkpoints.html [prisonplanet.com]
Re:Some people seem to forget... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Some people seem to forget... (Score:5, Informative)
If you don't like the TSA, you can travel a different way
Sure, as long as you also don't want to travel by car [youtube.com] or train [aol.com] or subways or ferries [cleveland.com]
I guess that still leaves by foot (as long as you don't go in a subway tunnel) and maybe horse. I guess we really shouldn't complain.
Re: (Score:3)
>>>privilege
Not according to the Supreme Court which has, in more cases than I can list here, asserted time and time again that freedom to travel is ONLY restricted when crossing an international border (and then you can be subject to a warrantless search).
People have always had a Right to travel, whether it is by foot, wheeled vehicle, horse, ship, or plane. Just as you have a right granted by nature to open your mouth and speak. It is YOUR body and you may use that body however you desire (exce
Re: (Score:3)
Learn to read -- this is not by Ron Paul.
Re:Can't tell if trolling or stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
Nearly everybody thinks that at least some kind of security measures are necessary for airplanes.
Yes, and we had some kind of security measures for decades before 9/11. Let's go back to that. The only security measures we need to take to address the problems that lead to 9/11 are 1) locking the cockpit door, and 2) tell passengers to fight back against hijackers. That's it.
The TSA has already killed more people than Al Qaeda has, by encouraging them to drive instead of fly. Why shouldn't they be treated as anything other than terrorists?
Some Kudos Deserved (Score:5, Insightful)
The Paul family has made the American public ponder deeper about certain topics than they normally would. I have to give them some kudos.
Ron's comment about foreign policy versus the golden rule during the GOP debates was a key moment in political history. It put the Neocons' philosophy up to the public X-ray machine.
I applaud them for making America think; something that is hard to do.
Re:Some Kudos Deserved (Score:5, Interesting)
Ron Paul has filled the same role in politics as RMS has for free software: sure, he's a creepy impractical nutbag, but we need someone in the game articulating the philosophically pure position. I wouldn't want to live in a world where either of those guys was in charge, but we should be moving closer to both than where we happen to be right now.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Insightful)
In your case you want Liberty in certain instances. Where you think liberty should be doled out and that liberty doesn't offend your sensibilities. Rand Paul stands for liberty for all. Even if that liberty hurts. So you'll agree with Rand when the rights gained are your own, but when someone else gains liberty at the your financial, social, or ideological expense, you call him a fool. True Liberty is painful and ugly. But it is the only way. If you let the government impinge on the rights of others, no matter how despicable their beliefs are to you... eventually the government will use that power to restrict your own rights. The truth has been born out in history in nearly every society that's ever existed. Now it's happening here.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:4, Insightful)
How about we be fair to the other side and say that they'd like government restrictions to be effective, and that their position is equally self consistent. Unlimited liberty = anarchy. Not even the Paul's seem to be in favor of that. They want government restriction just like the rest of us, just less than the rest of us. It's all about defining just where the government needs to intervene to protect us from each other. Almost everyone, as one example, and one I assume the Rands would support, favor the government having laws and police to prevent murder.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Agreed. I lost a lot of respect for him when he opined that Universal health care is equivalent to slavery [latimes.com] last year, but I'll be the first to cheer him on in this regard if he can do something about the ridiculous waste that is the TSA.
I actually proctored the TSA tests off and on from '06-'08. Besides the fact that the questions themselves were a joke (I remember one in particular being "Have you ever lived in a house you thought was haunted?"), the majority of the people sitting for them looked like th
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it is time to explicitly accept this fact, develop a universal health care program with decent basic preventative and interventional care and cost controls, and allow the private insurance market to provide coverage for the cadillac care that wealthy people want and can afford.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Insightful)
The part of the analysis that is incorrect is the part where it assumes that the government will force people to provide the service rather than raising the amount that it will pay. Sure, the government does create such mandates for corporations (more precisely, that they must provide X service for Y cost or else they won't be able to provide any service for the government at all), but A. corporations are not people, and B. they always have the right to refuse to provide the service, so long as they are willing to give up all of their other government-paid-for patients.
That second point is the most important one. Rights are, by definition, balanced against other rights. As Oliver Wendell Holmes put it, "The right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins." I have the right to free speech. That does not mean that you do not have the right to walk away and not listen to it. And so on. No right exists in a vacuum. The problem with the libertarian philosophy in general is that it tries to treat rights as though they did, which is a fundamentally flawed understanding of rights. Any argument starting from such a flawed premise is prima facie flawed.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Informative)
Well then get the shears because I'm in the herd ... for this.
I'm not sure how I can support this thing while giving him the absolute minimum power in the future, it's certainly not worth getting him re-elected unless it's practically certain he can pull it off, and probable it won't happen without him, but man he's right about this one, and any help I can give to this specific endeavor, I will. His views on abortion, civil rights, and other libertarian nuttiness are unconscionable, but if there's a way to work with an enemy toward a common goal without getting too fucked over by the cooperation ... well, the TSA is enough of a threat that it's worth working with an enemy to get rid of it. I'd say the same about the wiretap insanity and data sharing with other countries. I imagine Paul sees people like me the same way--an enemy, but with a common goal. Maybe we can use each other.
If he handles it well, pulls it off, and doesn't turn it into a power-grab, I'd probably be ... less ... skeptical of him in the future. I think there's about a 2% chance he does any one of those things, let alone all three, but I wholeheartedly agree with simply scrapping the TSA and I'm willing to hear him out on this.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait, no it doesn't...
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Informative)
No, he only has an issue with it because he finally got accosted like the rest of us.
Senator Paul has been complaining and fighting against TSA abuses for years along with his father. He did not just started having an issue with them.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Insightful)
But the root of the Pauls' objection to the TSA isn't because of nude scans or genital gropes, but because they think the Federal Government should be shrunken to levels that would likely have shocked late 19th century Americans. Yes, I'm sure they're appalled by the nonsense that goes on, but even if the TSA was an effective and reasonable security agency, the Pauls would still want it gone.
Er, what makes you think that the levels they'd like to shrink the Leviathan down to would shock 19th century Americans? I suspect they'd be far far more shocked by the run away fed.gov than they would by any attempt to shrink it.
"You mean there are entire federal agencies devoted to nothing but saying what you can and cannot eat/drink/smoke?!"
"What the hell do you mean you can't build a house on land you own because some bureaucrat in Washington has declared it a wetland?!"
"The Federal government largely dictate what is taught in schools?! Where is that in the Constitution?!"
I suspect the average 19th Century American would be shaking their head at us wondering how we let the boot get so heavy and just where all these powers fed.gov has came from.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:4, Insightful)
If we can get rid of the most egregious violations, then maybe this country will be worth living in again. If you are so very attracted to your own pet agency, then you can oppose him when he proposes their dismantlement.
Not that you will have a choice, as the debt is on a course for total government collapse and replacement with God knows what horrible dystopian system.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Interesting)
Not that you will have a choice, as the debt is on a course for total government collapse and replacement with God knows what horrible dystopian system.
I disagree. Things will be better after a total collapse. We won't get a "horrible dystopian system", but the country will simply break apart, as happens with all empires when they grow too large and unworkable. No, things won't be great everywhere afterwords; some regions might indeed become "horrible dystopian" places to live, but other regions will prosper by not being weighed down by all the other screwed-up states and the resultant infighting. The People will have a lot more control over their government, since they won't be fighting against 300+ million other people in the polls, but instead will be voting along with a much smaller population of more like-minded people.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:4, Interesting)
The second best case is to follow Yuan China, where a civil war erupted, but only a few tens of millions died (far fewer than during the establishment of the Yuan Dynasty), and a new Dynasty was established years later. The Ming Dynasty started off with total enslavement of the countryside, forming self-sufficient farming communities with zero social mobility allowed. This somehow lead to an agricultural boom. The literature is not clear as to how this actually happened. Peasant farmers do not as a rule produce large surpluses. But this was a boon to city dwellers, who experienced a golden age that lasted for many hundreds of years thereafter. I would posit that international trade had a lot to do with that, along with the adoption of a silver standard (vs the old copper cash system and the repeatedly hyperinflating fiat regimes of the last two dynasties).
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, because all of those times that aircraft took off between 1931 and 2001 that resulted in them being blown up by terrorist actions.
Re:Even a broken clock (Score:5, Insightful)
So lets have two lines at the airport: one going to planes where nobody has to pass through security. And one going to planes where there is security screening? I can tell you which line I am going into. Pat me down and ask me to stand on my head. Its not bothering me in the least to feel a little delayed if it keeps an explosive off my plane. I hope all you people complaining wind up in the plane with no security and six bombers on the same plane with you.
I doubt anyone wants 'no' security. More like bring back the old security (metal detectors, dog sniffing, etc).
Even if it was 'no' security, I'd still pick that line. If the plane goes down, at least I can say I died without getting felt up by a bunch of thugs.
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, the main reason to go to the trouble of getting a device on a plane is so that you can repurpose the plane into a big missile filled with flammable material, and do a LOT more damage and kill a lot more people than you could with a bomb in a security line. However, the days of that happening are over now, and indeed were over on 9/11 as soon as the passengers on the fourth plane learned what happened on the other three, and now that planes have locked cabin doors, and passengers willing to fight to the death (as has been demonstrated several times, not only on 9/11 but in a couple other incidents when passengers beat the snot out of people with bombs, which of course made it right through the oh-so-effective TSA screening), it's all moot.
However, I think terrorists could do a lot more damage copying the terrorists in Mumbai than bombing security lines. Imagine if terrorists came to shopping malls during the Christmas shopping season with AK47s; this scenario has been discussed many times before. The fact is, there's only so much security precautions will do for you; for all these other things, you just have to take the risk. Besides, it's much riskier driving your car to the mall, than the tiny risk of being shot by terrorists when you're there. Auto accidents kill 50,000 Americans every year (and 250,000 people worldwide). That's far more than have ever been killed by terrorists, but we do absolutely nothing about that.
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:4, Insightful)
Imagine if terrorists came to shopping malls during the Christmas shopping season with AK47s;
This would be less likely to happen in state such as Texas or Arizona where there are very liberal (ie right wing in this case) conceal carry laws. If one in twenty people are carrying a gun, your AK-47 rampage is ending very quickly.
Groping Rand Paul (Score:4, Insightful)
Have you ever seen an assault rifle in action? They are built to put a lot of people in the ground, and fast. They have been refined to do this well for the past 60 years. If I had a 9mm Tupperware gun, and some guy opened up with an assault rifle, I would not be trying to take him out. I would be grabbing cover and running.
The fact that Tx and Az have liberal gun laws isn't a solution to the problem, it feeds it by making it easier for dangerous people to get guns.
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, the main reason to go to the trouble of getting a device on a plane is so that you can repurpose the plane into a big missile filled with flammable material, and do a LOT more damage and kill a lot more people than you could with a bomb in a security line.
You're living in a dream world. The objective of terrorism isn't material damage, it's psychological/economic damage.
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course we do a lot about car safety. Are you kidding me? Traffic laws, speed limits, mandatory seatbelts laws, airbags, crumple zones, government mandated safety ratings, harsh DWI penalties, etc. But there's only so much you can reasonably do to protect people while still leaving that mode of transportation viable and cost-effective.
Please tell me what we've done to improve driver training in this country.
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:4, Insightful)
Any place there is a security screening line is an effective site to set off a bomb.
Yet it doesn't really happen. Not even in Israel, let alone the U.S.
There is NO threat from criminals that want to commit mass murder by hijacking planes.
There is A GENUINE THREAT from heart disease, cancer (including that caused by ionising radiation), diabetes, driving a car.
Hell, in america, more people died from hernias in the last 15 years than from plane hijackings.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Toddler Groping is Better than Rand Paul (Score:5, Interesting)
Rand Paul has proposed legislation to ban abortions and end birthright citizenship. http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/blogs/the-gaggle/2011/01/28/rand-paul-wants-to-ban-abortions-and-end-birthright-citizenship.html [thedailybeast.com]
I'm fine with a senator having either of those positions. I don't really aggree with either one, but they both come from a rational place (just IMO wrong ones). We're in serious need of immigration reform, we need to as a country reach some sort of compromise on when "personhood" begins. I'm cool with politicians starting off with the ideologically pure positions on issues like these - that's where each side should start, so that we compromise to something practical.