Re: Former TSA Administrator: Body Scanners Are A Violation Of 4th Amendment

by **TexasBlue** Mon Nov 22, 2010 10:41 am

Young Boy strip searched by TSA

From the filmer of the vid on his YouTube account:

Lets get the facts straight first. Before the video started the boy went through a metal detector and didn't set it off but was selected for a pat down. The boy was shy so the TSA couldn't complete the full pat on the young boy. The father tried several times to just hold the boys arms out for the TSA agent but i guess it didn't end up being enough for the guy. I was about 30 ft away so i couldn't hear their conversation if there was any. The enraged father pulled his son shirt off and gave it to the TSA agent to search, thats when this video begins.

******* THIS VIDEO OCCURRED AT SALT LAKE CITY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT ON NOVEMBER 19TH AT AROUND THE TIME OF 12:00 PM **********

***Insertion of what happened after the video (full story)****

After I finished videotaping the incident I went through the check point myself. I collected my things and went over to talk to the father and son. Before I could get to them a man in a black suit who had been talking with the other TSA officials approached me. He asked to speak to me and I obliged, wondering what was to come. He then proceeded to interrogate me about why I was videotaping the "procedures of the TSA". I told him that I had never seen such practices before on a young child and decided to record it. The man being frustrated at this point demanded to know my plans with the video, of which I didn't respond. Repeatedly he asked me to delete the video, hoping his mere presence could intimidate me to obey, but I refused. By this point it became obvious that he felt TSA had done something wrong and that I caught it on tape. After the interview, I left for my gate. I called my brother who told me I should put the tape on YouTube because this had been a recent hot topic in the news.

My gate was a long way off, but about 15 minutes after arriving 2 TSA agents came and sat 15 feet or so away from me. I stood up and moved so that they were in front of me and then took a picture. A 3rd and then a 4th agent came and sat down with the others. They would occasionally glance at me and talk on their walkie-talkies. I don't know why they were there or if it was a huge coincidence but they stayed for 30-45 minutes and left just before I boarded the plan. Interesting to say the least, intimidating? Maybe a little...

by The_Amber_Spyglass Mon Nov 22, 2010 11:55 am

TexasBlue wrote:I'm sick and tired of the politically correct baloney. Either start looking for people who are going to commit these crimes or stop with the stupid security measures all together.

You keep missing my point Tex. A determined Muslim terrorist is going to make every effort to disguise the fact that he is a Muslim.

by BubbleBliss Mon Nov 22, 2010 1:02 pm

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:
TexasBlue wrote:I'm sick and tired of the politically correct baloney. Either start looking for people who are going to commit these crimes or stop with the stupid security measures all together.
You keep missing my point Tex. A determined Muslim terrorist is going to make every effort to disguise the fact that he is a Muslim.

Exactly my point too. And you keep ignoring that not all Muslims are Arabs. In fact, most Muslims are NOT Arabs. And in those pictures, you can't tell right away that the guy is Arab. He could just as well be Italian, Spanish, Greek, etc. which was my original point..which you ignored.

by **TexasBlue** Mon Nov 22, 2010 1:25 pm

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:
TexasBlue wrote:I'm sick and tired of the politically correct baloney. Either start looking for people who are going to commit these crimes or stop with the stupid security measures all together.
You keep missing my point Tex. A determined Muslim terrorist is going to make every effort to disguise the fact that he is a Muslim.

I understand this. I'm no FBI agent or a cop but I'm sure people like that are able to figure out who is who. These TSA people are no different than I am. The point is that while we play the TSA game here, the terrorists are going to find another way to do their deed.

by **TexasBlue** Mon Nov 22, 2010 7:34 pm

ScannerGate?

Helen Whalen Cohen
Nov. 22, 2010

We've been tracking the latest TSA developments, so here's a few more. Samuel Wolanyk decided to opt out of both the porno scanner and the pat down, and instead stripped down to his underwear. He explained:

"I refuse to have images of my naked body viewed by perfect strangers, and having been felt up for the first time by TSA the week prior (I travel frequently) I was not willing to be molested again."

He never actually refused the pat down, but was arrested for refusing to comply with the security process.

Sadly, getting down to one's skivvies in the middle of an airport may now be the best way to protect personal integrity. A Skywest captain learned this the hard way when a clerk alerted everyone that a 'cutie' (his 18 year old daughter) was coming through. Can we call this ScannerGate yet?

by **TexasBlue** Mon Nov 22, 2010 7:37 pm

Why the TSA Outcry Is Healthy for America

Matt Lewis
Politics Daily
Nov. 22, 2010

The big story of the past week has involved citizen outrage over the Transportation Security Administration's invasive body scanners, pat-downs, and heavy-handed tactics.

To be sure, this is a tricky subject. We Americans, of course, do not surrender our constitutional rights simply because we enter an airport (though you wouldn't know that if you were to visit one), but simultaneously, the government is charged with keeping us safe, especially as terrorists develop more and more devious ways to commit murder.

Ultimately, some compromise will be reached. But in the meantime, the fact that this story has become so huge is reassuring to those of us who care about preserving liberty.

Frankly, I had assumed Americans were resigned to the fact that the Fourth Amendment's prohibition on intrusive searches had become just as irrelevant to the federal government as the 10th Amendment (on states' rights) -- at least, as it applied to airports. Happily, I was mistaken.

This skepticism of governmental authority is healthy. What is more, it is patently American. I may be wrong, but I'm unaware of others around the world sparking similar uprisings over airport security. Americans are, in fact, exceptional. We're seeing it more and more these days.

As American Enterprise Institute President Arthur Brooks has noted, in Greece, citizens protested to "demand that others pay for the early retirements, lifetime benefits and state pensions to which they feel entitled." But here in America, he said, "the tea partiers demonstrate not to get more from others, but rather are against government growth, public debt, bailouts and a budget-busting government overhaul of the health-care industry."

The TSA passenger rebellion is merely the latest example of American exceptionalism and is perfectly in keeping with the nation's ethos. As Ben Franklin declared, those "who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

I wonder how many people will be wearing "Don't Tread on Me" T-shirts as they pass through security scanners on their way to Grandma's house this week.

by dblboggie Mon Nov 22, 2010 8:12 pm

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:
TexasBlue wrote:I'm sick and tired of the politically correct baloney. Either start looking for people who are going to commit these crimes or stop with the stupid security measures all together.
You keep missing my point Tex. A determined Muslim terrorist is going to make every effort to disguise the fact that he is a Muslim.

Of course they are, but a competent screening process like they have in Israel is not going to be so easily fooled, and you can be sure they are not going to be pulling random people out of line who in no way fit the profile of a terrorist (a profile that is not confined to race, ethnicity, age or gender). The Israelis will wave an Arab past the screening process because they know what they are looking for. People intent on doing something like bombing an airplane will always have a tell of some sort that a well trained and competent screener is going to catch. All I am saying is that random screening will also not catch a determined Muslim making effort to disguise the fact that he or she is Muslim. Screening 3-year-old girls, 7-year-old boys, and the like is not going to make us safer. This is just political theater writ large, making none safer and all less free. We need to put a serious process in place before our luck runs out and the incompetence of the TSA gets several hundred citizens killed.

by The_Amber_Spyglass Tue Nov 23, 2010 11:45 am

Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

by dblboggie Tue Nov 23, 2010 4:41 pm

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

No security procedure is going to be 100% effective, no matter how good it is. Even if we did full body scans of 100% of all passengers, there would still be a chance of someone getting through due to human error.

BUT, I still say the Israeli method is the best, most effective and least intrusive on personal liberty of all the models out there. And I can certainly say that what we are doing is NOT effective because what we are doing applies NO consideration to anything beyond RANDOMLY looking for THINGS and not PEOPLE (aka terrorists).

Random screenings are complete crap and are, as I said before, pure political theater and nothing more.

by **TexasBlue** Tue Nov 23, 2010 5:51 pm

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

Yeah, As I've pointed out before, we need to do actual profiling here. That will never happen though. The PC police in this country would file lawsuit after lawsuit, negating the whole thing.

What it will take is an attack via an airport terror attack and finding out that if we would've used the profiling method, it probably could've been avoided. This country, as it is, is sick and tried of political correctness. But the laws as they currently are won't allow a stoppage of that crap.

One day though, Americans will demand it.... and that will occur after a terror attack.

by **TexasBlue** Tue Nov 23, 2010 7:57 pm

TSA Pat-Down of a 3 Year Old

by BubbleBliss Thu Nov 25, 2010 10:49 am

TexasBlue wrote:
The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

Yeah, As I've pointed out before, we need to do actual profiling here. That will never happen though. The PC police in this country would file lawsuit after lawsuit, negating the whole thing.

What it will take is an attack via an airport terror attack and finding out that if we would've used the profiling method, it probably could've been avoided. This country, as it is, is sick and tried of political correctness. But the laws as they currently are won't allow a stoppage of that crap.

One day though, Americans will demand it.... and that will occur after a terror attack.

Matt and I have tried to make the point that profiling will not actually be effective unless a terrorist actually looks like one. Why hasn't anybody addressed that point?
Screening little kids is extreme, but when it comes to adults, you'd never know who has something harmful/dangerous on them.

by **TexasBlue** Thu Nov 25, 2010 7:57 pm

You profile based on who you think may be what you think he may be. Not based on whether he's Irish. If I seem to be a person of interest, then do an extra scan/pat down..... based on that you think I'm suspicious. Not because I'm the 33rd person to go thru the line.

by dblboggie Thu Nov 25, 2010 9:21 pm

BubbleBliss wrote:
TexasBlue wrote:
The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

Yeah, As I've pointed out before, we need to do actual profiling here. That will never happen though. The PC police in this country would file lawsuit after lawsuit, negating the whole thing.

What it will take is an attack via an airport terror attack and finding out that if we would've used the profiling method, it probably could've been avoided. This country, as it is, is sick and tried of political correctness. But the laws as they currently are won't allow a stoppage of that crap.

One day though, Americans will demand it.... and that will occur after a terror attack.

Matt and I have tried to make the point that profiling will not actually be effective unless a terrorist actually looks like one. Why hasn't anybody addressed that point?
Screening little kids is extreme, but when it comes to adults, [u]you'd never know who has something harmful/dangerous on them.[/i]

And what Tex and I have tried to point out is that you will NEVER know who has something harmful/dangerous by screening every 10th or 20th or 30th passenger who passes through security by RANDOM, without regard to some sort of profile of the kinds of persons who have perpetrated these terrorist acts, their mannerisms, responses to certain questions, their body language, and any number of other characteristics that could indicate a person of interest.

by dblboggie Fri Nov 26, 2010 6:58 pm

May we take your silence on this today to mean that you have conceded the point that random screenings do nothing to ensure security Bubbles?

by BubbleBliss Sun Nov 28, 2010 10:07 am

dblboggie wrote:
BubbleBliss wrote:
TexasBlue wrote:
The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

Yeah, As I've pointed out before, we need to do actual profiling here. That will never happen though. The PC police in this country would file lawsuit after lawsuit, negating the whole thing.

What it will take is an attack via an airport terror attack and finding out that if we would've used the profiling method, it probably could've been avoided. This country, as it is, is sick and tried of political correctness. But the laws as they currently are won't allow a stoppage of that crap.

One day though, Americans will demand it.... and that will occur after a terror attack.

Matt and I have tried to make the point that profiling will not actually be effective unless a terrorist actually looks like one. Why hasn't anybody addressed that point?
Screening little kids is extreme, but when it comes to adults, [u]you'd never know who has something harmful/dangerous on them.[/i]

And what Tex and I have tried to point out is that you will NEVER know who has something harmful/dangerous by screening every 10th or 20th or 30th passenger who passes through security by RANDOM, without regard to some sort of profile of the kinds of persons who have perpetrated these terrorist acts, their mannerisms, responses to certain questions, their body language, and any number of other characteristics that could indicate a person of interest.

I think it goes without saying that not only the 10th or 30th person are checked up, but also people who seem suspicious. That's how it has always been. The reason why they're doing these check ups now is to avoid getting a lawsuit for racial profiling. If a terrorist really does try to board a plane with a disguise or something, then he's more likely to be picked up by random check ups than just profiling.

by dblboggie Sun Nov 28, 2010 5:48 pm

BubbleBliss wrote:
dblboggie wrote:
BubbleBliss wrote:
TexasBlue wrote:
The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:Tex and dbl...

So if you have a mixed British (white) and Jamaican (black) Muslim convert who was born in London, who does not have an arab name, who dresses in western clothes, has a British passport and has definitely travelled within the EU but nothing in his passport suggested he travelled to any conflict zones. He has a criminal record of petty crime and nothing immediately apparent to suggest that he is an Islamic extremist. How would you go about picking such a person out through the profiling methods you suggest?

Think about that for a moment and then uncover the "spoiler".

Spoiler:

Yeah, As I've pointed out before, we need to do actual profiling here. That will never happen though. The PC police in this country would file lawsuit after lawsuit, negating the whole thing.

What it will take is an attack via an airport terror attack and finding out that if we would've used the profiling method, it probably could've been avoided. This country, as it is, is sick and tried of political correctness. But the laws as they currently are won't allow a stoppage of that crap.

One day though, Americans will demand it.... and that will occur after a terror attack.

Matt and I have tried to make the point that profiling will not actually be effective unless a terrorist actually looks like one. Why hasn't anybody addressed that point?
Screening little kids is extreme, but when it comes to adults, [u]you'd never know who has something harmful/dangerous on them.[/i]

And what Tex and I have tried to point out is that you will NEVER know who has something harmful/dangerous by screening every 10th or 20th or 30th passenger who passes through security by RANDOM, without regard to some sort of profile of the kinds of persons who have perpetrated these terrorist acts, their mannerisms, responses to certain questions, their body language, and any number of other characteristics that could indicate a person of interest.

I think it goes without saying that not only the 10th or 30th person are checked up, but also people who seem suspicious. That's how it has always been. The reason why they're doing these check ups now is to avoid getting a lawsuit for racial profiling. If a terrorist really does try to board a plane with a disguise or something, then he's more likely to be picked up by random check ups than just profiling.

Oh really? You think they are pulling people who seem "suspicious" do you? Do you have any evidence of this actually occurring? I see NO evidence of this taking place whatsoever! And just HOW on earth do you suppose that a completely RANDOM selection of persons for additional screening is "more likely" to pick up a person in "a disguise or something" when we KNOW this is not the case. Not a SINGLE terrorist has been found by the random screenings being done at our airports. That's because they don't focus on PEOPLE, they focus on THINGS. Things don't bring planes down by themselves, PEOPLE with things do.

Just as the FBI creates a profile of the most likely suspects in ongoing criminal investigations, so too should we be creating a profile on the persons most likely to commit a terrorist act on airplanes, and THAT should be what our TSA agents are focusing on. Not 3-year-old children flying with their parents to Omaha.

by BubbleBliss Wed Jan 05, 2011 10:05 am

There also haven't been any terrorist attacks, maybe that's why "not a single terrorist has been found" by screeing a random amount of people. And airport security have always pulled out people who seem suspicious. If somebody seems extremely nervous, anxious or other such things that a normal passenger would not be, they pull him out and check him. That's always been the case.

by kronos Wed Jan 05, 2011 1:13 pm

Practically speaking, how is profiling going to work?

Keep in mind, the people who do the scans and make the selections as to who to target don't look at passports before doing so, so if they're going to profile, they're going to have to base it purely off appearance.

And what does a Muslim look like? Just about anyone. There is a tendency to not be of northern European ancestry, but beyond that...at a glance, just about anyone could be a Muslim. The guy who tried to blow up Christmas in Portland looked...black, (albeit with loose curls. He looks a lot like a Venezuelan I used to work with (also a [censored])).

Conversely, anyone who actually is a Muslim could easily pass for something else. The Ft. Hood shooter has already been mentioned. He isn't even a particularly "white-looking" Arab, but he could still easily pass for Italian (he looks like Justice Scalia, IMO).

What I am saying is, the airport security scan people do not have the ability to accurately pick out Muslims from non-Muslims. They'll miss a lot of Muslims, and they'll falsely identify many non-Muslims as Muslims. (This is not to say that they'll never get lucky and correctly ID a Muslim, especially if said Muslim is not making an effort to appear otherwise).

The upshot is that the screening process will be very subjective, based on the screener's idiosyncratic views of who looks kinda Muslim-ish, which will in practice equate to random non-white people.

by BubbleBliss Wed Jan 05, 2011 3:39 pm

That's exactly what I've been saying.
Then there's the fact that most Muslims are NOT in fact Arab.

by dblboggie Wed Jan 05, 2011 9:40 pm

kronos wrote:Practically speaking, how is profiling going to work?

Keep in mind, the people who do the scans and make the selections as to who to target don't look at passports before doing so, so if they're going to profile, they're going to have to base it purely off appearance.

And what does a Muslim look like? Just about anyone. There is a tendency to not be of northern European ancestry, but beyond that...at a glance, just about anyone could be a Muslim. The guy who tried to blow up Christmas in Portland looked...black, (albeit with loose curls. He looks a lot like a Venezuelan I used to work with (also a [censored])).

Conversely, anyone who actually is a Muslim could easily pass for something else. The Ft. Hood shooter has already been mentioned. He isn't even a particularly "white-looking" Arab, but he could still easily pass for Italian (he looks like Justice Scalia, IMO).

What I am saying is, the airport security scan people do not have the ability to accurately pick out Muslims from non-Muslims. They'll miss a lot of Muslims, and they'll falsely identify many non-Muslims as Muslims. (This is not to say that they'll never get lucky and correctly ID a Muslim, especially if said Muslim is not making an effort to appear otherwise).

The upshot is that the screening process will be very subjective, based on the screener's idiosyncratic views of who looks kinda Muslim-ish, which will in practice equate to random non-white people.

You are right on that Muslim/non-Muslim observation, but training could handle that. But that underlined sentence above is the real burning question. We know that the Israelis have gotten this down pretty well, but I learned yesterday that this comes at a very high cost/passenger - something like $56/passenger. Whereas our costs are something in the single digits. And of course, we have thousands of more airports and millions of more passengers than Israel - making the Israeli model insanely expensive to implement in America and thus impractical.

But we have to do something saner than what we are doing right now. Just randomly screening every 10 or what ever passengers is not what I'd call adequate to the threat at hand. And pulling little boys and girls on domestic flights out of line to pat them down just highlights the insanity of our current screening system.

I don't know what the solution is, but there has to be one better than this.

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