Posted on 10/29/2011 1:30:50 PM PDT by Libloather
Mission Creep: This Tennessee Highway Is Now Patrolled by TSA
By Conor Friedersdorf
Oct 24 2011, 9:25 AM ET
Most air travelers now endure naked scans or genital pat-downs by gloved agents of the government without surprise or complaint. But before invasive security became normal, there was a backlash. And at its height, Transportation Security Administration boss John Pistole said something revealing. "I see flying as a privilege that is a public safety issue. So the government has a role in providing for the public safety and we need to do everything we can in partnership with the traveling public, to inform them about what their options are," he told reporters. "I clearly believe that passengers have a number of options as they go through screening. But the bottom line is, if someone decides they don't want to have screening, they don't have the right to get on the plane." What perturbed me wasn't his defense of mandatory security screening. It was his assertion that air travel is a special "privilege" the feds grant citizens.
I felt the same uneasy twinge when Janet Napolitano, who heads the Department of Homeland Security, told USA Today that "if people want to travel by other means, they have that right." Because where does that attitude end? Is it a "privilege" to attend the Super Bowl, where TSA agents scan the crowd for suspicious behavior? Or to ride on a Metro system, an Amtrak train, or a boat -- other forms of transportation that Napolitano has mused about targeting? As Mark Browning wrote in 2010, using hyperbole and reduction ad absurdum to mock Napolitano, "The bus system could come next. Come to think of it, so could travel by automobile...
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Why in Tennessee rather than something closer to the Mexican border where you’re more likely to see serious terrorists on the road? It almost looks like a game to attempt to show those “hillbillies” that DC is boss.
Actually, flying over my property without my permission is something the federal government gave you in law. This USSC decision pretty much covers the waterfront and provides you with every cite you might need. Read it: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=328&invol=256
This is probably hard to believe but I-75 is a very heavily traveled route from Mexico. I live between Knoxville and Chattanooga and travel it daily. We have four or five K9 drug enforcement SUV’s along a 20 mile stretch that stop people non-stop all day, dump their belongings on the side of the road and completely strip search their vehicles and belongings. They find millions in drugs but do they bother illegals? Nope! They want the money that can be made from confiscating dope but don’t care how many illegals pass. It’s all about the money.
Lots of PD’s these days have “divisions” that are funded solely by drug/asset seizure. What could possibly go wrong there?
Pretty soon we’ll need internal passports and visas to visit any state. All interstates will have passport control stations like tollbooths - you’ll have to show your passport and visa to continue your trip. Unless .....
Nothing. The County involved gets rich. They lock up the drug runner for a day or two and then turn him loose to go get more dope so they can catch him another day. Sort of like catch and release. It’s such a lucrative business for law enforcement and counties that two counties here actually fought over turf. LOL
Yessir, arguably the “real id” act is a de facto internal passport, everything that was wrong about CommBloc Eastern Europe has been dismantled and reassembled in “the freest country in the world”/
YMMV folks, but one event precipitated all this and one group of people are the root cause of it.
Well, at least from the terrorism aspect of it. I am sure all of you remember the time when you could walk all the way down to the terminal to see your party on to the plane and no one patted you down. Now we have the TSA groping everyone but who they should because of political correctness. As long as islamic radicals wish to kill us, we will never be free from “necessary” government intrusion.
As far as the WOD, that needs end now. We should have never compromised the 4th Amendment in order to keep people from putting chemicals in their body. The price has been too high.
I can’t believe that that grabbing stuff and holding it is Constitutional (See Gibson? Guitar’s situation - twice now).
I’m sure there are. Actually, I hate what they do. I was really being sarcastic. That stretch of I-75 is more like a police state. I’m white and have local tags so I’m never bothered. If you have brown skin and out of state tags you will eventually get stopped.
I love the idea of stopping drug runners but it has become less about stopping drugs than it is about making money even if innocents get caught in the net.
I’m just wondering when the dept. of interior comes out with the order that everyone has to get an internal passport before they can travel; and what will happen when that happens. Then too, the states requiring a visa before you can enter. Every road in will have a tollbooth type entry point where you’ll have to show your travel documents. This is a scary scenario.
They are not looking for terrorists. They are looking to exert power over the populace. To turn us into a herd of willing sheep. Think not? Look what's happened at the airport.
TSA is power crazed.
That's not reductio enough, Euclid. Existing is a privilege they grant you. Just ask anybody who ever escaped from his mother's womb with life and limb intact.
“John Pistole said something revealing. “I see flying as a privilege...”
This is where you need a constitutional sheriff. He sends his deputies into the airport to observe. When he sees TSA sexually groping children and women, you arrest them for sexual molestation, 1st degree.
Put the perverts on trial, find them guilty and sentence them to 10 to 20 years in state prison. Then you track down the leaders of these perverts and announce a price on their heads. For example, a $100,000 reward for the arrest and conviction of John Pistole, a pervert who’s a ringleader of a group of pedophiles.
Let’s play hardball against the criminal fascist syndicate occupying Washington.
We, patriots, control 26 states. It’s time to use the rule of law against the Washington traitors.
The law of states is as relevant and pertinent as federal law.
We are at war, and it’s time for our side to use law against the fascists who are perverting the law.
To truck drivers: “If you see something suspicious...”
Hey, government, how about those hundreds of turban heads with their sandals and prayers rugs that YOU HAVE PAID the training for to get their CDL’a - and who are now legally driving big rig all across the country - and who keep in constant touch with 'friends' in a couple cities known to have 'cells."?
There's more, but you don't REALLY want to know - and I'll wager you will never stop ONE OF THEM...but the white boys - you betcha. Harass them and make them late for their drops. (Of course, they may also give equal harassment to the black truckers too, once they find out most of them are now far from enamored with "The Won.")
the gov't has paid for the schooling of hundreds of muslims to get their big rig license. We have hundreds of them on our roads now - wearing turbans and sandals (not legal) and whip out their prayer rugs while fueling up.
They drive straight over places like the Hoover Damn, can drive right up to power plants, nuclear plants, reservoirs -
I'm a bit m ore worried about them.
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