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Senator Blacklisted by No-Fly List
sig writes "Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) was turned down for a flight from Washington, D. C. to Boston because his name turned up on the TSA No-Fly list. He eventually got on a flight, but was again denied on his way back to D.C. It took 3 weeks of calls to Tom Ridge and the Department of Homeland Security for the ordeal to get straightened out. But what are ordinary citizens supposed to do if the Secretary of Homeland Security won't take their calls?" There's also a New York Times story.
Maybe they need to re-evaluate themselves and their standards...(DUH!!!!).
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
But what are ordinary citizens supposed to do if the Secretary of Homeland Security won't take their calls?
Umm....get a DAMN good start driving?
Join the TWIT army now!
Is it me? Or does it seem that potential threats have and easier time getting into airports and on board planes than ordinary citizens do?
Everybody knows Ted Kennedy is no threat unless you're driving in a car with him.....
Could this have been some backroom shenanigans to harass and intimidate an outspoken member of the opposition party? Lord, no, such a thing would never be done by politicians these days...
It goes to show that once you head down this road, it is abused, or at best, applied incompetently and inflexibly. Show me your papers, citizen!
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
It would be robocool to fill the list up with random names. Like George Bush's father. And the governors of all 50 states.
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
It's possible it wasn't that they thought he's a terrorist. Maybe they weighed him and decided they didn't have enough fuel.
He was supposed to be on the No-Drive List.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Nixon used the IRS to pester his foes. Now we've (er, they've) got the TSA to play with. It's lovely to see the advances that government has made.
Given the record of deaths in the Kennedy family, Tom Ridge was probably protecting Ted from himself.
It appears the good ole' US government is soon going to require us to carry 'airline licenses', just like drivers licenses ... maybe that would keep them from making incompetent mistakes like this!
He got to wait in the terminal ::cough::at the bar::cough::
Wear a Ted Kennedy mask?
Funny how a democratic senator is blacklisted after speaking at the DNC. Coincidence?
Kennedy used this as an opportunity to show how this system is sort of a lousy idea, and an even worse implementation.
So to this, all I can say is that Ted should be modded up at least +3 Insightful
Vonal Declosion
Don't recall the radio program but late in the day the word was that he wasn't on a No-Fly list but rather a Screen list. What the exact difference is between the list was not discussed, but I'd have to imagine that the first prohibits flight while the second is more of a harassment.
A Liberal Democrat Senator gets put on the No-Fly list by mistake _AND_ It takes 3 weeks to get removed?
He's very anti-bush, I wonder if some one with a little power thought this would be funny. I'm sure the bush ppl wouldn't mind inconviencing one of the most recognizable Democratic senators in the country.
of course, if that's true then only Micheal Moore would have a harder time getting OFF the list...or heaven forbid... an actual terrorist
http://monkeyserver.com --- weeeeee
Only glorious Party members need to go places. Citizens should be Happy to be working for the greater glory of the Corporation that so graciously employs them.
Ashcroft: Hey Tommy, can you do me a favor?
Ridge: What can I do for you Ash?
Ashcroft: Ted Kennedy grabbed my parking spot in the parking lot at Justice. Anything you can do so I can get back at him?
Ridge: I've got a GREAT idea!!!
>> Practice Safe Hex
this might not have been a mistake?
'And all the monkeys aren't in the zoo Every day you meet quite a few...'
the other members of Congress, regardless of their party affiliation, will get pissed off that one of their own was put on the No-Fly list and maybe re-evaluate the damn thing.
Or, they'll just give themselves a special "We're Congress, We're Exempt Card"
I was watching that show Airline that follows around SW Airlines employees and they wouldn't let a couple fly becasue they had too much to drink. Could that be the REAL reason Kennedy wasn't allowed to fly?
Those who make the laws aren't always able to see from the perspective of those who must obey the laws ... or at least, the rest of the population. After this incident, perhaps Kennedy will be a little more inclined to push for changes in the TSA, Homeland Security and the Patriot Act.
I don't know what his voting record is on the subject, but it seems like things can only improve after this incident.
I think it is more of an automatic process for the checking of the names. At least I hope it is, or the service is pretty useless.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
The last time Ted Kennedy went to the beach, a group from Greenpeace showed up, tied a rope around his feet, and used a boat to try and haul him back into the water....
What are you suggesting? That he blacklisted himself?
Oh come on, it was just an excuse for him to spend more time at the airport bar.
*sigh*
The system needs to be scrapped.
The appropriate solution is ZERO access to the flight deck from the passanger conpartment.
Fix the plane designs and the issue goes away.
They can still blow one up, but not drive it into something.
No way will GW drop the "no-fly" list. They'll probably just add an exception to the rule:
"If the passenger is overweight, has grey hair, looks like someone kicked his face in, and turns so red in the face when you tell him he might be a terrorist that he looks like he's going to spontaneously combust, let him pass."
How does this make us open to hijackings? The terrorists from 9/11 had valid credentials. They went through a metal detector. The added security does nothing but placate the sheeple. Try flying sometime and you'll see how security is spotty at best. You don't have this kind of trouble in foreign airports that are BIGGER targets for this sort of thing. Think about that.
- gtaluvit (prnc. GOT-tuh-LUV-it)
sounds like they are now going to ban people that support terrorists.
A photo of a face would go a long way, but would definatley increase the overhead of distribution of the list. Anyway, it does seem to be an easy-to-abuse/misuse system as it is.
You run for Congress. Then he'll take your call.
well you can take that several ways....
and conspiratorialists will point to this and say the Kennedy is a marked man in the eyes of our new republican overlords.
take your pick
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
I'd bet the majority of Americans would not recognize Ted Kennedy. And even if the counter employees recognized him, I doubt they would deviate from their normal procedure.
This comes at the same time that Arlen Specter made the news in Pittsburgh for trying to get around air travel safety rules.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
From the article: A senior administration official, who spoke on condition he not be identified, said Kennedy was stopped because the name "T. Kennedy" has been used as an alias by someone on the list of terrorist suspects.
Okay, how about adding J. Ashcroft, G. Bush, T. Ridge, J. Lieberman, J. Kerry, etc to our list of aliases?
'I ain't a liar, baby, and I ain't proud I just want what I'm not allowed.' -- Violent Femmes, 36-24-36
Ooooohhhhhh....
--LordPixie
A couple of years ago, I lost my passport in Jaisalmer, fairly close to the Indian-Pakistani border. According to the (Swedish) police I will be notified if my passport is found and turned in to Swedish authorities. I haven't heard zilch since, so I expect the passport went to the Pakistani passport black market and God knows where it will surface.
Then I will be on those lists!
If it were an ordinary citizen, we would just get the run around.
Everytime I fly I am on the Screen list. It's annoying and intrusive and pisses me off, but I've never had a gate agent actually tell me about it, and it's never made me almost miss a flight.
With the screen list, they put several big S's on your boarding pass, and then you get shunted into the "extra-thorough" screening line going in. You'll recognize it next time you fly: it's extra long, extra slow, and it's where all the people with dark skin or funny clothes go.
What was described in the article is nothing like the screening I've seen. I've never had an airline worker tell me I can't fly, in fact they never mention it. I wouldn't have realized the significance of the S if it didn't happen every time I fly.
This ain't a Republican issue, and I doubt seriously that it was politically motived.
It's more likely some intelligence somewhere picked up a terrorist with a sense of humor using "Ted Kennedy" as an alias...
or we learn to live with some inconvenience
You're kidding right?
This guy is a U.S. Senator. Not just that, but probably one of the most well-known senators (love him or hate him). This goes way beyond a little quirk in the system.
I highly doubt that the next attack is going to be the same as the last one, we need to focus on the unidentified threats, but instead we focus on implementing systems that get us used to losing our rights. Fuck it, the 9/11 terrorists actually accomplished their goal by fundamentally changing the way we think and act!
And when I speak of a system, I mean the end-to-end system, not the computer system.
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
Sounds like Ted was staging a publicity stunt to me.
Yeah, my guess is that he called in a favor, got himself put on the no-fly list. Then, when they were going to let him fly anyway, he probably, insisted that he was doing his civic duty to not let himself fly, since he knew he was on the list.
JWall: GUI client for IPTables
Didn't that Palestinian guy die of old age in US prison because Palestine no longer exists and his old passport wasn't held valid, or something?
My point is that I was marginally inconvenienced, but it was not the end of the world. It cost me maybe 10 minutes of my life. How much of this is that Ted Kennedy doesn't like being treated like the masses?
BTW, my name is as WASP as it gets.
Believe it or not this happened to my college roommate and his girlfriend when they tried to visit me in NYC in June. They got up to go to MSN (Madison WI) airport at 4am and when they got there they were held and interrogated because they were both on the no fly list. Even the TSA people realized it was a mistake (two middle class/white/college educated midwesterners in love with a round trip ticket?) but because it was so early in the morning none of the government offices that could sort this thing out were open. Long story short they finally made it. THANK GOD WE'RE SAFE WHEN MY COLLEGE ROOMMATE CAN GET INTERROGATED AND SEARCHED FOR HOURS AND MUSLIM ARABS CAN STILL GET ON WITHOUT GETTING SEARCHED AND RUN DRY TERRORIST RUNS (http://www.womenswallstreet.com/WWS/article_landi ng.aspx?titleid=1&articleid=711). I hate this country under Bush.
No, no, by all means keep up the good work, anti-Bush politicians should not be allowed to fly anyway! Is'nt that what democracy is all about?
This is not a glitch. Get it? And that is the problem.
Obviously the security people at airports are trained and no doubt encouraged by a litany of inflexible rules and consequences for those that don't follow them to the letter to simply "go by the book." What we wind up with is the mindless application of bureaucratic procedures by security drones. You couldn't convince me that we are all safer because of this.
It's not that politicians should receive special treatment; but it is ridiculous that one of the most recognizable men in American politics gets flagged by the computer and no one can do anything about it because no one dare stick his neck out for fear of being "flagged" for termination from his job.
On second thought though, with all the bullshit the average person has to put up with in every aspect of life that involves dealing with government agencies and their rules -- at least some of which I'm sure Senator Kennedy is responsible for -- I say hooray for inconveniencing the senator! Let's have more of this!
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
Riiiight. So basically anybody called 'T Kennedy' isn't allowed to fly.
According to the 1990 census information, 0.067% of Americans have the surname 'Kennedy' - given a rough poulation of 300million, that makes around 200,000 American Kennedys.
Now, also from the above information, 4.25% of the male population and 3.35% of the female population have names beginning with T.
This means that just from that single name on the no-fly list, roughly 7600 Americans could be excluded from flying.
It's utter, utter madness.
Airline: Sorry sir...we can't let you board this plane.
Senator: It's Kennedy...not K.A.Z.I.N.S.K.Y. How many times do I have to spell this out for you people?
Our Airline security system would be highly endangered if passengers were trusted because they were recognized as a senator. There are people who look almost identical to ted kennedy, I'm sure, who could also get fake licenses. They are following procedure, because if they do make an exception they will probably be fired.
This sig is o Unfunny o Funny
No, that not true. Counter personel will always check ths list and follow the rules, and act based on those rules no matter who is in front of them. If a ticket agent ignored the list and the rules and let someone on the airplane, they would be roasted.
Security personel are always drilled that you follow procedure no matter who is standing in fornt of you. If you don't follow procedure, if you act based on their own initiative, then you take all responsibility for your actions. If you follow the rules, no matter what those rules tell you to do, then the responsibility for what happens falls on those who wrote the rules and made the list. The agent is not responsible.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
> She'll issue the ticket without a second thought,
> unless she were a complete imbecile.
"complete imbecile" describes the majority of the American workforce.
should be how did a senator make the list in the fist place?
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
And it's unlikely that a clerk at an airline counter is going to check some list of banned passengers when a Senator that (s)he recognizes stops at the counter in front of her. She'll issue the ticket without a second thought, unless she were a complete imbecile.
Not if it meant she'd lose her job. I don't know about the airlines, but the security training I've undergone has always stipulated that you always check IDs and you don't let someone through whose name is on a "do-not-pass" list just because you happen to recognize them. That would defeat the whole point of "do-not-pass" list, since then all a terrorist cell would have to do is get someone hired onto the airline staff.
Don't get me wrong, I think the do-not-fly list is a stupid idea and a gross invasion of privacy. But blame the people who came up with it, not the people who'd be out of work if they didn't carry it out.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Since he's from Massachusetts, Senator Kennedy would only cause a disturbance if the chowder had tomatoes in it.
thats assuming that the measures protect us from hijacking. But ted is just grandstanding he actually did fly every time and it was not his name on the list but a simular name. and its not the tech that is the problem her , why would a booking clerk or sercurity person not have enough sense to look at Ted and say ok he is the senior pol from Mass let him pass
men will do for beer
But.... doing that would hinder the airline's god-given-right to maximize their profit. Isn't that unconstitutional? Much better to treat everyone as a criminal... that's what the record companies do and it works wonders for them.
</sarcasm>
As an American, I worry that our government is spending a lot of attention on air safety. The terrorists are quiet, perfecting their plans and one day...one day, they will hit us. All the railways are unsafe, a terrorist can still wait for the big political leaders and explode his car or an IED, just like they do in IRAQ. It does not take a lot of technology to defeat us. This reminds me of Somalia because even with all the technology, one bullet to the neck results in death. Our dead now number > 900 and still counting!...Cb..
Perhaps I shouldn't have helped out on PGP all those years ago.....
See my journal, I write things there
Doh! And here I thought I would get to read a juicy story about some aging senator who likes to get rip-roaring drunk on flights and pinch the stewerdesses' rears. Ends up being yet another story about how American "terrorist" paranoia knows no bounds.
On a somewhat related note, it took my girlfriend and I about 2 hours to cross into the States in late June. we were "pulled" aside - told to turn off our cell phones, remove all valuables from her car (but no camera's or recorders please!) and go into a building while they searched her car. After sitting there about an hour, a person who I assumed was the supervisor came over to us and said "Why are YOU here?" (being the only caucasian couple in "waiting"). We showed him the slip of paper they had given us - he wrinkled his nose, peered at us, went "hmmmmm" and handed the slip to a INS agent and went on his way. We were then very rudely "interviewed" by said agent. Even though my girlfriend drives a very nice 2000 model Grand Am - they wanted to know how much money we had on us - when I told them none, as we intended to use americna funds we would get from bank machines, they demanded to know how much money we had on our credit cards and in our bank accounts! Were they stupid enough to think we would leave the relative freedom of Canada to sneak into the States? Give me a break. I am happy to say that after that, our trip down to St. Louis and back was wonderful.
Oddly enough coming home, we got waved through Canadian Customs in about 30 seconds.
Going on means going far
Going far means returning
Vote.
"I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve."
For that matter, what is he doing flying commercial? Not like he's not more than rich enough to charter a jet!
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
fruit prices will go down?
"Hell, I don't even like him, and *I* would recognize him as a Senator, and treat him with the respect due the office."
Well then you've just done more than what we've seen from the Left about Bush being a TRAITOR and all... I was beginning to wonder if anyone has paused to reflect on the concept of respect - even for someone you don't personally like.
That said, I can't imagine how this sort of thing could happen. No Republican in their right mind would give Teddy this sort of fodder. No way. You conspiracy kooks are just out of control now...
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Some of the comments here just amaze me.
Yes, I'm sure the Bush administration deliberately decided to harras Ted Kennedy in such an obvious, ham-fisted way. that could so easily be twisted into anti-Bush, pro-Kennedy publicity.
Because the benefit balanced against such huge risk would just be so great; I mean God help the Republicans if Ted actually succeeds in flying anywhere. That delay will be crucial.
What are you people, twelve? Oh, wait ...
They didn't let him on the plane because he was a suspected terrorist, but there's no indication that they tried to detain or arrest him either. WTF?
As it is not impossible for a senator to commit a crime, any competent airline clerk would reject him if his name was on the list. A clerk is not responsible for making judgments as to which persons on the list should be allowed through, but for making sure that the names on the list do not get through. I feel much safer knowing that even senators can't bluff their way past airline clerks, but need to call other government officials who in turn need to contact the clerk's supervisor through appropriate channels.
Now that we've established that the clerks are doing their job, I just wish that I felt safe about the department of homeland security doing its job.
"Ted Kennedy. Great senator, but a bad date."
because his Karma on slashdot is a heavy issue on his mind.
Sounds like Ted was staging a publicity stunt to me.
WHAT THE FUCK!!?
Seriously, where the hell do people get ideas like this. Obviouslyhe set himself up as a publicity stunt......oh wait.....HE HAS NO CONTROL OVER THIS LIST. Yep, you're just another one of those fools who for some reason don't want to believe that the current administraion could EVER mess up even when there is overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
Maybe you've had your head in the ground since 9/11 but this country has routinely been harassing and banning people from air travel based on the flimsiest correlation (it's not even real "evidence") with some list of characteristics that MIGHT make them a terrorist.
It's stupid, and un-american and it's only matter of time untill they harassed someone important.
Life is too short to proofread.
The next pasture is always greener
I wouldn't be surprised if they put Kennedy on the Do Not Fly list to keep him from voting on a particular bill.
Well..since he was leaving Washington, flying to Boston, probably not.
First, this is just funny. Anything that inconveniences a Kennedy can't be all bad. Esp. Teddy! Second, I wonder how much this was done on purpose. Something smells here. Let's see, a Kennedy could probably easily get his name on such a list to pull a stunt to jab the Bush Administration. Again, this isn't so much a lax in g'ment as just a funny thing that isn't without some usefulness.
The quote is about the First Amendment. Which I consider important enough to fight for.
The quote probably originated with Voltaire, but is of uncertain provenance, so I put it in quotes, and did not attribute it.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
If there's something strange, in your neighbourhood - who're you gonna call?
Ghostbusters, of course!
Simpy
And how many people wrongly on the list can call Tom Ridge? If it took Senator Kennedy several weeks, how long would it take me or you? Thank you to the government for keeping us "safe" by taking away our Civil Liberties. Bastards.
if ! IsRepublican(name)
{
print "I am sorry, you can not fly!\n"
print "Have a nice day.\n"
}
You shoot the General.
VIPs are not exempt from security rules.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
HILARIOUS!
Hm, sounds like something that they implemented back in the 1930s in Germany. I don't recall how exactly that separation tactic worked. I'm sure no one was hurt by it, only delayed in their travels.
Ted's a nickname...
Washington Post states the actual [bad] entry in the system was "T. Kennedy" that trigger this whole event.
Scenario: When you goto the airport, they look at your drivers license and it says "Richard Bruce Cheney" (or Richard B. Cheney). I'm sure you will not be flagged against "D. Cheney" if it shows up in the database, otherwise all we need is a J. Smith to be entered in the database and viola, system overload... Anyway that's where profiling comes in to place I guess to prevent that ;)
Sounds like human error or poor judgement (or good judgement, depending on political party preference) but obviously blamed on a computer/database.
LOL, yeah, some glitch. Did you know that as an average citizen there is NO MECHANISM to contest your name on the list?
The real question is how did a known terrorist become a senator! I think this clearly prooves that the government cant be trusted because there are terrorists in the government!
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
I didn't get the joke, so I googled a bit:
here
On the evening of July 19, 1969, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts drove his Oldsmobile off a wooden bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, drowning his passenger, a young campaign worker named Mary Jo Kopechne. The senator left the scene of the accident, did not report it to the police for many hours, and according to some accounts considered concocting an alibi for himself in the interim.
At the time, Kennedy managed to escape severe legal and political consequences for his actions thanks to his family's connections (which helped to contain the inquest and grand jury) and to a nationally televised "Checkers"-like speech broadcast a week after the accident. But virtually no journalist who has closely examined the evidence fully believes Kennedy's story, and almost 30 years later, the tragedy still trails the senator, with aggressive press investigations revived in five-year anniversary intervals.
Probably more than any other single factor, Chappaquiddick - a frenzy without end - has ensured that Ted Kennedy would not follow his brother John to the White House.
be on a No-Drive List?
He seems much more dangerous there than flying (unless, of course, it is a small plane where he exceeds the weight limit.)
And I won't even go into the possibility of a No-Vote List for Senators...
--Qtone
Still not French
> I was beginning to wonder if anyone has paused to reflect on the concept of respect - even for someone you
... performance."
> don't personally like.
George Carlin did, and here's what he came up with: "Obedience, respect for authority. Just another name for
controlling people. The truth is that obedience and respect shouldn't be automatic. They should be earned
and based on
While it's true that I don't "personally" like Bush, that's not why I/we disrespect him. It's based on his performance.
25% Funny, 25% Insightful, 25% Informative, 25% Troll
...then you run for Congress. After you win, he'll take your call.
It's bad enough when comment posters don't RTFA, but the submitter?!?!
From the article:
A Kennedy aide said the senator nearly missed a couple of flights because of the delays
This is NOT "turned down for a flight". Sheesh!
It's just you. Seriously, one guy has problems because he ends up on the watch list on a prank or a fuck up and everyone starts whining that America is a police state and how their civil liberties have been taken away.
You really think it's just one guy, or even just a few? You are willfully ignorant then. This kind of shit has been going on since 9/11, and it has only gotten worse.
Screw justice, though, right? We have terrrists to catch!
First, you have to recognize that the right to speech is not about a specific message, whether it is smart or stupid. When you defend the right to speech, you are defending all speech, not just smart speech or stupid speech. That is not a distinction.
When you defend someone elses right to say something stupid, it is the same as defending your own right to say something smart. When you attack someone elses right to say something stupid, you are also attacking your own right to say something smart. The right to speech is the only point. Whether the message is right or wrong or smart or stupid is irrelivant.
So, as the quote says, I may not like what you are saying, but since I value my own right to the freedom of speech I must defend all freedom of speech no matter how poorly someone else uses that right.
By saying that you *refuse* to die for someone elses right to say it, I presume you mean you would not die for their message or their ideology. That is your choice, and I probably wouldn't die for most other peoples ideology either. But that isn't the point of the quote. They are not saying they'd die for the ideology or the content, but that they'd die for the right to speak freely reguardless of the ideology or who agrees with it.
Nuff said. Too much answer, not enough question.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
The parent post should not have been modded insightful, because it reveals the fact that the poster DID NOT READ the fucking article(s). It was NOT a publicity stunt by one of them "Demorats" trying to push the "librul agenda" onto the American people.
Here's a passage from the SF Gate article that should shed some light for the poster:
Federal air security officials said the initial error that led to scrutiny of the Massachusetts Democrat should not have happened even though they recognize that the no-fly list is imperfect. But privately they acknowledged being embarrassed that it took the senator and his staff more than three weeks to get his name removed.
A senior administration official, who spoke on condition he not be identified, said Kennedy was stopped because the name "T. Kennedy" has been used as an alias by someone on the list of terrorist suspects.
Why reevaluate? The system is working perfectly.
The system is designed to be used against "enemies" and to scare people into submission.
Just look at the recent reports of FBI/homeland security "visiting" potential protesters of the Republican convention in order to instill fear. Look at the way these laws against "terrorism" are now being used against everyone from peace advocates to drug dealers/users and common criminals.
They're working exactly as they were indended to work.
Well, it's not like the Democrats haven't been terrorizing poor George Bush.
Yes, lots of Hezbollah Ted Kennedy lookalikes on suicide missions flying *away* from Washington DC.
With thinking as profound as yours, have you considered a job in Homeland Security?
Offtopic: What fuckwit named it "homeland security" ? Sounds like something a hick would come up with.
Is that you? Nixon used every power at his disposal, from the FBI to the IRS to the CIA, in order to intimidate and even imprison his enemies. Look at what he did to Tim Leary: got him sentence to over 10 years in a federal prison for having, IIRC, less than two grams of marijuana in his car.
There were plenty of *allegations* made about Clinton and the IRS, but like 99.9% of the allegations made about him they turned out to be Dudge fodder and usually outright lies.
I fly quite a bit for work and know that for a time I made some sort of list somewhere. Apparently after a while, if you pass enough of their tests you are removed from the list.
The e-ticket machines would not issue me tickets, telling me that I had to get my tickets at the counter. I was no longer asked if I wanted to upgrade to first class for special price... The boarding agents stuck little colored dots with initials on them on my boarding passes - apparently as cues to people down-stream. It got frustrating that everywhere I went I and my luggage were singled out for special attention. Up to the point where my luggage would not be accepted curbside, My luggage and I would be taken into a little room and searched. In one case, even sealed packages were opened. As I boarded the airplane, I was always one of the passengers called for a random search.
Durring one of these searches, I mentioned to the agent that I must have made someone's list somewhere. He shook his head up and down as he said "I can't say that sir!" I had my answer and just resigned myself to being watched.
Then one day, as suddenly as it started, it stopped. My guess is that I satisfied the intellegence built into the database that I was not a threat and it removed me from the list.
I do not know what I did to make their list nor do I really know what I did to get off of their list. I can tell you it is an unpleasant experience being there.
As far as I know, I have never done anything anywhere that would cause someone to think of me as a potential terrorist.
"Ja, I vos only following orders..."
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
For the safety of everyone else, they meant to put him on the no DRIVE list. It was an honest mistake.
So I'm dying to know which category you are in: Funny Clothes or Dark skin? I've been through that line more than a few times, although I don't think I dress funny and have light skin.
This guy is a U.S. Senator. Not just that, but probably one of the most well-known senators (love him or hate him).
Not to nitpick, but I think that most Americans wouldn't know Ted Kennedy if they saw him (especially if you picked someone who didn't live on the East Coast). If you put Fat Ted, James Traficant and Boss Hog in a police lineup and pulled someone off the street and asked them to pick which one was Ted Kennedy, my bet would be most people would pick the one they vaguely recognize (hint: Boss Hog).
Rampant Ninja related crimes these days...Whitehouse is not the exception
My point is that I was marginally inconvenienced, but it was not the end of the world. It cost me maybe 10 minutes of my life. How much of this is that Ted Kennedy doesn't like being treated like the masses?
Perhaps some. But perhaps some of it is that he has been made aware of how people are being treated, and doesn't like it. I don't either. Are you old enough to remember the Cold War at its height? It was the same kind of crap: band-aid measures typically undertaken out of a knee-jerk reaction to some scare, real or imagined, and it winds up doing little if any good. "Duck and cover", anyone?
Same thing here. America has gone batshit crazy over terrorism, and needs to settle down. Bringing attention to crap like this is good for us all.
http://bugzilla.dhs.gov
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
I would start spreading rumors that terrorist cells have adopted the following aliases:
John Smith
George W. Bush
George Bush
Ariel Sharon
Dick Cheney
Colin Powell
C. Rice (yea, I can't spell that name)
etc.
No, I'm not kidding. From what I can tell from various stories about this no-fly list, it really would cause great havoc to the general public, if popular names would end up on that list. It would likely also make that list largely useless for its intended purpose.
Any system that flags people as a potential terrorist by the name they use is idiotic, insecure and completely useless.
In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
So I'm thinking to myself "who's on the list with a name like Ted Kennedy?" Then it hits me: Ted Kacynski.
My handle breaks slashcode, what does your handle do?
Sounds like an interesting opportunity for a little experimentation. Next time you fly, try wearing different clothing from what you normally do. If you usually wear baggy pants and t-shirts, try normal-fitting jeans and a nice button-down shirt. Try carrying a different piece of luggage.
I'm not saying you should conform to the TSA's idea of non-threatening style, just that a little experimenting might nail down exactly the sorts of things they're looking for.
You may know full well why they screen you already, and I don't mean to ask. Could be your name or your skin color or probably several other things that you can't change that I haven't thought of.
Bigger targets? Are those bigger targets sending billions of dollars like the USA in military forces to support a country or factions that the terrorists hate? They didn't crash a few planes into the Leaning tower of Piza, or the Eiffel Tower...
Now we can keep all the opposition politicians from voting against our bills by preventing them from getting to Washington in the first place! We'll just tell them that Tom Ridge is in a meeting with the vice president and can't be located!
-All that is gold does not glitter - Tolkien
www.ra
Though it is the most frustrating thing to have happen to you. You entire privacy is completely violated and the process solves absolutely no problems.
The second time it happened to me in the Reno, Nevada airport (which is a freakin horrible airport) they lost my laptop and a $250 watch. How the hell do you do that?
1;
before I go flying in the USA, I think I'll change my name to "Tom Ridge", so I won't get hassled...
-- it must be true, it's on the internet.
Yes, I agree. Blame Hitler, I'm just a Nazi running the "showers". Nothing personal, eh?
After all this brouhaha, "Edward Kennedy" should be a pretty good choice of alias for a would-be terrorist hijacker to use, since that name has surely been removed from the No-Fly list.
Since you're calling people idiots, let's address your own intellectual shortcomings:
Just because it happened to intercept him leaving Washington doesn't mean there was no political motivation behind his inclusion. Having him put on the list for political purposes, specifically to hamper his ability to move freely and get in and out of Washington easily, and actually timing his movements accurately enough to guarantee he was intercepted at a precise moment coming back are two entirely different things. You will note that he did have trouble on the return leg as well!
I'm not saying it was a conspiracy, just that your logic is unsound. The original poster is correct in stating that the GOP has abused the FAA before, but he's probably wrong to infer political abuse here. A much more likely scenario is that there exists an Edward Kennedy (*very* Irish name) w/ IRA affiliations or something.
Trouble making decisions? Just flip for it.
Would you care to provide a list of the court dockets detailing the convictions for the crimes you accuse? See, the policy of "innocent until proven guilty" applies equally to everyone, including scummy senators, and the problem here is that someone who did not qualify for the list on legal grounds ended up on the list in error. Sorry, but the only accusation that's ever stood the test of prosecution is plagiarism, and last I checked it's not reasonable to prevent someone from flying for that.
Sure, Kennedy has been very low-life, but that's not the real issue presented here. The real issue is that someone got on the no-fly list incorrectly, and the question arises as to whether someone in the same position as him but without his influence would be able to correct the error, and whether the error indicates a fundamental flaw in the no-fly list to begin with. Try to stay on target here.
Virg
It's pretty much useless, anyway. It hasn't led to a single arrest, only the inconveniencing of innocent passengers.
~*~ Tara
If you wanted to show that the average citizen had better stay quiet or risk being fucked with -- and as others have mentionned, if it took Kennedy 3 weeks to get off the list, what are your chances? -- you could scarcely devise a more effective scenario.
As usual, I'm wondering if we are facing very well thought-out machiavellic plans or sheer ineptitude. And every time I think I have it figured out, they do something else to throw me off.
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
LMAO!!! Nice one...
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
Reminds me of a funny think my friend Nisa told me (She's from Shri Lanka):
No matter how late you are for a plane, if you have dark skin, never EVER run through an international airport.
~D
This sig has been enciphered with a one-time pad. It could say almost anything.
If a would-be terrorist/extremist wants to hassle the neocons, that person would just use the names of the lesser known ones as a fake identity and voilà - you'd have angry undersecretaries on airports!
(Yes I'm a bit childish today - it's Friday for God's sake)
Stop the brainwash
:)
From the same organization that gave you the No-Fly List: Information on Liechtenstein.
In german it is called a Kingdom, but they indeed have (just) a Prince
Cool info site BTW
They went through a metal detector.
Here's the really obscene part, which comes from the 9/11 commission reports: in every flight, at least one (and in one case all four) of the highjackers on the flights set off the metal detectors. They were screened by security afterwards, and allowed to pass. We even have it on video. The sad truth from what happened on 9/11 is that we did't really need more security-we needed to make the security we already had functional. Of course, this is the country that passes new gun laws instead of enforcing the ones it already has, so why break with tradition?
Sure, that's it.
Are you...Are you some kind of genius?
No, ma'am, I'm just a regular Slashdot reader.
In addition to this don't neglect the financial impact (the terrorists leaders don't).
A cryptic cell phone call and a correlating notebook with maps and jibberish left in a rental car could shut down major institutions.
If they can get one guy to blow himself up in an airpport with explosives up his bum, it will be cavity searches for Aunt Betty from Phoenix next.
Our best security is to keep our heads up and go about our business. Marshal law is not the answer.
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
Score 0, Troll? Have the Repugnicans taken a hold of Slashdot moderation? Oh, the ignominy...
Bush Lies Watch
Sounds like Ted was staging a publicity stunt to me.
Right. And rather than call him on it, Asa Hutchinson decided to bite the bullet and appear in front of a Senate committee to apologize up and down for the mistake.
When I take my bicycle with me on the plane (in Europe), I am wearing:
- Glasses with a metal frame;
- One home key and one cycle key hidden under my clothes;
- One metal watch with a metal strap;
- Two pieces of steel sized 6x15x20 mm, one under each shoe, that fit into the pedals of my bike.
Guess what? All this does not set off the metal detection ports. In my hand luggage, there are often a number of things that must look funny on the X-ray screen: a metal cooking vessel, the pedals (full of springs and oddly-shaped pieces of steel), wires (for recharging batteries from the dynamo), lumps of cheese and chocolate (must look like lumps of semtex), a spoon, fork, and (blunt) knive that I forgot to put into the check-in luggage, and other small things that you need in outdoor life. I've never been asked to show what's inside of that bag. I'm actually considering to cut a few layers of tinfoil into the shape of a gun or knive, just to see what happens.The laser service engineer that visits our lab every now and then carries a big case with screwdrivers and other tools as well as cleaning chemicals and a gas-operated soldering iron, and he claims that he managed to carry those as hand luggage on occasions where he was in a hurry. (He is of course a very good airline customer with a pass for unlimited domestic travel).
think about it, a do not fly list is in effect creating a sub classification of untermenschen, who are treated as non citizens with no rights, automatically. Not charged with a crime, charged for being who they are. When will they be required to wear the official symbol at all times, so that other "real" citizens can avoid them or further persecute them? Didn't we already go through this in ww2? Classifications of humans based on some government list? It's easy to see, too, as soon as any human is referred to in a non standard way that suggest or implies they are "not really human", but different somehow. Why those people over there aren't human, they are monkeys, niggers, so we don't have to treat them like humans. They are slopes, gooks, slants, huns, beaners, japs, filthy injuns, bloody wogs, commies, liberals, ragheads, camel jockeys, unionists, rebels, terrorists, insurgents, persons of interest, or todays favorite "detainees". Nothing like getting "detained" for years or life. Makes it sound so righteous, as soon as you are a detainee your captors can think-say-do anything, because you cease being a human so anything goes. First you need the list, then the de humanising term, then mass feudalistic profit. It was the same 3,000 years ago, 300 years ago, 30 years ago. It's always been that way you untermenschen, obey your "superiors", bow and kneel before them as they are gods walking before you, grovel knave, the bluebloods demand it.
It's not the main politicians who are pushing these fascist agendas who are at main fault. They are actually small in number and almost pitifully impotent in their own right. If it was *just* them we wouldn't have much problems with it, they could be rubber roomed like any other legitimate nutjob. Nope, it's their nature to be fascist pigs, it's literally bred and inbred and brainwashed into them with their feudalistic backgrounds and inclinations and social structure. It's the legions of bureaucratic drones and brainwashed seig heiling gun toting order followers who implement these fascist decisions masquerading as laws, with no questions asked, who are the enemies of freedom. The biggest flag wavers always turn out to be the ones who *implement* these decisions by the autocrats, using every excuse in the book to justify their blind obedience and order following. They are always the first to implement thoroughly bogus actions, and the last to recognize that what they are doing is wrong.
Sucks, but there ya go. It's your friends, neighbors, relatives-even this guy "you" who is at fault, because he she them they you or me will "follow orders" that are clearly *wrong*. Pick an excuse, that's all that's needed, one single excuse, poof, totalitarianism reigns, no matter what it's called-communist dictatorship, fascist dictatorship, monarchial dictatorship, etc. That name doesn't matter, and people waste a lot of thought and energy fighting over a stupid name, when it's the actions that are important.
9-11 was an exact implementation of a reichstagg fire-like event. It was designed to implement a police state, to be used as an excuse to implement things such as this, and others such as the concept of "detainees" and secret military tribunals and internal checkpoints and expanded paramilitary surveillence and command and control. Same old crap with "ohh, new-shiny!" plastered on it. Then all they have to do is mutter "terrorist" or "security" to excuse any actions. And it happens on all the sides involved, I am not picking on any one grouping here, folks all over are just as guilty of it.
The "why" of it is easy to understand, the worlds elite have always been feudalistic in nature. Very very few are not. And in order for them to be and remain topdogs, they have to create targets so that the vast middle can have anyone but the top to look at as "the enemy", to keep attention focused there, to keep sub groups of serfs willing to remain serfs and to keep them suspicious and fighting with each other while *all* of them are be
"Yes, lots of Hezbollah Ted Kennedy lookalikes on suicide missions flying *away* from Washington DC."
:-P
You know, amazingly, that is not what I said, or implied at all. Not all people who would be a danger to an airplane are Hezbollah. With thinking as profound as yours, have you considered a job in the KKK? Just because someone is white, or looks like someone famous, doesn't mean they aren't a terrorist, or threat. And even then, it's not up to the people checking the lists and admitting them, they are doing their job, and if they make an exception, and on a tiny chance end up being wrong, they can lose their job, get sued, or even go to prison.
Don't feed your superiority complex by pretending I have one.
This sig is o Unfunny o Funny
Responsibility doesn't fall on anyone, and that's the entire problem with government and corporate systems. A (fairly) complete lack of personal accountability.
It's always "Well, the government blah blah blah...". The government, last time I checked, was made up of people. And when these people screw up, heads should roll. Preferrably in a televised event on Fox.
included a funny little exchange between a woman whose daughter was being prevented from boarding planes and Asa Hutchinson, TSA honcho (and, interestingly, one of the House GOP engineers of the Clinton impeachment). The gist of the story being that after repeated attempts to get her daugher off "the list," she was still on the list. Hutchinson suggested she talk to the TSA ombudsman, which she had evidently already done.
f Id=38597 56
There were a few other interesting, chilling tidbits regarding homeland security. Fun stuff:
http://www.npr.org/features/feature.php?w
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
Well, right or wrong, he was seriously investigated for manslaughter charges in the past. That's enough to make other criminals and thugs on that list to say "Whoa.... Heavy."
He didn't say everyone in the line was non-white, but that most non-whites go through the list. I have to agree with him. I'm white and I've been through the extra-security rubbish (at LAX a few times), and it sucks. There definitely is racial profiling going on, which is just freakin' stupid, and illegal in the US. But then it's part of the war on terror, so most people forgive it.
AARRRGGG!!!! Why won't these falsehoods die?! Their passports may have been issued in the true names of the terrorists, but they were still fraudulent. Try reading the complete 9-11 commission report. Specifically, page 563, note 32 claims that two of the hijackers had fraudulently manipulated their passports and that it is believed that up to 11 others did as well (their passports were not recovered from the wreckage). Apparently, the passports had been doctored to remove entrance and exit stamps of the countries the terrorists passed through enroute from Afghanistan to the US. This is the sort of information that immigration officials use to determine both the depth with which the entrant should be interviewed, as well as what additional surveillance would be required.
You don't have this kind of trouble in foreign airports that are BIGGER targets for this sort of thing.
You sir, have obviously never flown in or out of Ben Gurian airport in Tel Aviv, Israel... and it seems to have served them quite well.
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
My point is that I was marginally inconvenienced, but it was not the end of the world.
Oh yes, quite! You have not been seriously inconvenienced, and your experience in not being inconvenienced obviously proves that nobody else has a problem either. Those lying elitists!
"The good reader is a rarer swan than the good writer."
...is why a no-fly list even exists. I don't mean the list where you get pulled aside for extra scrutiny, but the one where they simply will not let you on the plane.
I'm not aware of anything in particular happening to these people, other than not being allowed to board. And I just don't understand the point of that. If the government considers you too dangerous to be allowed on a plane, then they ought to arrest you, charge you with some terror-related crime, and let a court determine your innocence or guilt.
Freedom to travel is a long-acknowledged right. If the government can't muster enough evidence on you to justify their actions against you, then they shouldn't be able to interfere with that right.
The added security does nothing but placate the sheeple.
Amen. Also, no matter what the government mandates to try to make people feel safe, it all comes down to Mr. John Q. Agent working at the airport to actually make it work. And he often fails.
I can give several examples of (post-9/11) experiences in an airport where I used to live (Missoula, Montana). I once boarded a plane with nobody at the gate to check passes (I still have the complete, unchecked boarding pass). I've walked right into almost every "restricted" area, including the machine room in the basement, the offices behind the airline counters, and even right out the back door to where the planes are.
My only comfort was knowing the strategic choices of planes on 9/11 was related to their high fuel content and proximity to specific targets. By the time any plane from Montana gets to a terrorist target, it's time to re-fuel.
http://publicvoidlife.blogspot.com
Out of curiosity, how did they handle that problem? Did they cover the "lost" items or did you have to use your insurance policy?
I can relate, even though nothing was actually lost by the screeners, I had an idiot damage my digital video camera once. The hardest thing at the time was to contain my anger and not snap in the airport.
I did get stuff stolen by baggage handlers in the past though.
What I find with the airport staff is they seem to hire the most brainless thugs that never were held by their mothers as childs, and seem to have an utter disregard for the people they are supposed to server. The worst in my opinion are the folks working at Fort Myers, followed closely by the people in Chicago. A solid third is Vancouver.
Wearing pants should always be optional.
Israel is a unique instance. Compare any US airport to a European one, and you'll see tighter security, yet faster-moving people. Go figure.
My favorite thing at the airport is the sign that tells you what you can't bring on and it has a very cartoon looking bomb on it. That should definetly keep Wiley E. Coyote off of the plane.
SIGFAULT
I don't think the fact that he was put on the list was politically motivated - but I am wondering why it took three weeks to make the news...
Did he decide that he wouldn't tell anyone until the issue was resolved? Did the people in the airport not realize it was Ted? I'd have told everyone I know, and an airport usually has enought people in it that SOMEONE would have let a newspaper or TV station know... It happened FIVE times...
Further, wouldn't this have made a more favorable impact for the D's if the news came out during the DNC? Maybe they wanted to wait until people forgot about the DNC and started thinking about the RNC...
Or maybe it never really happened...
</tinfoil>
-bs
That that is is not that that is not. That that is not is not that that is.
If you follow the rules, no matter what those rules tell you to do, then the responsibility for what happens falls on those who wrote the rules...
You are always resonsable for your own action, even if you yeild control of them to someone esle. Maybe if more people realized this we would be in better shape.
"I just clicked on the link and installed the software like the e-mail told me..."
Since your heads too far inside a very dark place, I'll summarise it for you:
This happened between March 1 and April 6. And Ted Kennedy brought it up at the hearing just to make a point. He didn't run around screaming when it happened; otherwise you would have heard about this in March and April.
If his intention was to create publicity, don't you think he would have done it a long time back? Don't you think he would have brought video cameras with him to the airline counter, a-la Geraldo??
Jeeez! Use your f'n head for something other than carrying a hat, willya?
The check-in agent has to use the computer, and if the computer finds the person on the DNF list, the terminal is locked automatically, to stop just such a practice. The computer has the final say whether you fly, and it doesn't read the papers.
When I google for "Königreich Liechtenstein" I find no hits other than the juxtaposition of "Vereinigtes Königreich" (United Kingdom) with Liechtenstein in some comparison or other.
So if someone in the TSA thinks there's a King of Liechtenstein, I can't figure out where they'd get the idea.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Its funny that if you truely say you are a Muslim and knows the difference between yourself and an Islamist, I would have to question the "troll factor" of your post. Quite frankly, most of those who are labelled "islamists" today are freedom fighters. Sure, there are terrorists who attack our country but those are the same people lumped into those who truely want their freedom like the Palestinians and Chechans. Remember, Geroge Washington and his "goons" were called terrorists more than 200 years ago.
"Ok...here's a proposal. [
I fully agree. Another critical angle is to contact your representatives and be heard. Your phone call is actually more powerful than your vote in many ways. Your vote gets the person into/out of office, your phone calls/email/letters gives them direct feedback on specific issues.
Followup ideas on How To Do It Better to follow shortly, but I've got to knock out a conference call first. Yeah, work. The nerve of them. ;-)
...although I don't think I dress funny...
Uh, suuure you don't.
toresbe
No matter how late you are for a plane, if you have dark skin, never EVER run through an international airport.
Unless your initials are O.J. Then you can get away with murder.
... looking for 'Haddi Ou-ard Quani-di'
Compare any US airport to a European one, and you'll see tighter security, yet faster-moving people
Clearly, you have never flown through Madrid or Athens (pre-Olympics).
You didn't watch the DNC, did you? I think something like 43% of the American population had spoken at it by the time it was over. It's probably just a coincidence.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
yep your right, it's my lack of language knowledge, not me being from TSA ;)
Beyond the civil liberty implications and obvious bureaucratic bungling that seems to have reached new lows lately, you've touched on the real issue.
While we're spending billions of dollars on a 21st century Maginot line, it has distracted us from what really needs to be done to ensure safety.
When Ted Kennedy is stopped because he's on a secret list, that's a warning flag. Unfortunately, the guys in charge refuse to look at what's going on and fix the mistakes, so they repeat the same mistakes, hoping for a different result.
Its almost as if these guys have a pet project that ignores the real world. Its like saying "We need national identity cards!". It ignores the fact that the terrorists on 9/11 had the equivalent of identity cards.
The system can be gamed, there's no way around this, so these knuckleheads spend billions of bucks hoping it will make the population feel better *without concern for whether it improves actual security*.
Its this kind of thing that turned me into someone who can no longer support Bush. Its not just that he's stupid, he hires stupid people, and they continuously do stupid things that piss away money, isolate us from the rest of the world, start wars in the middle east and have dont nothing. Zero. NADA to improve actual security.
With that kind of track record, I'm going to assume that the only people left supporting Bush are either religious nuts or idiots.
And I'm republican, and I voted for this idiot last time.
Please have your papers ready.
This will be another 'reason' to move towards tagging people, or doing DNA tracking on *all* citizens: "We have to be sure its you, as we all know documents can be faked"
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Wow. So all terrorists need to do is start using legislator's names as aliases. In no time, Congress will collapse (or laws will be changed).
I'm only half joking, you know.
With the screen list, they put several big S's on your boarding pass, and then you get shunted into the "extra-thorough" screening line going in. You'll recognize it next time you fly: it's extra long, extra slow, and it's where all the people with dark skin or funny clothes go.
How did you buy the tickets?
Last year, while travelling for business, I was sent through the special line 10 times out of 12. It was because
1. The tickets were booked at the last minute, some the day before the flight.
2. Since I was travelling to several cities in a row, they were all one way tickets.
3. The company (a big and powerful one) paid with frequent flier miles accumulated on the corporate account, for business class tickets. Now, you'd think that a ticket linked to a corporate account would breeze me through, but no. I think perhaps these tickets are marked as purchased by "cash"...
4. Even though I was travelling on business, I had brought along backpacking gear since I expected to get out into the backcountry at every possible moment I wasn't in the office. So I had a big rucksack and camping gear.
I was never denied entry to the plane, but they searched very well... most of the time. A couple of times the TSA agent began digging through my (well packed) backpack and gave up halway through.
-- If god wanted me to have a sig, he'd have given me a sense of humor.
From the U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section 6:
[...] They shall in all cases, except treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same [...]
This clause is sometimes put forward by congressmen to try to avoid tickets, since they are "going to and returning from" their sessions. See Sen. Robert Byrd: Invoking an ancient rule to avoid a modern law to find out more.
To be more precise: in Dutch 'vorst' can also mean 'King'. It means Fuerst in German, but I don't know if it can have the meaning of King in that language.
The hell? All that happens is that Andy Anthrax finds out that he's on the list? So the next time he books a ticket, it will be as Barry Boxcutter.
Has anyone in the Department of Homeland 'Security' considered that this scheme is only going to stop innocent people who don't happen to have multiple identities? If we had any confidence in this list, then Senator Kennedy should have found armed agents waiting to take him down the moment he entered the airport. That this didn't happen just highlights that the whole no-fly list is a bad joke that's got way out of hand.
We need real security, not window dressing. And no, answering "National Security" in response to any criticism of the policy is not a substitute.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Are you old enough to remember the Cold War at its height? It was the same kind of crap:
Except that this time, instead of a nebulous threat of Soviet ICBM's raining down on us, the "bad guys" are actually blowing things up and purposely targeting civilians.
America has gone batshit crazy over terrorism, and needs to settle down.
What do you propose we do instead?
Keep in mind we aren't talking about a neutral party here - Teddy is very much pro-Kerry, anti-Bush. He has a vested interest in publicity that is bad for Bush.
Seems to me that when a bunch or terrorists were caught at a time convenient to Bush and bad for Kerry (during the Convention), people had no trouble at all believing that it was a setup. Now, something bad for Bush appears, from a famous guy on the other side, at a convenient time, and it's "NO WAY COULD SUCH A THING HAPPEN!"
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Delayed? Most were "expedited" to their "final" destinations.
Yeah, I'm just thrilled about this TSA stuff.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
> For example, it would not have been socially acceptable for a woman to wear a gstring bikini in public in the 1930s. However, fasion and social acceptance changed in small increments to the point where it's completely acceptable and normal today.
This would only generalize the slippery slope argument in the particular case that some social force has been actively trying to get women to wear g-string bikinis since the thirties. The concept of the slippery slope as an argument really requires intent on the part of the force or entity pushing down the slope. It's easy to say everything is a slippery slope if you consider everything from your conclusion to be "uphill" in terms of your argument, but to say that means every slippery slope argument is false for that very reason is itself fallacious, by the fallacy of incorrect association.
Virg
Nonsense! According to the article, in all three cases, a supervisor overrode the clerk, and got Kennedy on the plane. So obviously, it is a trivial matter to override the computer.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Look this has nothing to do with the TSA, the airline probably told the security people to stop Ted 'I got away with murder' Kennedy from hauling his bloated ass onto the airplane because transporting his disgusting fat-body requires two or three times the fuel of a normal human being. Ask yourself would you want to sit next 300 pounds of alcohol-soaked, chewed bugglegum? Having to apologize to the stewardess everytime Teddy grabbed their ass? Oh and before you lefties start your whining, this has nothing to do with his politics. The man could be anywhere on the political spectrum, he would still be digusting fat-body.
between the greater and lesser infinities sleep the dreams undreamt
Before my first flight under this new "security" screening, I was pulled out of line for several stupid reasons, including an empty plastic water bottle (which they discarded for me) and an untied shoelace. The shoelace prompted them to do a quick wipe of my shoes and bag handles, and led them to "discover" "drugs".
They got really uppity and starting firing questions rapidly at me as to the possible source of this contamination. After about 3 to 5 rounds with me deliberately responsed slowly -- because I figured they were trying to get me to make a mistake -- they stopped and just recorded my name, address, etc.
Great. I'm now a person of interest for drug trafficking or who knows what. Woo government.
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
I'm sure they "lost" the watch right onto their wrist later that day. As for the Laptop, Who knows.
Read: Rabbit Rue - Free serial nove
Give me a break, of course the conservatives did this because they love the negative publicity they would have to know it would bring. This being modded to the point of interesting is rediculous, all it is is an easy jab against the Bush administration. Most conspiracy theories are rediculous, but this one may take the cake. Maybe, just maybe, there is a way to explain how besides the ever so popular way of bashing the Bush administration. I have no idea how the list works, but maybe it formulates risk based on conditions that include driving records (don't know why it would, unless the had they made the criterion exactly to stop Ted Kennedy from flying!!)
Seriously, where the hell do people get ideas like this. Obviouslyhe set himself up as a publicity stunt......oh wait.....HE HAS NO CONTROL OVER THIS LIST. Yep, you're just another one of those fools who for some reason don't want to believe that the current administraion could EVER mess up even when there is overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
It's just as stupid to believe that Bush deliberately targeted him for being a liberal democrat. What on earth would that accomplish that would be worth the risk of doing something so obvious and ready to backfire?
You accidently drop them in a... local pawn shop, I suspect.
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
What do you propose we do instead?
I dunno, maybe do things that make *fewer* people want to kill every single one of us? Not target civilians? Keep our promises when funding AIDS relief efforts, help stablize African economies, not torture people and then pretend it was just a few reservists, not invade countries for no good reason, etc., etc. Oh, and bitchslap Israel occasionally, too. That'd be nice.
You know: be liberal.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Aha! You must be one of those soldiers at Abu Ghraib...
Did he inhale?
For some reason, it seems this would be funnier if this was a pratical joke by President Bush...
[W]e need to focus on the unidentified threats...
Hehe, well put. Sounds like a Bush quote along the lines of, "We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur."
For the slow kids, the point is that you can't focus on something until you identify it. If you're focusing on it, you've already identified it, so it's no longer unidentified.
"In a 32-bit world, you're a 2-bit user. You've got your own newsgroup, alt.total.loser." -Weird Al
Call him on it, and the newspapers play this as "he said, she said" for weeks. And the damage continues for every day it is on the front page in one form or another.
A quiet apology gets you a bit of (quickly forgotten) bad publicity, and you go about your life.
I guess, what I really have trouble with, is the notion that an airline clerk would recognize Kennedy, input the data into the computer, see the flag, and NOT call her supervisor immediately. The "refuse to issue a ticket", coupled with the "why?" and the "I can't tell you" looks too much like a setup.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Oh, I'm caucasian too. My wife, however, is not. And we've definitely noticed that while I'm not the only white guy in the screening line, there aren't many of us.
Look, it's not like they didn't let him fly. They just made him wait until a supervisor with the authority to give him a bording pass arrived on the scene. I'm glad they're giving equal treatment to average joes and to important people alike. So, a few people are going to get hassled at the airport. It happens. You'll live, most likely.
I keep forgetting my place. Jesus is for losers. Why do I still play to the crowd?
I'm sure this is proof the system is working.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Lost Sheep to Shepard, you got your ears on?
who has to carry a letter around when he flies because of this. While i understand that we are in danger from terrorists, it's unfortunate that our own citizens cannot travel about their country without "papers".
"Papers mein herren"
"here you go, heil Bush"*
*sorry for the bad german!
JediLuke
-Do or Do Not, There is no Try
Yes sir, you just bought the false dichotomy that the US government is currently peddling. Contratulations on being a Good Citizen.
So do you have a better solution or are you just here to troll?
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Dude, it was documented BEFOREHAND that Republicans pressured Pakistan to nab some bad guys during the DNC. And there it was, just as planned, on the 4th day of the convention.
Look out honey, 'cause I'm using technology; Ain't got time to make no apology
Sadly, that's exactly it, I did join up with a terrorist organization.
You see, I'm muslim. And we must all be bad, right?
Yes, flying is a privilege and all that. Let's see, can I list some scenarios where it's more than an inconvenience?
1) Someone who has been unemployed too long, about to lose it all, but they managed to land that interview in another city. Good chance of holding it together, vs. losing it all.
2) Their child/parent is dying, and they've got at best a few hours to race home and say goodbye.
3) You've only got partial custody or visitation rights for your kid, and it's Christmas Eve.
C'mon guys, let's help this guy out. We can name more, can't we?
I'll tell you what I tell the telemarketers who are sassy enough to talk back at me. Get another job. Hell, maybe I should cut them more slack, they aren't TSA, after all. I have more respect for whores, to be quite honest. At least they only prostitute their bodies, they aren't pissing on the Bill of Rights and and giggling.
I think they meant to put him on the no-drive list.
According to the book "Dark Waters" (a book about the cold-war nuclear mini-sub NR-1), an incident of this sort really happened to Admiral Rickover, the colorful and fearsome head of the US Navy nuclear submarine program.
--
Mad science! Robots! Underwear! Cute girls! Full comic online! http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/
Well, you probably shouldn't use the bag you normally carry your pot in as a carryon. ^_~
Me, I learned a similar lesson - it's a bad idea to re-pack my range bag as a carryon. Residual gunpowder can show up on those little testers. And while it didn't happen I kept thinking "What if I missed a loose round of ammo and it's lying in some crevice of the bag awaiting discovery?"
"An unarmed man can only flee from evil, and evil is not overcome by fleeing from it." Col. Jeff Cooper
First they came for the Democratic senators, and I didn't speak out because I was not a Democratic senator...
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
You've got Liberal Democrats in the Senate?
;)
Wow, I'm impressed
Trolls are like broken clocks. They show the truth two times a day. The rest of the day they talk nonsense.
Take a look at Heathrow. Massive, massive airport, hundreds of flights, and fast-moving people. The security procedures are more thorough, yet they don't terrorise the passengers. Makes you think, doesn't it?
we need to focus on the unidentified threats, but instead we focus on implementing systems that get us used to losing our rights.
So how exactly are we to focus on the unidentified threats without everyone screaming that their rights are being violated? And since when is flying a right?
Fuck it, the 9/11 terrorists actually accomplished their goal by fundamentally changing the way we think and act!
So anything we've done since 9/11 in an attempt to stop another incident is giving in to the terrorists? That's akin to saying that running anti-virus software is nothing more than giving into script kiddies.
Maybe in some ways you're right, perhaps there is a better way. But you know what? In the 8 or 9 flaming posts I've seen in reply to mine there isn't one single idea on how to make the system better. Infact one of these posts had outrightly erroneous "facts" to support their claim. yet, while my original post got modded down this post got modded up to a +5 interesting. I'm open to suggestions, but make it a bit more specific than "focus on the unidentified threats".
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Yes, I posted in haste (and anger). Upon reflection , I should have said ..need to focus on identifying the unidentified threats... Hey, I guess I could grow up to be president some day!
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
Let's just say that even though I think the circumstances are highly suspect, I still doubt republicans would go that far.
If they really did that on purpose, I'm sure it's several felony counts, one per every voter removed that wasn't supposed to.
Too bad we will never find out, since nobody, but the "unpatriotic" are interested in reporting or hearing about it.
In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
I'll bet that no-one named Bin Laden is having any trouble getting on a flight. Heck, when I was stranded trying to get a flight home after Sept 11, 2001, a bunch of these folks had grabbed a plane out of the country.
The government-run TSA will certainly benefit (read porkbarrel) from more government management. However, more Federal inefficiency and centralized mishandling will certainly not fix the inherently broken No-Fly list system.
Meanwhile, we passengers are screwed.
--
Mad science! Robots! Underwear! Cute girls! Full comic online! http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/
I never trusted anybody who doesn't have a real job.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
The difference between George Washington and the crazy Islamists today is that G. Washington didn't have his friends in other countries blowing up buildings and killing innocent people far from the fighting. I don't rememember Thomas Jefferson saying it was ok to take the war to the civilians back in Britan or France or kidnap Britsh merchants and cut thier heads off as a 'message to others.'
You cannot make this comparison logically. The war we are fighing now is against people who are obsessed with destroying our way of life. It is not a war for 'independence' or 'freedom.'
By the way, the last thing the Palistinians want is peace. Their entire political and social system is built on hate for the Israelis the and goal of destruction of the State of Israel.
There is something truely perverse about sending your children out to blow themselves up.
Good try, but nothing about this is like George Wahshington and his 'goons'.
There is nothing so powerful as an idea whose time has come.
Wouldn't it be funny if it turned out that Kennedy's name ended up on that list as a form of political protest?
I should probably shut up now...
I think the number "13" and the words "hole" and "Punched" had something to do with them.
Wanted : A Signature.
freedoms are lost in incremements. this is one. Props to John Gilmore for fighting a worthy fight. What I'm scared of is flying through your soon-to-be police state of america, and getting stopped/detained on the way through because I'm on some vague, secret list. American customs officials scare me. I've been through US airports many times, and I always have had negative experiences. Apparently, walking up to customs with your girlfriend and handing over 2 passports is too much for them. We handed over our passports, open, showing our photos, and they guy looks at us like we're idiots and says, gruffly, "which is YOUR passport?". I cut short some smart-ass reply due to my own personal fear of having my ass invaded by a latex covered glove....
People: does anyone really, REALLY believe that a senator of the United States couldn't get Homeland Security to listen to him?
Kennedy is Enemy Number One with conservatives, and believe me, Homeland (Fatherland? GOD!) Security's political employees are damn near 100 poicent Bush supporters. Remember, HS has no civil service protection -- it's a patronage army.
Come on, you really think Kennedy's pleas were ignored in the normal course of business? "Conspiracy theory" my tired skinny ass, the honchos who now control our access to air travel are screwing with Bush's political enemies. Kennedy isn't the first one to find himself on the list. And the list is secret, you can't appeal, and no one cares anyway. It's the work of a second for a political shark to tap in a partial string into the database to mess up your life.
I just don't see that taking away my fingernail clippers is going to prevent a repeat of 9/11. In fact, I highly doubt that a 9/11-style attack will happen again, the bad guys have already moved on to the next idea. My point was that we need to focus resources on identifying how the next attack is likely to play out.
All of this added so-called airport security is like closing the door after the horse is out of the barn, so to speak.
Maybe I'm idealistic, but I believe that I do have the right to anonymous domestic travel. Up until recently we have had this right, but now we have to show papers wherever we go.
What fuels my sense of outrage is that so much is being done in the name of fighting terrorism that clearly has little or nothing to do with fighting terrorism, and does take away my civil liberties. Look at it this way, when do you expect to get any of your liberties back? That's right, everything changed on September 11 2004! You hear it all of the time. There is a constitutional process for dealing with war and curtailing liberties in time of war. But we chose, for a host of reasons, not to go that route. So now we have an open-ended "war", and no way to get our rights back when/if the war ends. The terrorists achieved their goal.
And yes, every time I have to deal with frigging AV software, I get pissed because I am sacrificing my time and resources to the script kiddies.
How do we make the system better? As citizens, we provide well-reasoned critical analysis (whoops, I forgot, this is /.), and elect officials who demonstrate understanding and respect for the principles that differentiate our country from the systems that preceeded it.
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
Hmm, the Left has said it is true, therefore it must be true? Show me something from a reasonably impartial source, if you wish to convince me.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
When I heard this story was that Rumsfield had somehow had a hand in it and was back in his office giggling because he'd managed to get Kennedy on the no-fly list.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Melius mori in libertate quam vivere in servitute.
This seems to take lack of discrimination to a new unhealthy level. Sounds like these guys need to take a lesson out of "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead".
"Don't you discriminate!"
s/2004/2001/ [blush]
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
How many times have you tried to cross the border into Canada? I'm willing to bet the answer is none. Do you really think that Canadian Customs has nothing to fear from people entering from the US? Just because you are not greeted with an MP5 being shoved in your face at the border, doesn't mean you aren't being checked. Just because the Customs agent treats you like a human being instead of a terrorist, doesn't mean you aren't being screened. It is quite funny when reading these posts about how "lax" our border security is. Many americans mention it, but can't give any reasoning for the position. I suspect it relates to the statements made by one of your politicians following 9/11 that "some" of the terrorists had entered from Canada. Of course the actual events were not discussed much later. One of the terrorists entered (actually re-entered) from Canada, after living in the US for months, going to Maine, crossing our border, staying for a couple of days, then recrossing back to the US. So we missed him once, you missed him at least twice, but it was our fault for not getting him?
How about answering three questions for me. How many people from Mexico make the nightly crossing of the Rio Grande? How many of them check in for screening with INS? Which border is the bigger problem?
Its a shame that in post 9/11 America, you can't even see who your friends are anymore.
The funniest thing about this whole thread, is the other day, I got ripped for suggesting that the US has become/is becoming a police state. Now it turns out that the most recognizable senator in the US is turned away at the airport because of this abusive "no-fly" list. Enjoy your freedom, that is the freedom to sit the fuck down, shut your fucking mouth, and answer my questions before we send you to Cuba for a long vacation in an orange suit.
Remeber way back, when you actually had freedom to do what you want, and say what you felt. I hope you get it back some day.
It is possible to override the system, but it can't be done by the check-in agent, but their supervisor. But then you're all for this, aren't you? ;)
Kennedy is, after all, a radical leftist. He goes off on angry tirades about the president on public record. He is alleged to have murdered an American.
" Do we operate under a system of equal justice under law? Or is there one system for the average citizen and another for the high and mighty? "
~ Senator Ted Kennedy, 1973
Apparently the latter is true; the rest of us can't just pick up the phone and ask Tom Ridge to fix the no-fly list.
Maybe next time he flies he should use a pseudonym. Something really innocent sounding. Like maybe Mary Jo Kopechne.
The 9/11 attacks were made possible because the natural right of carrying weapons for self-defense and defense of others was denied the (regular, law-abiding) passengers. So a puny box-cutter was enough to threaten a planeful.
There ought to be gun-checks at airports -- to make sure you've loaded the right sort of ammo.
("frangible" ammo breaks up on impact and won't punch holes in walls, nor ricochet.)
How long do you think he waited to tell the airline people he was a US Senator? How long after he said the S word was he allowed on the plane. How many levels of airline idiots did he have to go through before he got to one who knew what a US Senator is?
In the event an airline says they can't let me on the plane and they can't tell me why. I will just tell them that I work for Haliburton. I will probably fly for free.
This is great. Just as stupid as this forms you have to fill in on the plane when coming from europe and you're not an US citizen.
There are actual questions in the form of "Are you a terrorist?". Yeah, sure, if i were a terrorist i'd check the "Yes" box? And i would check in with my real name at the airport?
Dear security guys: How stupid do you think your average terrorist is?
Look, this thing is totally safe! Built it myself, you know. You just press that button like this and then turn that lev
The reason we (the US) went into this war is simple. France, Germany and Russia were being thoroughly uncooperative with catching the "baddies". Any why would one suggest that they took this stance? Simple. They spent millions (billions) on Iraq in arms and supplies. The reason we knew they had WMD is because our "allies" had sold WMD's to Iraq. The reason for our "allies" wanting more time for inspections was to allow more time for the weapons to be moved. I don't think there was any false information, the US knew, our Allies knew, Iraq just had forewarning.
The outcome of this is two fold, we stick it to our "allies" with veto power in the UN and show them that their investments are not worth as much as protecting everyone, and secondly, to make an example out of Saddam. There are alot more people that this administration would love to go after, but by taking on Saddam, they may have accomplished alot more.
I like to hope that this, in 20 years maybe, will help bring a moderate level of peace to the middle east. If the Iraqi reform is successful it would set a powerful example.
Suspecting a partisan political figure of doing something for partisan political gain is just so...absurd, after all, that noone could really believe it, could they?
Unless the figure were the opposing party, right? ;-)
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
See: www.gregpalast.com
All of this added so-called airport security is like closing the door after the horse is out of the barn, so to speak.
Not to belittle your point, it does seem to have some merit, but hijackings have happened before 9/11 and will after. Infact I would even go as far as to say that your argument doesn't hold much water since "The Shoe Bomber" was another attempt to target commercial passenger airliners. Granted he was flying from (I believe) the UK but all the same...
Maybe I'm idealistic, but I beleive that I do have the right to anonymous domestic travel.
It's not the idea of getting from point A to point B but rather the method of travel. Again the word "right" has come into the mix when it simply shouldn't have. The use of a government regulated transportation system is not a right at all. That's why we have a drivers license, a pilots license and vehicle registration. Theses are considered privileges. Perhaps it seems that they should be right as we are taxpayers supporting these systems but technically speaking it's still a privilege.
What fuels my sense of outrage is that so much is being done in the name of fighting terrorism that clearly has little or nothing to do with fighting terrorism, and does take away my civil liberties
Again, not to belittle your views, but since when has flying on United Airlines been a civil liberty? I think we need to take a step back and re-evaluate what we're really considering rights and liberties. Neither the government nor the airlines is prohibiting you from traveling. The airline has the right to deny you access to a commercial their airliners, the government also has the right to deny you access to commercial airliners (and this is a right of theirs by the way, not a privilege).
elect officials who demonstrate understanding and respect for the principles that differentiate our country from the systems that preceded it.
I'm still asking for a better plan. Electing someone to formulate a better plan isn't a plan in and of itself. I'm just simply looking for honest answers instead of the flaming replies I was subject to. I'm afraid the answers are few and far between.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
*Ahem*
Bullshit...
I'm about as close as you can come to being the average 20-something white guy (the frat-boy image comes to mind), and I get pulled for the "random" thorough screening process at pretty much every check-in. And I've never seen this so-called special line at any airport I've been in. For the record, that includes Denver, Detroit Metro, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Salt Lake City, and a handfull of small town airports.
If I had to guess, I'd say that I get picked so that the screeners don't get accused of profiling, but maybe they just like to feel me up.
One only needs two tools in life: WD-40 to make things go, and duck tape to make them stop. ~G.M. Weilacher
Yes, I read his book ("The Best Democracy Money Can Buy") on it. Great book, bought copies as gifts to my friends. Don't read the book, if you suffer from high blood pressure, it will make it worse...
The information in the book is not conclusive. It hints that it might've been on purpose, but I certainly did not come out convinced that it was. I'm not a republican or a conservative, btw, quite the opposite.
At the very least there should have been some serious investigation on the issue. Of course there was none, because the whole thing was effectively kept out of the news in the US. The US media really dropped the ball on this one.
In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
Whatever your political views, this is clearly something that should NOT HAPPEN in America. The fact that it does should greatly concern anyone who believes in American ideals. This country was founded on some fundamental beliefs. For example, that you are INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY. That citizens have the right to life, LIBERTY and pursuit of happiness. How does a "no-fly" list support these American axioms?
Be afraid, comrades, be very afraid. I for one, greatly fear our new overlords.
..he was never actually prohibited from flying. His name was flagged. The counter clerk bumped it up to the next level. That person checked him out, found he was not the person they are looking for, and cleared him to get on the plane.
Yes, it took 3 weeks to get his name off the list, but during that time, he was still flying.
For an analogy, let's presume there is a warrant out for a person that goes by the name MysticalFruit. No address, no other info. All they have is the name. Should you get stopped by the police (running a stop sign, maybe), should the police officer check you out a little further, to determine if you are that MysticalFruit named in the waarrant? Or should he just blow it off?
Because this particular T. Kennedy is not the person they are looking for does not mean that there isn't a T. Kennedy that they ARE looking for.
If I was counting fingers it would have been 24 (though only 20 not counting thumbs), not 12.
It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
I've noticed the same thing. What's going on with it?
So, if you don't wear other metal parts, you're supposed to pass through with a small knive? The 9/11 hijackers used stanley knive blades. Since then, sharp items (safety needles, scissors, pocket knives) are confiscated upon discovery (even in Europe), but the metal detectors are still not supposed to be triggered by them. Weird.
Avantslash: low-bandwidth mobile slashdot.
My theory goes that the Homeland Security honchos are in a dead panic. They've been given enormous fiscal and human resources to 'make America safer' and they have been telling everyone that this is exactly what they are doing. At the same time, they are coming to some hard conclusions that you just can't engineer security into a society overnight.
Presto - wave of the wand, and what have you.
My theory goes that they are panicked because they are realizing that it takes more than a big Washington budget and a staff of a few thousand highly trained agents. It takes lots and lots of time. Years worth of time.
And meanwhile? Well, you're just as insecure as you were yesterday.
I think a lot of what the public is shown in terms of 'steps' HS is taking to ensure their safety is for show. Meanwhile HS is beating their collective heads against the factual wall that a democratic (democratic-republic, sure, whatever) society will, by definition, have traded personal safety for personal freedoms.
And just how do you engineer around that? Certainly not by matching passenger manifests against a list of "known terrorist aliases."
Cheers,
-- RLJ
You can't win... just the other day was a slashdot story about NOT having to present ID in order to travel...
Are you suggesting that people should not complain when the system which has been imposed upon America (and quite frankly the world) by this administration, without any public consultation, and with implied threats against other nations which dont get on side, and in contradiction with historic American values of liberty and freedom, don't function as advertised?
The root of the complaint is that this administration is causing disruptions in people's lives, without accomplishing the stated objective (beneficial or otherwise). i.e. America is not safer. It is absolutely impossible to secure every single mile of road, every train track, every building, every hospital, every boat, every mail parcel, every nook and crany inside or outside of America. And as long as Al Qaeda or islamic fundamentalists still exist, there will be unsecured targets to attack.
Unless you consider the fact that you can be detained for having initials which match those on some terrorist list to be a form of "safe". This process is misdirected. It is a huge waste of resources to detain the WRONG PEOPLE.
Americans used to think of freedom as a right, and a threat to that freedom as a form of danger.
People, you can't have your cake and eat it, too. I personally don't think showing ID to travel on a plane is that bad.
What about traveling on a train?
What about walking on a public road, or visiting a doctor?
What about being present in a public place?
What about being present in a private place?
What if your ID had been deleted from the database?
You don't think it is bad because you dont think you have a RIGHT privacy, and you don't appreciate that in this information age, privacy is just as much a necessary protection against tyranny as the right to bare arms.
The right to bare arms is actually meaningless without privacy. You can't possibly win a war, when the enemy knows everything about you. Once privacy is abolished, then the environment is ripe for a tyranny to empower itself. A tyranny, supported by information technology the likes the world has never seen before.
Comparing it with the former Soviet Union is a joke... you don't get stopped on every road at every state border with people asing for "papers, please".
But then again, the Soviet Union was communist.
You don't get stopped at every road at every state border with people asking for papers *YET*.
Wait for it.
But this administration has reserved such authority for itself. Not to mention complete and absolute surveilance over all communications.
Imagine what will happen, the next time the terrorists make a strike against America. It will be lock down time.
Thats what they do in prisons. Every hour or so.. everything locks down, including guards, nobody can leave their section, and everyone reports a body count in their sections. So if a single person is missing, it will be detected before the escaped inmate can get to far.
However in america's future, the number of people in jail or on parole will increase from 6 million, to over 300 million. Everyone will be on parole.
Afterall... aren't we all born in sin? There is all the moral justification you need to put everyone on parole from day 1.
That is America's future, if America keeps going down this path of fear.
Would you like a Department of Home Security Officer to visit your house each day to make sure you haven't moved or left with ciy without reporting in?
Perhaps, a friendly high speed internet video phone call, secured by longhorn. It would only take 30 seconds of you and your families time each day. A small price to pay for freedom.
Of course, "terrorists" need not check in.
No one has a right to their *own* opinion. They have a right to the TRUTH.
Given the rabid right-wing politics of most of the people in the defence and intelligence communities, I'm not surprised that a prominant "lefty" like Ted Kennedy was targeted It was probably some mouth-breathing contractor at the TSA's idea of a joke.
Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud.
it's a very good thing this is happening to those in power, especially someone as powerful as Senator Kennedy.
Only when idiot laws begin to affect those in power will something usually be done to correct it.
Maybe the Honorable Senator and John Gilmore can get together and work to getting TSA to be an organization that doesn't resemble authority from a Charlie Chaplin movie.
Well, it's not like the Democrats haven't been terrorizing poor George Bush.
You keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means.
Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?
Why presume when you can RTFA? Senator Kennedy wasn't cleared by "second level checking", or even the first 2 of 3 calls to Tom Ridge, Director of Homeland Security. You've obviously decided that the system is good, and aren't interested in having your mind changed by the facts. Sounds like you work for the Department.
--
make install -not war
I am thinking you are kidding, but it is kinda hypocritical to complain about how "they" did it to "us", then recommend that "we" do it back to "them". How can "we" claim to be anything but "them" this way, really?
emt 377 emt 4
I know it is difficult for most /. Freedom-Of-Speech Libertarians, but especially when a topuc is blatantly political, it is necessary to mod UP (or at least leave modded up) posts that you STRONGLY disagree with.
Seems like a poignant chance to (re)bring up John Gilmore's interview (recently covered by Slashdot). John is highly concerned about the US government's increasing restrictions on the ability of supposedly free people to go from place to place in what was once a free country.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
If the database of terrorists had any accuracy at all, MOST senators - and the Bush administration - would be smack dab at the top of the list.
Hey, someone had to say it.
I am NOT a number! I am a - oh wait, I'm number 761710. Look! 761710!
You must have me confused with someone else. I use the work rarely, and I know what it means. Do you need help?
also, good thing for the Bush regime that lying to the American people isn't considered to be perjury, or Gitmo would be holding mssers Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith et al...
despite the legal spinning and political bs, the facts remain:
Clinton lied about a blowjob in the Oval Office--total monetary cost to the American people--$80 Million
Bush lied about the 'clear and present danger' of Saddam Hussein--total monetary cost to the American people: $130 Billion and growing
hope you're getting your money's worth!
Actually, the correct romanization of the term for "foreigner" in Japanese is "gaijin", note the "i".
ciao
I know I'm going to get modded down for this, but it's worth it.
I'm sick of all the outright lies about the war in Iraq coming from the anti-war left. It's disgusting. Saddam Hussein was not a nice guy. Iraq was not Disneyland before the war. It was a totalitarian hellhole in which people were getting killed by the thousands. Talk to an Iraqi sometime. They will tell you stories about how on their sister's wedding night a drunk Uday Hussein showed up and decided to rape her death and slit the throat of the groom. These weren't isolated incidents, they happened every day.
Only 6,000 have been "wounded" and only a fraction of those are serious wounds. Saying that 10,000+ were "mangled" is an outright lie. Let's take the highest number of wartime civilian casualties in Iraq: right around 12,000. Let's take the lowest figure for the number of Iraqis killed each year by Saddam Hussein: 24,000. That's at least 12,000 lives saved in Iraq, and that figure is likely too low by at least half. If you're going to talk about the morality of war, don't gloss over the costs of inaction. Nice ad hominem attack, but have you ever considered that maybe MI6 has better intelligence than we do and believed that Hussein was a threat. Have you ever tried reading the Butler Report that said that there was no evidence of politicization of British Intelligence? I'd guess no, because that would challenge your worldview. This kind of leftist cant is both prima facie ridiculous, but it crowds out legitimate criticism of the war by those who don't get their rocks off by reading Chomsky. If you're going to increase intelligent public discourse, calling someone a "poodle" for having an informed opinion that you don't like is not the way to go about it.As much as I like George Carlin's schticks, I try not to use him as an example of proper civil discourse. Note I said: CIVIL. In order for that word to have any meaning whatsoever you have to start with respect.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
i bet it was just some republicans playing a prank
lose != loose
The first question, if it took Ed Kennedy, a well known Senator, three weeks of calling around to get off the list, what chance would a regular Joe have of EVER getting off the list.
The next question, will Tom Ridge be personally calling and apologizing to everyone who is improperly placed on the list, or just those who have the pull to make things inconvieniant for DHS in future legislation?
I hate to risk a divergent spate of crap spewing but that nonsense about "not enforcing gun laws already on the books" is poo-poo.
The same crackpots that say that are the same ones that, for some reason, resist criminal background checks for people seeking to purchase a gun. They basically WANT criminals to have easy, free, and protected access to guns (to what end?). This IS a fact because it is the ONLY explanation for resisting background checks at gun shows...HELLO!? That is a free ride for criminals to get around the background check to get some heavy duty firepower. Makes NO sense.
So OK, let's enforce the law entirely, consistently, and logically: background checks to buy a gun (ANY gun, ANYWHERE), period. How about that eh?
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
Section. 6.
Clause 1: The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. (See Note 6) They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, beprivileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.
This story has be passed around and it has fueled the "The US Gov is evvviiiiiiil" fires for a while. The problem is that it is very misleading.
These journalists got in trouble because they didn't have the correct visa. In the past the rule that required foreign journalists to fill out some extra paperwork was not enforced but in these times of shoe inspection seems like they would have looked into the immigration rules a little closer.
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.
Funny if anything.
"Fit supertall buildings with anti-aircraft weapons (specially designed for short range so they don't get hijacked)."
This one is just silly. OK, so it's short range. You can still cause mass amounts of damage to the nearby area. OK, it can somehow only hit planes. Great, you killed all the innocents on that plane. And oh, oops, the plane (or bits) still smash into things after being shot.
We need to make sure every building has some guns attached. After all, a terrorist with a car in a crowded area could kill hundreds, if not thousands, before he could be stopped. Right?
As for the false documentation,... perhaps if their passports were not so easily manipulated, their previous travel would have placed them under further scrutiny. Maybe not for each hijacker but hopefully someone would have noticed that several men, all travelling from Afghanistan to the US via Arab countries, were all boarding the same plane, with recently purchased one-way tickets. But then again, we all remember what a joke security was before 9-11.
As for the security at foreign airports, I fully agree with you... there is no reason that the US can't have both faster service and tighter security. I thought you were implying that US security wasn't as good (quality not speed) as European.
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
One of the great modern myths is that we should strive toward a risk-free existence. I say, do not accept infringement. Freedom is risky.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Given that the contents of the "no-fly" list are secret, would the airline employees even have told him why they could not issue the boarding pass if he hadn't been a US Senator (and somebody they recognized).
"This story has be passed around and it has fueled the "The US Gov is evvviiiiiiil" fires for a while. The problem is that it is very misleading."
The problem, however, is that this is not an isolated incident due to a single visa issue. There's a broader pattern of similar behavior on the part of US authorities.
Please read it, it's enlightening. Note that the article was written this month.
I was unaware of his manslaugther charge.
Here's a link to Wikipedia's Article on Ted Kennedy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kennedy
- It had never been done before.
- In EVERY previous hijacking in the USA all you had to do to survive was sit down and shut up. The people on teh plane were hostages used as tools for getting money, transport to Cuba, prisoners released from jail, etc...
9/11 was teh first time in US history where the passangers were "collateral damage" and nothing more. We had all been correctly trained to just sit down and let teh hijackers do what they wanted in order to survive. Because until 9/11 they were only killing passangers who tried to get in their way.Now the rules have changed. We know that every hijacking could be people trying o turn the plane into a weapon. People won't be so willing to sit down and shut up in the future. And you can bet your ass that the Air Force won't be waiting for orders from above to put an F14 on teh tail of any hijacked plane in the future.
This whole system is a waste of time and energy.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
The same crackpots that say that are the same ones that, for some reason, resist criminal background checks for people seeking to purchase a gun.
Wow, back that truck up a couple miles there buddy. Don't lump me in with the NRA politicos who resist every new gun law passed-there's a reason why I'm no longer a member of that group, even though I support the right to bear arms. I agreed with instant background checks, and I've seen people arrested at gun shows who attempted to purchase arms illegally. Thank goodness they were stopped there. My view is that many times we pass laws on state and federal level that are contradictory (look at the gun laws in CA, for example-I've talked to law enforcement folks out there and they aren't certain what is legal in many cases), or are a redundant passage of something that already exists.
Just because I don't like congress wasting its time passing the fifth law on something that is already illegal and just needs to be enforced by the current administration does not mean I support the hard line "No new laws period" attitude.
So OK, let's enforce the law entirely, consistently, and logically: background checks to buy a gun (ANY gun, ANYWHERE), period. How about that eh?
Nice try there buddy. Don't go shoving words into my mouth because you have a stereotypical view of gun owners. I support all of this. I support background checks for private sales, even between family members, something the NRA does not support (and a large part of the reason why I ended my membership).
Or maybe it never really happened...
Yep, the story is being leaked from the same secret base where they faked the moon landing footage.
P.S.
You know all that Mars footage? It's being filmed at the secret moon base.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Were looking for, you mean? If it took the senator three weeks to get the name "T. Kennedy" off the list, doesn't that mean that the suspected terrorist by that name is no longer being looked for? Or, did they simply change the listing to read "T. Kennedy, except senator Ted Kennedy, Massachusetts"?
It reminds me of the anti-spam measures blocking entire domains from sending mail, then making exceptions for individual legit senders one by one, until everybody is cleared and the blocking has been rendered ineffective (thanks to joe-jobs).
Blacklisting passengers by initial and last name only sounds pretty crude, but may work to some extent if false positives can be resolved quickly. Whitelisting famous people by initial and last name only is plain stupid. They should have kept "T. Kennedy" listed and used the senator's ordeals as an argument for improving the screening process instead. A security fence with random holes in it is worse than no fence at all, because it provides no security while pretending it does.
I'm sure we're all safer that Teddy isn't driving, especially his passengers.
However, I'm surprised that he doesn't have his own plane.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Liberal by American standards. :)
"You don't have this kind of trouble in foreign airports that are BIGGER targets for this sort of thing."
How many foreign airports have you been to? The last one I saw (in germany) had several armed guards walking around with SMG's. Some international airlines also fly with armed agents on board. Think about that.
An isolated pilot compartment would be nice, but self-defence is about protecting against the unforseen. A passenger could still hold passengers hostage.
"Innocent bystanders" -- perhaps you mean, unlike the people in the towers? Or, unlike the people in the plane when, as modern doctrine runs, they scramble a military jet or SAM and blow 200-ish passengers and crew into mincemeat and confetti?
The nutcases are the ones who think a passenger compartment crossfire would be bad, but a passenger compartment scattered from Kansas to Texas would be fine.
My understanding is that selection is done automatically by some computer system. I don't know what the selection criteria are, but they clearly are not just "dark skin and funny clothes".
They probably thought he would commandeer the plane and fly it off the runway into the Potomac!
Well we all know what happens when MA Senators and rivers get involved.
People die or they can't remember what country they're in (or who's president at the time either).
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Didn't I read somewhere parlementarians in the USA 's travel to DC (to meet in congress, I know he's a senator, so it may be different, but I thought it wasn't) was constitutionally protected? Maybe we can hear some funny things coming out due to this mistake.
So, you're saying he was flying one-way for weeks?
The revolution will NOT be televised.
-shrug- He's absurd most of the times, and intentionally so. But there are nuggets of pure genius in his rantings
;)
and I contend that the above is one such insight. The idea that a person should be deferred to or treated
differently due to their occupation, their station in life or other aspects of social position and not on their
individual achievements is a foreign and mildly offensive concept to me.
I try to afford everyone a basic, polite assumption of respectability, until they have proven themselves worthy
of either reverence or contempt. For what it's worth, it usually doesn't take long to go one way or the other.
25% Funny, 25% Insightful, 25% Informative, 25% Troll
There is a very easy way to get the no-fly list repealed. Just put the names of all 535 congressmen, and all of the federal judges, on the list. It will be repealed in just a few days.
Ah yes, a video with no time stamp, and the only thing which can really be seen clearly is the equipement which has been added to the checkin processs since 9/11. Funny how that video was plastered all over the place, then just disappeared.
Em, I'm talking about security videos discussed in the 9/11 commission report. If you're saying that the commission based their history of the events on that day on video that is known to be spurious, and you know this, what does that tell us about their report? Maybe I'm being naive, but I'm a little skeptical of what you're saying here.
...but without frangible ammo, you do run the risk of shooting through delicate control systems, computers, wires, hydraulics, landing-wheel tires, fuel tanks etc. So frangible is still good.
One of the great modern myths is that we should strive toward a risk-free existence.
So you do not think that we need more security, if any, than pre-9/11? If so all you have to do was say that we should drop the system instead of trolling. Things work much easier that way.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Know your government.
Unprecedented Corruption: A guide to conflict of interest in the U.S. government
I'm a registered Republican;
I'm conservative about most issues;
and I normally laugh at conspiracy theorys,
but it's hard to imagin that the name Ted Kennedy was mistakenly added to the list.
If you follow the rules, no matter what those rules tell you to do, then the responsibility for what happens falls on those who wrote the rules and made the list. The agent is not responsible.
I can think of a counter-example or two.
Don't like it?
Boycott the airlines.
Make less money.
Pay less taxes.
Stop purchasing extra stuff.
Stop supporting a system that refuses to work for its people.
If enough people did this they would beg us to be more productive again and improve our economy. Because everyone in power would be losing their jobs too.
Welcome to the Government of Men.
Unfortunately, the Judges appear to be with Them.
mefus
In Open Society, GPL Software frees YOU!
It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.
It's stupid, and un-american and it's only matter of time untill they harassed someone important.
...But that shouldn't matter, because we're all equal and have the same rights, right?...
I'm sure Ted Kennedy isn't the first "important" person they have harrassed. This was a while ago but it really pissed me off at the time, because this Canadian preaches tolerance and peace and yet Airport security had no tolerence for him because of his skin colour. He's not an important Senator like Ted Kennedy...
"Software is like sex... it's better when it's free"
"It really looks like the TSA simply doesn't care whether innocent civilians are denied the ability to use the nation's airlines."
To be completely pragmatic, why do they care? Its not as if it costs them money to deny access to transportation. It costs the airlines and the people trying to travel.
Perhaps if people were unfairly not allowed to fly, and TSA would be forced to reinburse them real costs, then all of the sudden, they would be smarter about it.
But the way things are set up now, there's no penalty for denying *everyone* access to travel.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Something that won't take decades to bring to fruition ("Don't be so mean to them and cause them to blow stuff up").
There are things the U.S. could do in a few days that would alleviate the suffering of millions of people within a few days. Of course, they will never do it even if it makes total sense like ending the drug war.
Think I'm talking nonsense? There's a book about it: Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky. Read it and decide for yourself. Also, "Profit Over People" by him is good as well.
The Senator was blacklisted to save the airlines money. Free booze in First Class has to have limits.
From this article on the ACLU's lawsuit: [of people on the list] "the "no-fly" list has resulted in routine stops of passengers without terrorist ties who "have no meaningful opportunity to clear their names," said the complaint filed by the American Civil Liberties Union... They are detained, interrogated, delayed, embarrassed, humiliated in front of other passengers."
"Plaintiff David Nelson, 34, a trial attorney in the St. Louis, Missouri, area, said he has been stopped more than 30 times -- every flight he's taken..." Its all the Nelsons everywhere, although evidently the one bad one is from Tennessee. From another article "...this week 18 men named David Nelson, all residents of Oregon, confirmed they have been repeatedly delayed at airport counters and security checkpoints in the last year or so."
I do not feel safer that all T. Kennedys or all David Nelsons are being searched. They should hire police to follow the one bad David Nelson around and save those 12,000 searches (assuming 1 trip per year) for random searches of everybody. As Bruce Schneier points out:
Bad Soundex matches don't make us more secure. Even good soundex matches aren't much better: the bad guys will just learn which names not to use. Random searches: annoying, but results in more actual safety.
I can't *believe* they took this long to get everone on Dick Nixon's Enemies List on the no-fly list!
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
He brought it up at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. If you'd read either of the articles you'd have seen that.
This would be the best time and place to reveal his experience if he wants to effect change in a system which clearly has flaws.
> Or maybe it never really happened...
Riiiight... so he was lying along with all those other people (including Tom Ridge).
I am also on this list. I have flown a few times within and out of the US in the past 6 months.
Houston -> Boston - RED ALERT! SCREENED
Boston -> London - RED ALERT! SCREENED
London -> Istanbul - Nothing
Istanbul -> London - Nothing
London -> Bangkok - Nothing
Bangkok -> Sydney - Nothing
Sydney -> Cairns - Nothing
Cairns -> Sydney - Nothing
Sydney -> London - Nothing
London -> Boston - Nothing
Boston -> Houston - RED ALERT! SCREENED
Houston -> Philly (I had no checked luggage and a shopping bag only! -> RED ALERT! SCREENED
I am more of a threat in MY OWN DAMN country than I am when I am a visitor to countries that dislike (put mildly) the US for their "imperialistic attitude toward the rest of the world" (paraphrasing many people I have met outside the US)
--------- I have no signature
If my memory serves me correctly, the terrorists on 9/11 had return tickets. So the whole one way thing is ridiculous. If you are willing to die, you arent too cheap to buy a return f*ing ticket.
--------- I have no signature
I would go further and give the cockpit an outside door, so it is inaccessible from the passenger cabin.
What happens if there is a problem in flight? Not being able to get into the cockpit can be good and bad.
Give the pilots (or, for that matter, properly qualified passengers) guns so they can fight back.
What happens when a pilot decides to hyjack a plane? Or a 'Certified' passenger? Who watches the watchmen? What happens when terrorists decide to forge a homeland security gun permit?
Put remote control lockouts on the aircraft.
Good idea, then terrorist wont even have to board a plane to take control of it and crash it. They will all become hackers. And the best part of this idea, is that when such a system is exploited, you will be able to crash EVERY SINGLE PLANE IN THE AIR AT ONCE.
Fit supertall buildings with anti-aircraft weapons (specially designed for short range so they don't get hijacked)
Do you have any idea how silly this is? If you want to down a 747, you can't do it when it is about to hit a building. And, btw, most major cities have big airports nearby. If you put AA under flightpaths, terrorists can just take an AA installation, and pop away at incomming flights. Moreover, what is 'short range' AA? A phalanx system? Do you really want to put something like that on top of a building?
How about this, we just make sure that people getting on planes don't have guns, explosives, and knives. Without a weapon, a terrorist has to wrestle down 200 hysterical passengers who no longer believe that they might live through a hyjacking.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Think about it... How much better off would this country be if none of the politicians could get to DC?
You get used to it after a while. What I do is basically:
1) Don't carry anything valuable. They'll make you dump everything on a table, which they don't watch very well. For security staff, they're pretty slack about other people's stuff.
2) Wear cheap, flat 'deck' shoes, like $12 pairs fron a cheap show chain. You may lose them at some point.
3) If you wear a belt, use a cheap flat belt. You may have it torn open at some point.
4) Wear clean underware, with no holes. You may wind up with your pants around your ankles with 20 strangers there, as you try to stand straight, with no belt, and your arms straight out from your sides. (Happened to me at San Diego, in the hole they call Gate 1.)
Expect to be laughed at by the wanker TSA employees. Do not make any remarks or show any expression in response. Remarks about a**holes results in an extra hour or two in a small room while you wait for a cavity search 'specialist'.
EDY','heh heh, silly terror-loving anti-USA democrats!');
2 years and no mod points. Join reddit. Because openness is good.
All of these posts saying that "following orders" is not safe are just lost. The defense of "following orders" is valid so long as the orders being given are valid and legal orders. The defense is only invalidated when the orders are illegal and the person carrying out the orders clearly knows that it is illegal and does it anyway. I don't believe that it was illegal to prevent someone from getting on an airplane because their name is on a list.
The military requires everyone to follow orders. It's one of the most important military laws. Failure to follow orders can land you in prison. The addition of the "Nuremberg defense" was only to take care of the most extreme cases where illegal orders were being given, and that actually does not happen often (at least in the US military). When that does happen, it is always a case that gets a LOT of legal attention.
The poor soldier trapped in the middle is usually screwed both ways, but the problem is not caused by the soldier but rather by the environment and orders given to the soldier. The soldier has the option, if they believe that their orders are illegal, to refuse the orders. They almost always land in court for doing it and they must defend themselves by having the orders declared illegal. It's not an easy situation for them so they don't do it often. Between the two, it is usually easier and safer for the soldier to just follow orders no matter what.
Civil law is not too different. The punishment for disobeying orders is usually being fired, and there is even less chance to defend yourself from that than a soldier has in a courts martial. The punishment for following illegal orders is about the same, suitable to the crime involved.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
And whatever they claim otherwise, they're still getting data from credit reports and the like. So say you're one of the hundreds of thousands of identity theft victims. With ID theft you have rights, and the credit reporting agencies responsibilities, to attempt to fix bad data. Takes 200 hours of your time and never, ever really finishes, but all you lose is your potential new job and potential new car loan.
But in the meantime the bad data gets into the gov't files: now you never can fix it. And your taint creeps out to touch all your associates (like how the casino software catches ex-roommates of ex-roommates of card counters). Now not only do you not get hired after the NCIC screen in the background check, but your buddies and grandparents all get extra airport searches (they should add a nurse they way they do some of those searches... add in a breast or testicular cancer lump screen while you're there). And of course as 1 in 2500 of us is a terrorist any close check of you will find those suspicious degrees of separation in your Orkut links. Hi Mr.Tuttle, your new name is Toast.
From my favorite precient and well-written essay on privacy losses:
If these errors were merely harmful to the innocent, that would simply be horribly injust and an affront to the ideals of the US. But these errors are also stupidly harmful to safety. From Schneier (via my D.Nelson post)... "almost everyone who fits the profile will turn out to be a false alarm. This not only wastes investigative resources that might be better spent elsewhere, but it causes grave harm to those innocents who fit the profile..."
"Administration of the list clearly needs to be changed and consolidated to be government-managed," Hatfield said. "This points out the weakness in having the names checked against passengers at hundreds of different airlines at thousands of different airline counters across the country."
Sounds like Hatfield's idea of a fix is to centralize the no-fly into a central database with automatic checking. When this is in place even a supervisor who recognizes the esteemed Senator would probably not be allowed to let him board...
"Knowing everything doesn't help..."
Senator Ted Kennedy )D-MA) was one of the few
politicians that stood up to George W. Bush
and voted NO for the Iraqi Conflict. Shortly
after 9/11/2001 (before the anthrax letters),
George W. Bush said "If you are not with "us",
then you are against "us"."
This puts Senator Kennedy in the same class as
the Taliban, al-Queda, the opposition forces in
Iraq, (and AFAIK, the "liberal" NYC news media
and the Senate Democratic leadership and the
National Inquirer, who were sent those deadly
anthrax letters) -- "enemy combatants".
It has been very nearly 3 years since those
letters were sent out, and the closest the
FBI has come to catching the criminals involved
is to now have 2 "persons of interest", which
is reminiscent of the Olympic bombing in Atlanta.
Can anyone say "Keystone Kops"?
Very true. But he was still flying.
IIRC, they stamped a "J" on every jew's passport
Insightful? How?
The 9/11 hijackers didn't have anything that security wouldn't allow through. That's why they used boxcutters. Blades less than 3" were fine.
People set off the metal detector all the time, even today. They are screened by hand.
If there were any security failures on 9/11 it's that there was no procedures or policies to prevent that type of attack even though similar attacks have been tried on a smaller scale at least three times before by crazed or distressed individuals. (Source of info: Gavin de Becker's _Fear Less_ and experience which I won't disclose.)
Geez, people...no terrorist is going to successfuly hijack a jet in the next 50 years because everyone remembers 9/11. Hell, look at the Pennsylvania crash...that's how fast we figured it out. The 4th plane was taken down by passengers hours after the first attacks. How's that for rapid response to changing conditions?
Just keep bombs off the planes and everything else will be prevented by the passengers.
Umm... actually, the overwhelming majority of American citizens are still alive. Sorry, couldn't help myself!
Sean
Couldn't happen to a nicer person!
It's ALWAYS going to be a good thing to know who someone really is from a security point of view.
Not true. In addition to impeeding ordinary travelers (thus doing damage FOR the terrorists), it's an innefective waste of resources that could otherwise be used to do something useful.
Such as random searches.
A watch list means anybody on the watch list is harrassed, and KNOWS it, while anybody NOT on the list passes through. This means that the terrorists can do a dry run and find out which of them are not on the list and pass through unhampered. Then the ones that succeed get togther and do the REAL hijacking - with no problems.
And the terrorists already knew this. They did dry runs immediately before the 9/11 event.
Had the resources been used instead for random checks, being passed through without search once would give no improvement whatsoever on the probability of being searched on the next trip. Mixes of the two are progressively less effective as the fraction of random searches goes down and watchlist searches goes up. (There was a recent paper on this published, and referenced here on slashdot.)
Meanwhile, having a watch list means having a government black list, selecting out a subset of the population for systematic penalization and harrassment. That's already unconstitutional, in the absense of individiualized evidence of wrongdoing and legal action to determine guilt, under the equal protection clause. But doubly so when it can be shown that a watchlist is not effective for its stated purpose, so no pressing government interest is served.
And of course there's the issue of harassment of additional people improperly put on the list - with T. Kennedy as the poster child.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Article. I.
Section. 6.
Clause 1: The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. (See Note 6) They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, beprivileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.
Anything is fair in war.
and Love.
Ask the British or rather the victims of British war and peace time crimes the world over. Ask Abu Gharibites about what they think about the upkeepers of democracy and freedom. I am sure you will hear a different version. So you saying what you say now is really without complete knowledge of the facts. I am not claiming to know otherwise, but the mere fact that some of these people had slaves should tell you something about their respect for human lives. And sure - No Britisher was stabbed in the back during the Independence War.
Gimme a break from this holier than thou attitude.
As far as killing innocents by blowing things up goes, no one ever in the history of man kind, including the Nazis has killed more innocent people than the USA. Now with all this in perspective, what you say is truly hypocritic. More than all the islamists of the world, its your kind that I fear. You will be the creaters of the Animal farm, if its already not in place.
I worked the VIP side of a hockey rink for the 2002 winter olympics. Somehow, Sen. Dodds (Vermont, I think), snuck his uncleared father-in-law into the VIP seats. When they got up to go get something from the VIP tent, one of my volunteers told Dodds that his father did not have the proper clearance, and that if he left the stands, he would not be able to pass the checkpoint to get back in. Dodds' response:
"But I'm Senator Dodds."
I was watching the whole thing and about to get involved (which I rarely did), when the volunteer said, "That's nice, but he still doesn't have the proper clearance."
I'm sure Sen. Kennedy's experience was similar.
I'd rather have someone respond than be modded up.
Ted could have used the "dont drive across bridges" list in 1969. Then he might have beat Nixon in 1972 and history would have been different. No Watergate followed by two timid presidents.
(Same week as first manned moon landing.)
I thought the point of this system was that they combined disparate databases to create a whole profile for the no-fly listees. If they flag on "T. Kennedy" without cross referencing ImportantPerson.db and FrequentFlier.db and FaceLooksLikeThis.db and ICanGetFired.db, not to mention mundane things like Address.db and Phone.db and SSN.db, etc., then
1. The database is useless.
2. The public has nothing to worry about when it comes to privacy.
-- Gary Goldberg KA3ZYW 301/249-6501 AIM:OgGreeb Digital Marketing Inc., Bowie, MD
They just misread it.
He was on the no-DRIVE list.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
This makes me think of the movie Brazil. One bureaucratic mistake can make your life miserable.
Did anyone who misread it as such find it strange?
Could public flogging be used to make more masochistic exhibishonists fly?
Nice.
Ted Kennedy's so far left he's a communist. Plus he probably puts the plane over the weight limit.
John Kerry is a Joke!
This stupid No-Fly list is an aggragte of a bunch of lists. One such list is the A-hole list kept by many airlines. Ted Kennedy is on that list and that is how he got on the No-Fly list. They want to keep "problem flyers" off of flights. Kenedy has been said to be abusively egotistical. It's no suprise he made the list . Just shows how worthless the No-Fly list is. Now I am on it I bet.
Ted Kenedy's car has killed more people than my guns.
If you don't like what I write don't be a CS and mod it down. Refute it.
Yea I can't spell. So what is your point?
Although a little late to posting, I had an interesting experience about 8 years ago in Northern Ireland. When crossing from the Republic to the North, I was stopped at a British army checkpoint. It was just after a medium bombing and I happened, unbeknownst to me to be driving near the bombing site. The soldier asked for my name and when I told them, all of a sudden the soldier stood up with a visible change her appearance. There was scurrying around the armored transport with soldiers now grasping their assault rifles and coming towards the car. Fortunately the next question was "where are you from?". When I said "America" things got under control quickly, with the other soldiers turning around and heading back to where they were sitting, and the soldier asking me questions was much relieved. Apparently my family name had links to the IRA with a couple of members serving time for terrorist offenses. Mind you, none of my relatives were/are involved. But because my name is a somewhat uncommon Irish name, the simple reference to the name almost caused me and my family problems. Just simply our names should not enough to cause these problems.
It is dangerous to be right on a subject on which the established authorities are wrong. - Voltaire
The CIA factbook says "Fuerstentum Liechtenstein" which I've always translated as Principality.
Yep. In German, Fuerst = Prince, Fuerstentum = Principality.
I've been to Liechtenstein and seen the Prince's castle. It's a nice little country, although not that distinguishable from Switzerland, as they use Swiss Post and Swiss currency. At the border there is just a sign beside the road that says "Fuerstentum Liechtenstein".
Iraq is not safe or else the UN, Red Cross even Médecins Sans Frontières would be in the 80% area. My friend worked in Basra setting up an internet connection and he left Iraq to be based in Jordan. I asked him why he left and he said Basra is not safe! We only get media reports from Iraq when there are casualties. The daily armed gang robberies and kidnappings among Iraqis that occur do not get reported. This insecurity is what the Iraqis are pissed about.
I don't think this means what I think you think it means.
Please note that the quote does not read: Those who would temporarily give up a little Liberty to purchase essential safety deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
1) Essential Liberty - there is no right to privacy when conducting many types of business transactions. For instance, moving millions of dollars around. Or sending a dangerous chemical substance through the mail. Or buying and utilizing a car.
I am not saying that my icecream preference, bathroom habits, who I voted for in the last election, or my innermost heart's desire should be an open book just because I once got on a plane. That's essential privacy.
Certainly one has no natural 'right to fly': I am hindered from that by the force of gravity and lack of adequate wings.
So, I can make a contract with someone who has the ability to move me from one location to another quickly. As part of that contract, they can ask me to prove who I am. Further, since this is (usually) interstate commerce, government has been granted the power to regulate that contract. Thus, government can require that the contract stipulate that I will attempt to prove who I am.
2) Give up - in fact, in this scenario, I _retain_ my right to privacy: I can accept or reject the contract with (given an ounce of perspective) little or no permenant harm to myself: I trade the expediency of getting on a flight for the 'good old days', where I can get a horse and carriage and clip-clop across the country just like my forebears did. Or the 'good really old days' where I can walk. It's good for the environment.
3) Little - this one is debatable. Yes, you still have a very small percentage of dying by the actions of a terrorist. But it's become very important that we put up some barriers to avoid making it trivially easy for bad people to do bad things to many people simultaneously. Every time you raise the bar a notch, you increase their chances of getting, as a previous poster called it, 'unlucky' and screwing up and getting caught before they have actualized their murderous intent.
4) Temporary - Death is permenant for those unfortunate enough to be involved. Death is the fundamental denial of all other Liberties. Conversely, the right to life is the sine qua non of all natural rights and liberties. The Safety (which is, the defense of that right to life) of those innocent non-Combatants on the plane and on the ground is a good thing.
Remind me again what we're arguing about? Oh...showing your ID and checking it against one of the few records we have about the bad guys: the names or known aliases of a handful of known terrorists in order to board a plane, and if you are, inconveniencing you until it's straightened out. Right.
I think the correct response to this is "Thank you, yes, here's my ID, and and, please do double-check my bag thoroughly and even make me take off my shoes and twiddle my thumbs while the machine churns - I'm really okay with that, if spending time on my bag at random is the cost to effectively increase the chance you'll stop someone bad before they do something very bad."
His secretary could have drawn them up, his butler could have made the call, and his daughter could think Rich was innocent - none of it matters. What matters is that money slid across the table in exchange for Clinton's signing the pardon.
Ted Kennedy sure had trouble keeping his car from falling in a river.
the one thing Bush did NOT do was stand by his word. Sure he stood by the resolution.
I don't mean to pick nits, but Bush is a liar all the way around; he did not stand by the resolution.
In the UN Security Council resolution on Iraqi WMD before the war, the US did not specify the use of force -- Russia and/or France would have vetoed it.
The US gov't also thought it was important that the UN Security Council be in unanimous support of the resolution, so the US gov't had to get Syria (then a non-permanent member of the Security Council) on board too. Syria was adamant about no use of force.
So the US draft resolution was modified removing the US desire to use force. This modified resolution passed unanimously.
Immediately after its passage the US liars started claiming that the resolution gave them the "right" to use force. Bush lied again.
The US is run by capatilist forces, ie: consumer consumption and
.
_ __
producer production.
If say the consumers were to decrease their consumption, then the
producers would lobby their congress buddies, until changes took place
which would increase the rate of consumption.
Now how does this relate to the topic?
Well people should try their best to travel less, use other means of
travel or other technologies such as video conferencing and such to
eliminate travel from their lives as much as possible.
Doing so would change the market dynamics and would force airlines,
aircraft manufacturers and all dependent industry players such a fuel
and equipment providers to begin lobbying congress for changes to
domestic travel
My final word, market forces are much stronger than the principles
of "true" democracy.
Arash Partow
_______________________________________________
Be one who knows what they don't know,
Instead of being one who knows not what they don't know,
Thinking they know everything about all things.
http://www.partow.net
Arash Partow's Philosophy: Be a person who knows what they don't know, and not a person who doesn't know.
Dude, you've never flown El Al. Beyond checking me against every list known to man and I'm sure several known to nobody, they did everything except a full body cavity search and kept sending different people to see me to ask me the same questions for on the order of an hour before I was allowed to try to pack my stuff back into my suitcase and give it to them so it would make it on the same flight as me to Jerusalem.
;-), so last time I flew here, I, my carry-on and my shoes were checked by this big, ugly, chubby gorilla of a guy for five minutes - and it seemed like an hour.
About the only positive part of it was I spent a good half hour talking with (and looking at) a nice looking Sabra (Israeli girl) as she was pawing through my shorts (the ones in my suitcase, get your mind out of the gutter). The time went quickly.
I'm almost certain they hired a number of fairly attractive youngish women (all of whom have, de facto as Israelis, military experience and whom I'm betting had orders of magnitude better training than the TSA people get) to do such things as a way of keeping people from being irritated - good customer service, in all.
Also, the guys who came in to talk to me intermittently, who were admittedly brusque and obviously daring me to take offense at it, all had a similar look of sharp, competent authority about them - something I fear our own TSA has not considered a factor for in their hiring process.
Of course, in America, you're not allowed to hire based on age, sex, or overall prettiness or the appearance of competence (or, in a union shop, actual competence
This is not to say that I minded - I always say 'Good job, thank you, sir', and 'have a good day'. Because I am grateful that someone is doing something to protect what could be my behind, regardless that their getting paid for it. I say "Thank you" when a cop gives me a ticket too. Silly me, perhaps.
Well that's why it's a bummer to have the name Kennedy. Or Jones. With the amount of people worldwide, whether born with the name or not, there's almost bound to be a terrorist or a felon with that name. That' why it's nice to have a long italian last name. With 12 people in the US with my name, it's doubtful my name will show up on the no-fly list.
I don't think the fact that he was put on the list was politically motivated - but I am wondering why it took three weeks to make the news...
Did he decide that he wouldn't tell anyone until the issue was resolved?
If he had brought it up in the media, do you think it would have taken three weeks to resolve? The whole point, I assume, was to make it more how a "normal person" would have to go through getting removed from the list (and make sure it wasn't cut short by media scrutiny). Now, it just looks horrible how long it took. As for the RNC and whatever, sure, that's just possibly icing on the cake.
Eurohacker European paranoia, gun rights, and h
Surveillance-Industrial Complex. It details how the gov't is
- "Recruiting Individuals." Documents how individuals are being recruited to serve as "eyes and ears" for the authorities even after Congress rejected the infamous TIPS (Terrorism Information and Prevention System) program that would have recruited workers like cable repairmen to spy on their customers.
- "Recruiting Companies." Examines how companies are pressured to voluntarily provide consumer information to the government; the many ways security agencies can force companies to turn over sensitive information under federal laws such as the Patriot Act; how the government is forcing companies to participate in watchlist programs and in systems for the automatic scrutiny of individuals' financial transactions
- "Mass Data Use, Public and Private." Focuses on the government's use of private data on a mass scale, either through data mining programs like the MATRIX state information-sharing program, or the purchase of information from private-sector data aggregators.
- "Pro-Surveillance Lobbying." Looks at the flip side of the issue: how some companies are pushing the government to adopt surveillance technologies and programs based on private-sector data
This privatized surveillance...Edward = Ted
"It is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists." -Ludwig Wittgenstein
Doesn't anyone find it scary that there are terrorists roaming freely through our country now, because they know as a result of this news story that the alias "Ted Kennedy" is now a free pass through all airport security lines?
It's a great idea. Kills two birds with one stone.
They're playing us like a fiddle against each other, and we're making it too easy for them.
it was the "keep Kennedys away from water list"
Diplomacy is the art of saying "Nice doggie" until you can find a rock. Will Rogers
George Bush the Third today announced plans to expand the Homeland democratic No Fly Zone to include the States that border Florida and Texas.
Words to men, as air to birds.
You may not see dead people, but they sometimes vote.
Bringing third world style law enforcement to the USA is a bad idea - travellers having to paying bribes to get through checkpoints is the sort of thing that can happen when it is very easy for security gaurds to make things difficult.
1) Comfort.
Some passengers are extremely anxious when it comes to flying. Even though it's widely believed that you're safer on board an airplane than you are in your own car, there are people who are terrified of flying. As you can imagine, the number of people with this anxiety has risen since 2001.
Alcohol is a depressant, it has a relaxing effect on most people. Yes, there are some who become violent when intoxicated, but when it comes to dispensing alcohol, your friendly flight attendant is going to be more anal than the stingiest barkeep you've ever encountered. He or she will cut you off if it's believed that you've had enough, and not only is that decision final, you can face criminal consequences if you get rowdy about it.
Who would you rather be seated adjacent to, a passenger who's had 3 or 4 shots of the good stuff and is either relaxed or passed out, or a passenger who's enduring a multi-hour panic attack? From the airline's perspective and from the other passengers' perspectives, the guy with a buzz is certainly preferable to the guy who's freaking out.
2) Profit.
The little one-shot-worth bottles of hooch and the cocktails that flight attendants mix with them are a lucrative market. You're on board an airplane, maybe you're nervous or maybe you'd just like to pass the next 4 hours calmly, and (assuming you're flying a class without free beverages) you're willing to fork over a little extra for some relief. Five bucks for a six ounce screwdriver? Sure, why not! $7.50 for a 50 milliliter bottle of Jack to mix with your Coke? Hey, it'll relax me!
Airlines are raking in a lot of money on the Great Bar in the Sky. So much so that the little pony bottles of booze are an attractive target for employee theft. I can't recall which airport, but in the mid-nineties, there was a very well organized theft ring operating with the vending contractor (Dobbs?). Employees who stocked the flight deck food and beverage supplies were pilfering a bag here, a bag there of those bottles. The feds infiltrated the ring, brought them down, some of them had hundreds of thousands in cash along with caches of airplane booze bottles in their homes.
If stockers could make a few hundred grand selling stolen, tax-free liquor at cut rates, imagine what the airlines are making charging full price per bottle. It's profit, lots of profit.
And that's why they serve alcohol on flights. Because drunk and drinkin' are not the same thing, there's a lot of money to be had in the booze biz, and some people wouldn't fly at all (read: lost profit) if they couldn't get loose on the plane.
"BSD: Free as in speech. Linux: Free as in beer. Windows 10: Free as in herpes." --Man On Pink Corner in #52607549.
Open your fucking eyes man...endless congressional investigations and an independant prosecutor with an unlimited budget, unlimited staff, unlimited time, and an unlimited scope of investigation. If the government did all that to you, spending 60 some million on the way, that the worst thing they could come up with was making misleading statments about your (perfectly legal) sex life?
This was not a case of someone being tried for a crime they comitted, its a case of someone being tried for a crime (actually, not even a crime, see below) that they were pressured into making. Thats called entrapment and is illegal.
As others have pointed out, he was asked if he had sexual relations with Monica. He asked the court to define "sexual relations". The court defined it as intercourse. Now, if all he had gotten was a blow job, to say yes at this point would have been a lie. Stick that in your cock and smoke it. And even if he did have intercourse and lied about it, its still not perjury as the statment has to be relevant to the case at hand.
position to sell pardons to people
Yes, he did make some questionable pardons. But nothing compared to Bush I who pardoned heroin dealers and people who could have testfied against him in the Iran Contra trials.
Bill Clinton was impeached BECAUSE HE LIED UNDER OATH.
No he didn't, you moron, as others have shown. The court defined "sexual relations" to mean "intercourse". For him to have said that, yes, he had had "sexual relations with Monica" would have been a lie. Eat it, bitch.
It does not matter what he lied about, the key issue was that he LIED UNDER OATH.
Of course it matters. For it to be purgery, the lie has to be relevant to the case at hand. And while perjury is illegal, so is entrapment.
"Eskimo power"? WTF?
Share and Enjoy: 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
wtf? Does the US not use sugar in their coke? What do they use instead, corn syrup?
Yep. High fructose corn syrup.
Start rhyming, because your grasp on history leaves something to be desired. Reconstruction was a Republican program. It was misused at times, with Democrats being the ones on the short end of the stick.
I'm afraid it's you who needs the history lesson - starting with the fact that "Reconstruction" refers, not just to the program, but to the period. It is the latter definition I was using.
Yes, Reconstruction was a Republican program: Its primary purpose was to protect the newly enfranchised blacks and poor whites, establish schools and roads, and generally rebuild the south and prevent its return to feudalism under the thumbs of a few rich plantation owners.
And that's exactly what it did. And the newly enfranchised blacks and poor whites (who had previously been unable to vote but subject to conscription as guards to recapture escaped slaves) organized local Republican parties.
Meanwhile, the rich whites who had run the show and started the war organized the Ku Klux Klan - one of the classic terrorist organizations of all time. After a few years they were reenfranchised. And within a few years after that, with the aid of their KKK terror, their Democratic party had regained control of the southern governments.
They immediately passed the Jim Crow laws, to consoldate their power and again disenfranchise the blacks and poor whites. "Grandfather clauses" - so only people whose ancesters had voted before the war could vote now. "Literacy tests" for voting - where blacks, poor whites, and known Republicans mibht be given their "test" in Chinese. "Poll Taxes" - so only the rich could afford to pay the tax and thus vote. The first gun control laws - to disarm the blacks and poor whites, leaving them helpless before the KKK.
("Saturday Night Special" dates from the debate over one such law - banning all but one of the most expensive guns as being unsafe. The full term is "Niggertown Saturday Night Special", from the claim that it is suitable only for use in "Niggertown on a Saturday Night".)
And the KKK - the same people as the Democratic party structure - ran rampant, intimidating Republican voters into not voting and potential candidates into not running, lynching or burning those who refused to intimidate. The blacks and poor whites appealed to the federal government for troops to stop their literal slaughter. But they didn't get them.
Because president Johnson - who had been added pre-war to Lincoln's ticket to balance it by appealing to the southern vote, and succeeded him after the assasination, blocked the further implementation of the Reconstruction - over the voiciferous opposition of the rest of the Republican party. For this he was impeached (but not convicted).
And the Democrats took over in the south. And were the power structure of the south once again, for over a century - until the civil rights laws, and the freedom rides set the stage, and the burning of the cities in the '60s finally led to the restoration of black voting rights.
All the way from the Reconstruction era to the 1970s, "Southern Democrat" meant a heavy-handed pro-segregation politician. But once the blacks once again had the vote, they suddenly had a "change of heart". Even the poster-boy of segregation, George Wallace (who bolted the Democratic party and founded his own) eventually "became the black man's friend".
The first civil rights law was proposed, and signed into law, by Eisenhower, with the Kennedys voting against it (something that historical revisionists conveniently forget). What they WILL tell you about is the SECOND civil rights act, promoted by the Johnson who succeeded Kennedy upon HIS assination.
LBJ was as much a maveric to his Democratic party as Lincoln's Johnson was to the Civil War era Republicans. He was honestly in favor of ending segregation and promoting full cicizenship for blacks. And he is known to have despised the Kennedies. He promoted the second Civil Rights act as a "memorial to JFK" - ove
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
You don't have to "pay" for tax cuts, any more than anyone has to "pay" for it because a mugger decides not to steal your wallet.
The tax cuts are not the issue.
The issue is huge increases in spending. Coupling this with tax cuts only makes the situation worse, but it isn't the initial problem.
MMDV (my mileage did vary)... On Tuesday, they put one "S" on my boarding pass -- oddly enough, this was US Air, the same folks who were so helpful to the Senator. The TSA folks missed that when I went through security an hour before my flight. When I tried to board, the gate agent noticed the flag and denied boarding. Seems my ticket wasn't punched. No kidding. I got one of her colleagues to walk me back to the checkpoint, get a supervisor, and commit to me that he wouldn't close the door on me. I was just a little frosty with the super, and he knew his gang had screwed up. I had a thorough but not intrusive inspection -- wand, no patdown, bag contents examined briefly. I made my flight with minutes to spare... it helped that I was going out of Gate 1 at SFO so the walk was all of 50 feet. I was traveling on miles, for a funeral -- I suspect that having ordered up the ticket on Sunday night is what triggered the Screen flag. I had tried and failed to print a boarding pass from online Monday night, so I figured I'd be jumping through some hoops at the airport. No hassles on the return to SF, yesterday. I wonder if I'll wind up on the list again, unless I fly on short notice. Then, I guess it's safest to bank on it.
Some of your points have value, but they all ignore the important distinction.
Spending has gone through the roof after these tax cuts.
This affects your points as follows:
1: Less is taken now, but more is being spent now. This money will have to come from somewhere.
2: Going to straight numbers here is as misleading as what you are trying to refute. The concentration of wealth is so extreme, that there are less people controlling more money. This needs to be addressed for your point to have any validity.
3: But far less than they did. Their percentage savings might be less, but in real dollars it is so much larger as to make your comparison laughable. If you are "not taking" enough to allow somebody to afford to eat 3 meals a day, then that will all get spent and keep moving through the economy.
If you are "not taking" enough to make no difference to somebody's ability to live since they are already living in great luxury relative to most of the citizenry, then they will probably invest more in the stock market, which has some positive stimulus on the economy, but far less than if the money were to be spent on real physical items produced within that economy.
4: Of course they will pay more. Those bills will come due and they will have to be paid. If spending was kept even somewhat in line with income, you would have a point.
Your points are not completely without merit, but by ignoring the obvious problems with your points, you are going as far out as the points you are responding to.
you know... i hate to say it, but all this is stuff that would never have gone over in my "communist bloc" country of birth. At least not in the 70s/80s/90s (only period i have 1st hand experience from)
1) Don't carry anything valuable. They'll make you dump everything on a table, which they don't watch very well. For security staff, they're pretty slack about other people's stuff.
If they lose it, claim there "MAY BE" a bomb in it and watch how fast they get it back.
One year I was travelling and saw the customs thugs wearing a badge saying "US Customs Service - Defenders of Liberty", and it was really annoying to have to refrain from telling that thug that my great**6 grandparents ran a revolution to get rid of tax collectors like him.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
actually i think they pretty well sped them along on trains...still in a hurry?
By and large, language is a tool for concealing the truth. -- George Carlin
I suppose you are serious. How do the US call themselves ? "Land of the free" ?
Everybody else conceives your Govt. as freaking oil thieves - but it's always the general population that has to suffer the treatment fit for the evildoers...
Good luck... I won't travel to the US if I can avoid it. Used to be a nice country, but now ? Stalinist Capitalists.
actually I do
between the greater and lesser infinities sleep the dreams undreamt
...was supposed to be on the "Do Not Drive" List...
"It's not how many people I've killed - it's how I get along with the ones that are still alive."
Where did you get the statement that it has led to no arrests? Do you have any facts to back that up or are you just pulling statements out of thin air?
Well, one could point at that said atrocity killed a few thousand people out of the entire U.S. population...
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?