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Traveler Detained for Anti-TSA Message
scifience writes "A traveler frustrated with recent changes to airport security procedures found himself detained in Milwaukee after writing a message critical of the TSA's leader on a plastic bag presented for screening. The message, which read "Kip Hawley is an Idiot," resulted in a confrontation with law enforcement, the traveler being told that his right to freedom of speech applied only "out there (pointing past the id checkers) not while in here [the checkpoint]." The story, which is detailed in a rapidly-growing thread on a discussion forum catering to frequent flyers, has attracted the interest of the ACLU, an AP reporter, and many others. The incident raises a number of interesting questions and concerns regarding just where our rights end."
But increasingly, your rights end where dissent begins.
"The incident raises a number of interesting questions and concerns regarding just where our rights end."
Don't you mean "... when our rights ended"?
"The incident raises a number of interesting questions and concerns regarding just where our rights end."
Well, they end right there at the point where people happily exchange freedom for that so called "security".
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Born stupid? Try again.
Don't you yanks have a constitiution for this sort of thing?
> regarding just where our rights end.
Your rights ended on the morning of September 11th 2001 - apparantly the morning of a successful coup of the US government by Al-Queda.
In Civilization IV's Civilopedia there is a Benjamin Franklin quotation on article about Liberalism.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both"
In this context the society is not the State but the airport. Do people feel more secure on security control when a person before them is pointed out because of critisim about the system or are they going to be looking around for the lion in the bushes.
Kip Hawley and the entire TSA are rice-bowlers, collecting paychecks from a spectacularly moronic WPA that spends money as fast as the real WPA ever did but doesn't produce a damned thing.
This guy knows it, and said it in a particularly insulting way. To the people collecting those paychecks, who also know it in their hearts, and are ashamed.
So, yeah, they got angry. The twaddle about 1st Amendment rights applying ~out there, not in here~ was just angry-stupid horking, not worth getting in a flap about.
As always, all IMO. Insert "I think" everywhere grammatically possible.
They clearly ought to have let him or her go through. There was no security risk, and being held up for 25 minutes can easily make you miss your flight. On the other hand, as abuses of authority go, this is fairly mild.
But what I'm wondering is why people think it's a good idea to go out of your way to be rude or insulting. If you shout "pig" at every cop you pass in the street, pretty soon you will find somone who takes it to heart and will give you a bad time. Maybe this is a violation of your freedom of speech. But why do it in the first place?
I was thinking to myself while reading this travellers story - and I know from my own experience, these airport security people are much the same everywhere in the world - why do we tolerate security people like this.
It's like Doctors - they are expected to be arrogant, aloof and possessing of a certain air of infallibility. But they're not infalable, we know that and they know that.
Same thing with security people, customs, immigration etc etc. We expect them to be rude and aggressive - but in point of fact they have absolutely no right to be.
When planes blow up etc - the individual security people aren't berated for this. The system maybe - but not the individuals. Also, their lives are not a risk - it is we who travel on the planes that are at risk - and if we can be light-hearted about it, why can't these idiots be? (Gotta love the guy with cocaine).
I think it goes back to the same old thing - give a small man a little power and he will abuse it.
I would like to say that a number of these people are actually very nice and endowed with a decent sense of humour. And you know what - they get the job done just as well.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
Are not very bright, have an over important opinion of themselves and become hostile if contradicted.
Punishing those responsible isn't going to solve this problem in the general case.
Can anyone suggest a more proactive solution?
I think you meant "when did our rights end".
Here in the usa, what rights we had left pretty much ended on 9.11.01, when the government seized the opportunity to grab the rest of them after a tragic event.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Try insulting a cop's mother...
This was hardly that personal. Hawley is the director of the TSA, and these were grunts at an airport. This was akin to telling the average private in Iraq that "Donald Rumsfeld is an idiot".
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
If you don't think too clearly, then it's best you don't think to much.
Evidently philosophical acumen apprently isn't high on the list of qualifications for being a TSA screener.
That said, I fly a great deal, and TSA personnel seem to be fairly representative of the rest of the human race; some are automatically grouchy and unpleasant, some are tempermentally helpful and friendly, and the majority are like most people, they give you back what you bring them. When you're snide or difficult, the grouchy ones return with interest; when you are pleasant and courteous, the friendly ones return that with interest.
Speaking of philosophy, in Plato's ideal state there were three classes of people, rulers, who required the virtue of wisdom (sophia); soldiers, who required the virtue of courage (andreia); and the rest of the people who required the virtue of sophrosune, which is translated often as moderation, but is perhaps better thought of as temperance. The Greeks thought of this as a kind of self-control over pleasure seaking, but it applies to the negative emotions like anger and suspicion as well. In a modern democratic republic, people (even soliders -- possibly especially them) are called on to excerise the virtues of all three Platonic classes of people, although in different measure.
TSA is above all a civilian agency, although security is its function. And the civilian virtue of temperance is critical to the efficient execution of its duties. Consider the grouchy, aggressive and irritable inspector, on one hand, and the overly friendly one on the other. These are both bad, not because the travelling population is comprised mostly of decent people (it is) on one hand, nor because the travelling population contains dangerous bad people (it does). The reason these characteristics are bad in a screener is that they are both forms of distraction from the actual job.
TSA was cobbled together pretty much overnight, so its a mixed bag. But consider the benefits of moderation. If you're too suspicious, you jump to conclusions and you dwell on irrelevant details. If I were a terrorist, I'd want to be a couple of people behind the guy with the Kip Hawley bag, so I could pass through while everyone was dealing with the First Amendment brouhahah. Likewise, you want the inspectors to be pleasant, but not too friendly. Pleasant behavior is a social lubricant; it makes things run faster. That means more people inspected in a given number of time, or the same number scrutinized in more detail. But you don't want pleasantness to rise to outright friendliness. Chatting and making small talk would get in the way of business.
Of course, you need a wide selection of people if you want to consistently pick the ones from the middle of the deck. For better or worse, security is just one of those things we think anybody is able to do; we don't see it as a job with high professional or personal qualifications. By paying accordingly, we don't a work force which is consistently fitted to do the job with excellence. We end up with a workforce that is representative of the population, and have to accept the natural variations in performance that involves. Perhaps that's good enough. Freedom isn't going to fall apart because of some hot-headed TSA employee taking it upon himself to impose loyalty on the citizenry. Society isn't going to unravel if the occasional airplane is hijacked. We don't like to think of it this way, but we really treat these things as part of the cost of doing the business of society. If we didn't, we'd do what was necessary to have a more consistenly professional TSA.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The problem with our current "war" is it has no defined condition for winning. We won WWII when Germany and Japan were defeated, but our current military escapades have no potential end in sight.
How will we know when the War On Terror is over? George W. Bush said, on 9/20/2001, that it "will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated". How the hell are we going to determine that? Who can possibly predict how long that'll take?
Similar problems present themselves in Iraq. "Major combat operations" officially ended over three years ago, when that banner was unfurled on the aircraft carrier. But we're still there. We've been hearing phrases like "as the Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down" and "the next six months will be critical" for years now, with no end in sight.
We have no definition of victory. You can't compare this current erosion of rights, done in the name of perpetual war, with any erosion of rights that might've occurred during the well-defined WWII, because no one has any idea when we'll even know that it's time to expect our rights back.
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.
May the Maths Be with you!
Capisci? Your freedom of speech, or press, or whatever, exist _only_ in your relation to congress. Noone else. Not an airline, not your neighbour, not Slashdot, not your employer, etc.
Congress, and by extension, the government. Most airports are federal government property and the TSA is a government agency. Because of that, the first (and the rest) amendment applies to them.
By your interpretation, someone only has those rights when they are in the congress.
Let's say you're a frequent flyer, for reasons of business. If your local TSA supervisor gropes you or someone you know at a bar or on the street, what are you going to do? What if they get in a property dispute with you? What if their child is tormenting your child at school? What if they don't like the clubs or places you want to frequent? What if you want to campaign for a political party they don't really like?
What will you do? Exercise your rights? Do something that might displease the officials? Perturb or them in some small way? You will on your fuck! You will drop everything and anything the moment you smell that this petty prick might make flying more difficult for you. Only fools and people with the right kind of friends will do otherwise.
As the TSA officials and persons like them grow in number and influence, expect such situations to arise. You think it won't happen? The people who set up the TSA, the people in the TSA, they all believe that such a state of affairs would be right and proper. They have a world view, and it does not involve tolerance for yours. If they can find a way to make life miserable for people who don't follow them, they will.
May the Maths Be with you!
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759 that seems to be relavent in this case
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You hit the nail on the head - my country is turning (in places) into a police state. OK, OK, it's not smart to exercise your free speech in certain times and places. I wouldn't call a local police officer an "idiot" on a routine traffic stop on a dark country lane, even though it would be legal to do so if you weren't threatening
That being said, this is inexcusable. My wife and I aren't going to travel to a cousin's wedding this winter because it has become an exhausting, aggravating, and sometimes demeaning struggle to fly from place to place within the US.
If we (the people of the United States) don't use our right to vote this year and in 2008 to shake up those who imposed these draconian "solutions" to terrorism, well, shame on us all.
Using plain ol' text since 1968
Hey for a safer America you should be willing to do anything, right?
If you have nothing to hide, they wouldn't pick you up, would they?
The terrorists have won by allowing a regime that wants to do things the same as the countries we accuse of "not being free & democratic". The fear of this irrational thing called terrorism is pathetic. More people die from lung cancer every year in the US. More people have died (or will soon) fighting a stupid war with no real goal, direction or possible positive outcome.
This country is slowly moving down the road of fascism or some other "new" form of dictatorship. When a government keeps it's society in check by fear and hatred, only bad things come of it. How long until we get our Hitler? Stalin? Moussolini?
We are not impervious to failure. The almighty dollar seems to be the only concern in the U$A. Pathetic when a country can spend billions on war and nothing to help the poor and sick.
Jesus wouldn't have voted for Bush that is for certain. War is not the solution to the current problems in the world. Our external policies over the last 50 years or so has assisted in creating this monster. When will people wake up and realize we (the country and our representatives) are not infallible? Hopefully not before it's too late.
Until the DoJ tries to claim that your freedom of speech is a danger to national security.
Then your lawsuit (usually) disappears.
:(){
How convenient. Extremists don't seem to follow their respective books very much.
i would think that their copies of the books seem to be missing some pages.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
Threats to nuke Iran if they continue their nuclear programme seem very hypocritical.
I don't blame Iran for pursuing nukes if the information on the matter isn't lie.
A nuclear arsenal is the ticket to respect and an insurance policy against invasion ala Iraq. Look at North Korea; a wild-eyed dictator brags that he can hit Palo Alto with a nuclear missle. His country doesn't get invaded, he gets nuclear talks and diplomacy. Pakistan is a dictatorship set up after a military coup and said to be a hiding place for OBL. Since they have the bomb and play ball with the US, they're allies and can sit at the big kids table with the rest of the nuclear-armed nations.
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
This is the Military Dictatorship Act (Bush overtly claims his authority comes as Commander in Chief). There's no two ways about it
There are millions of Americans out there who are distressed at what's going on, but think we're still ok, because no one has come to take them away for speaking their mind. They overlook the fact that dictatorship is not defined by whether or not they have come to take you away, but whether or not they have the legal authority to come take you away.
Once they have the legal authority when they finally come to take you away you will have no defense; and it is your ability to defend yourself under law that defines a free society.
But don't worry, they aren't likely to slap chains on you, what they do is slap chains on a few select people to make you afraid and get you to slap chains on yourself, like a "good little boy."
And your children will accept without question that you have no rights of speech, because they do not even understand the concept. Be afraid of . . . your children.
Yes, I'm being "alarmist." That's the frickin' point.
KFG
"The incident raises a number of interesting questions and concerns regarding just where our rights end."
There is no interesting question about where our rights end. Our rights themselves continue to be what they were. The interesting question is where our rights begin to be oppressed.
If you fail to grasp this important distinction, you are granting others power over your inalienable rights.
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd
Good of you to bring that up. There's a big difference between saying everyone who isn't on your side is your enemy, and saying everyone who is not your enemy is your friend.
I don't know about you, but my servers run on the power of cotton candy and happy thoughts. -Anonymous Coward
Go to http://www.senate.gov./
Use the "Find your Senator" box at the upper right. Sorry, Javascript required. If you already know who your Senators are you can skip this step.
Dial the phone numbers given.
Politely (the staff member is not to blame) and concisely (s/he is busy) explain your values about trials and torture.
There was an amendment to the bill from the Democrats that would have resotred to the House version of the bill the removed protections. It's the amendment that was killed. :-(
Basically, some of the Senate said "Woah, that house version goes too far!" and they tried to tone it down. But once it got out of committee, the Senate as a whole smashed it and has gone on to procedure regarding the full-strength House version of the bill.
You can read both at senate.gov (see the right-hand column).
As I quoted to another poster, this is the most important bit:
"SEC. 6. HABEAS CORPUS MATTERS.
(a) In General- Section 2241 of title 28, United States Code, is amended--
(1) by striking subsection (e) (as added by section 1005(e)(1) of Public Law 109-148 (119 Stat. 2742)) and by striking subsection (e) (as added by added by section 1405(e)(1) of Public Law 109-163 (119 Stat. 3477)); and
(2) by adding at the end the following new subsection:
`(e)(1) No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who--
`(A) is currently in United States custody; and
`(B) has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.
`(2) Except as provided in paragraphs (2) and (3) of section 1005(e) of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (10 U.S.C. 801 note), no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any other action against the United States or its agents relating to any aspect of the detention, transfer, treatment, trial, or conditions of confinement of an alien detained by the United States who--
`(A) is currently in United States custody; and
`(B) has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.'.
(b) Effective Date- The amendments made by subsection (a) shall take effect on the date of the enactment of this Act, and shall apply to all cases, without exception, pending on or after the date of the enactment of this Act which relate to any aspect of the detention, transfer, treatment, trial, or conditions of detention of an alien detained by the United States since September 11, 2001."
You'll notice that the bill claims to apply to aliens. But once you're picked up as an alien, no court has jurisdiction to review your status. So if they come by your house to pick you as a citizen up, there is no way for you to say "No way, dude, I'm a citizen!" because the moment you're picked up, the courts lose jurisdiction.
If they decide you're an alien, not a citizen, that's it under the law. And who is they? At the top of the bill it spells out clearly: the Secretary of Defense or anyone he designates. So, basically: party members.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW