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TSA Bans Flight If You Refuse To Show ID
mytrip notes a CNet blog entry on the recent TSA rule change banning flight to anyone who refuses to produce ID. It's OK if you claim to have lost or forgotten your ID — you undergo a pat-down and hand search of your carry-on bag and you're on your way. The new rule goes into effect June 21. "The change of rules seems to be a pretty obvious case of security theater. Real terrorists do not refuse to show ID. They claim to have lost their ID, or they use a fake. TSA's new rules only protect us from a non-existent breed of terrorists who are unable to lie."
I've always wondered about why people don't seem to get that fake IDs can be used for more than just getting into bars. And in that, far more serious things. I had my own experience with having to provide an ID in a case where it was not needed or useful to them. I bought an account with Hostgator once and they had a policy of not allowing you to use a shell account without providing a faxed copy of your driver's license. I argued with the system administrator there that it was a useless policy as it doesn't prove anything as IDs can be faked. And especially with the low quality of a fax, how could they tell. I could easily put in fake details using any simple image editor. He actually responded saying something like "If I can prevent one security breach, then the policy is worth it.". He didn't seem to get that it won't stop anything. Hackers see policies as obstacles to get over, not impassable walls. What's sad is that Hostgator isn't the only company with this very same policy. They probably don't realize how many malicious hackers they already have one their systems.
All that IDs provide is another hoop for everyone to jump through, including hackers and terrorists. They are useless as a security measure to anyone who doesn't have the authority to validate them.
After all, not one of the 9/11 hijackers had validly issued ID in their own names. Right?
Yeah. Maybe the next president will do something to fix the utterly idiotic "security" games the TSA insists on playing with airline travel. I'm not putting money on it, though.
What I find amusing is that you refer to the people creating these policies as "we". Like you've got any say in it.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Fuck DHS and the TSA. Fuck them and the horse they rode in on. They're far worse (if they aren't yet, they will be, just wait) than any terrorist ever could be.
Sad part is, I'd move to another country if I knew of any better ones out there. Anyone know of a mostly English-speaking country that doesn't walk all over its citizens' rights? I know the UK is right out, and I hear Australia is pretty bad too.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
[emphasis mine]
So... refusing to identify yourself at the airport is equivalent to refusing to identify yourself when you're arrested.
Let's stop piddlefucking around and admit that planes are now airborne maximum security prisons. Because that's exactly how their "security" is treating passengers.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
It's also amazing how conservatives claim to strive for less state control by not regulating the market and by not taxing the rich and powerful, but they sure don't have a problem regulating the lives of the many by imposing "security measures" and by ignoring human rights in the name of national security. Isn't it weird? Conservatives don't have a problem with the government invading their personal lives, but they DO have a problem with the government invading the corporations' lives. In the free market state you Americans idolize, corporations and citizens should have the same treatment under the eye of the law. No more, no less.
that refuse to go along with the pack and surrender all of their rights when asked in a confident voice by an authority figure.
Bingo. They could not have made the intention any more transparent. It's not about security - otherwise why is pat-down good enough for people who just make up an excuse? It's about control and making the population submissive. We learn to bend over at the airport and it makes it easier to do it at the checkpoint, the federal building, the state border, or while jogging in a neighborhood in which they think you don't belong.
Leave the gun, take the cannolis.
...but it will catch the real enemy of this administration and of the tsa - folks willing to think for themselves and unwilling to be scared into submitting to big brother.
i already take off my shoes at the airport. and, because my job requires me to fly quite a bit and get where i'm going, i produce id (passport, usually). and every time i take the baggie with my toothpaste and travel-size deodorant out of my carry-on, i throw up in my mouth a little bit.
but i keep doing it.
because i have to pay the mortgage.
i can't remember who said this, but someone once said the 20th/21st century equivalent to the nazi war criminals' "i was just following orders" line will be "well, i had a mortgage to pay"...
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The government knows exactly how much I make. People can look me up on line and see where I live, and how much I paid for my house. Credit companies know if I am late paying my bills. My credit card company knows what kind of purchases I make, and calls me if I do something unusual. Amazon knows what kind of books I read. Netflix knows what kind of movies I watch. In my county, you can look up my name on line and see if I have an outstanding traffic ticket. So you think I am going to get excited about my "privacy" if I have to show an ID?
The whole purpose is for the TSA to make the traveller feel that they are being kept safe. Real safety has nothing to do with it.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
This is an inane argument. There is not a bit of evidence that Al Qaeda or any of the Islamic terrorist groups are trying to undermine America by eroding our civil liberties. You may not have noticed it, but Islamic terrorists are not exactly big libertarians. Religious fundamentalists tend not to be. The idea that they recognize the power of Jeffersonian ideals and are therefore trying to move us away from them is farcical.
If you want to argue that such erosion of civil liberties is bad for the United States, such a case can be made. But to argue that this was the terrorists' intent is to project your own beliefs onto them.
When I was in school ( oh so long ago ), we were told that America was better than the Soviet Union because we were free.
... and here we are:
"The Soviets don't let you travel without paperwork - we would never do that because we are a free nation."
"The Soviets tell everyone that the restrictions are 'for their protection', but it is a lie."
"The Soviets distort the news which is reported to the people."
Fast forward 25 years
Being shaken down for "papers" and "inspected" by the powers that be when we travel (air, auto, borders) or sign up to do an honest day's work.
All while living under an administration which distorts information as a matter of policy, supporting war with lies.
Not only that but we are losing out economically to a nation which is officially Communist.
So what did we win in the "cold war", exactly ?
I'd move away, but that would be allowing them to win.
Lets make THEM move away and get on with the business of restoring our nation !
Lurking in the desert
Corporations exist primarily as a means to shield owners from the liability that results from actions performed in the service of the corporation.
They aren't anywhere near the same thing.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Absolutely not. By asking this question, you've demonstrated that you're ALREADY under their control.
And as far as what constitutional rights have been violated, you are ignorant and misunderstanding the bill of rights. The bill of rights is not an enumeration of what rights you have - it's merely a list of a few of your rights that the framers thought so important as to merit special mention.
In fact, some were against a bill of rights for the very reason that they felt that the ignorant would see them as your only rights. As a compromise, the ninth amendment was added to make sure people understood this fact:
Ninth Amendment - Protection of rights not specifically enumerated in the Bill of Rights.
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
As you have demonstrated, it didn't fucking work.
This space available.
Oh, give me a break. This isn't that hard to understand; even you can handle it:
They won't let you fly if you say "I don't want to show ID". They will let you fly if you say, "I forgot my ID". That won't stop a single bad guy ever. It doesn't solve any problem at all even a little bit, except for people expressing opinions the TSA doesn't like.
What a sad existence conservatism believes in if the rights you support don't even include something as basic as the right to do what you like as long as it doesn't harm anyone else.
We can be monitored by the government every second of our lives and every action we take can be subject to government approval but as long as you can make money and complain about it's all good?
We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
There's actually a good reason for asking that question. It's a knowledge-based verification, to try to catch someone who might pickpocket a passport off someone else in line. It's not a foolproof security measure, but if you happened to see someone who looks like you in line and swipe their passport it might be difficult to memorize their birthday and their prior itinerary in the few minutes you have before you're next in line (if you try to steal it earlier your theft is less likely to go unnoticed). On the other hand, you'll surely remember your own birthday, nationality, and whether or not you've been to a given country, so the questions cause minimal inconvenience to those going through immigration.
"TSA's new rules only protect us from a non-existent breed of terrorists who are unable to lie."
This is silly and misses the point. They protect us from something far more dangerous to the regime: People who refuse to have their rights flushed away.
Here is what makes "terrorism" interesting. Terrorism on its own is close to harmless. The Spain bombings, 9/11, the London bombings... all of those bombings didn't even dent those nations. Even 9/11 was just a drop in the bucket. 4000 or so people dying in the US? It won't even register as a blip on US death rates for a year. A couple of knocked over towers? Those are a little costly, but they pale in comparison to even a minor hurricane.
The terrorist attack itself was a pin prick against a giant. The problem is that the giant in response decided to saw off its own hand to keep from ever being pricked again.
While the attack itself did minimal economic damage and a barely noticeable effect on the number of people living and dying in the US (especially next to such terrors as cancer or heart disease), our response to it did horrible.
I am not even pointing to the government response alone. The government did terrible damage to itself by implementing policies that make business harder, travel harder, and importing students and skilled laborers harder. Lets not even considered the more intangible damage done to civil liberties. Even worse, people's own reactions turned a minor disaster into a major disaster. Being terrified of airplanes despite the fact that you are vastly more likely to be struck dead in a car did terrible economic damage. Fear that lead to reduced spending did horrible economic damage.
My point is this. Terrorist are hardly worth mentioning for the acts that they commit. They rank far FAR below other dangers that are likely to kill you. McDonald's and swimming pools kill far more people than terrorist do in the US. Cars kill vastly more people, and yet we manage to soldier on in utter indifference. The only thing that hurts about a terrorist attack is our very own response. If we want to defend against terrorist attacks in the future, prevention isn't the answer. Snatching low hanging fruit, like reinforcing plane doors and telling passengers to kick the shit out of anyone trying to get into the cockpit is fine and relatively cheap. Where the REAL savings would come from is if policy makers could find a way to dampen their own and the publics responses to terrorism. The damage is done when we react by chopping our own limbs off. If we could find a way to not react so violently, terrorist attacks, while hardly a good thing, would be FAR less destructive.