Slashdot Mirror
Court Approves TSA Body Scans, But Calls For Public Comment
OverTheGeicoE writes "The District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals has finally issued a ruling (PDF) on EPIC v. DHS, a lawsuit seeking suspension of the use of body scanners for primary screening pending an independent review that would include a public comment period. According to the summary, the court 'grant[s] the petition for review' but 'due to the obvious need for the TSA to continue its airport security operations without interruption, we remand the rule to the TSA but do not vacate it.' In short, the TSA is required to open up their policy for public comment, but they can continue to use the scanners in the meantime and most likely afterward. This doesn't sound like much of a victory for EPIC or the U.S. public."
These unwelcome intrusions continue because we allow them. If we the people as a group, boycotted air travel, tgis DHS BS would go away. There are two waaaay more effective antiterror methods to use than spying on everyone and fondling people against their wills... first, airlplanes should be constructed to make hijacking physically impossible, (not that hard to do) and we should figure out what it is we as a nation are doing that makes people in other countries want to fscking want to kill us, and stop doing it. It shouldnt be that hard... if we were willing to open our eyes as a nation and see.
There isn't one shred of data that these devices actually work, or that TSA's security practices have stopped anything. The TSA does not track anything, so there's no way for anyone to know what the hell the truth is. I suspect that the TSA has not stopped anything since 2001, it's been other agencies (FBI, CIA, etc) who have prevented attacks.
There's also the fact that driving is many times more dangerous than flying, yet flying gets the most "security" (not that I want a TSA pat-down before getting into my car, of course, but it just shows how useless they are).
By the way, the backscatter devices would NOT have detected Mr Underpants Bomber. Oh, and every policy the TSA has put in place has been after someone got through security (e.g. shoe bomber => take your shoes off). Security theater at it's finest. Now, who are the politicians who've gotten donations from Rapiscan et.al. and how do we make sure they're permanently removed from office?
These unwelcome intrusions continue because we allow them.
That's the thing, most people I talk to in the real World actually think that the scanner make them safe - they'd be pissed if they went away or if there were another successful terrorist attack would say, 'SEE! We needed those scanners!!"
Remember, we're in a society that has many many people who think that chiropractic doctors are real, homeopathy works, Satan exists and that by increasing the Debt Ceiling, Government spending will go up.
If the TSA sets up a website for public comments about this screening policy, it'll be the only safe place in the world to put kiddie porn, messages between terrorists or between organized crime groups, etc.
Because you can pretty much guarantee that the government will NEVER READ IT.
You left out what may be the worst offender among the TLAs: the Drug Enforcement Administration. The scale of attacks on our rights by the DEA exceeds pretty much any other government agency. The TSA attacks the dignity of America travellers; the DEA routinely sends paramilitary units into homes, rifles drawn, and imprisons or kills the residents. The DEA routinely seizes money and property, and uses the proceeds from those seizures to fund its own operations. The DEA can even declare a substances to be illegal without any congressional approval, and then arrest people for possession of that substance (let me reiterate: the DEA can arrest you for violating laws that the DEA can create without any democratic process).
There is outrage at the TSA's actions by the media, both from left wing and right wing sources, as well as in state legislatures and in congress. Yet we stand by while the DEA is permitted to commit even worse abuses of American rights, and the media is largely silent or even supportive of what the DEA is doing.
Palm trees and 8
I'm more afraid of the TSA than I am of Terrorists.
I'd rather die a free man than fly as a slave.