Slashdot Mirror
Former DHS Official Blames Privacy Advocates For TSA's Aggressive Procedures
colinneagle writes with an interesting excerpt from Senate testimony offered yesterday, on the 12th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, from Stewart Baker. Baker formerly served as DHS Assistant Secretary and NSA General Counsel, and gave his opinion on the source of the real problems within the TSA, opining: "Unlike border officials, though, TSA ended up taking more time to inspect everyone, treating all travelers as potential terrorists, and subjecting many to whole-body imaging and enhanced pat-downs. We can't blame TSA for this wrong turn, though. Privacy lobbies persuaded Congress that TSA couldn't be trusted with data about the travelers it was screening. With no information about travelers, TSA had no choice but to treat them all alike, sending us down a long blind alley that has inconvenienced billions."
Sounds like the lesser of two evils to me. If you really think they would not have done both keeping data and the enhanced pat downs I have a bridge to sell you in New York. Slightly used.
Yes, I was punching, kicking, and otherwise beating the crap out of this random person.
It was the fact they put their arms up to shield their face that resulted in such a horrible beating. I bare no fault what so ever for his actions which, despite being performed after I started the beating, are still somehow the reason for the beating.
What a strategy. Want to curtail both privacy and freedom? Set up a a blackmail scheme where you pit one against the other.
It's not my fault I beat you up. If you had just given me your lunch money you wouldn't have a black eye.
Any insufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.
dhs was created and given the impossible job of keeping everyone safe all the time.
if someone gets killed then dhs will be the scapegoat in endless congressional hearings.
what did we expect DHS and the TSA would do? i personally expect them to freak-the-fuck-out and go crazy with the aggressive techniques.
the public bitches no matter what.
I blame the mentality that profiling is some horrible crime, therefore everyone must be overly searched.
It was all my fault for standing in line. Being there.
Won't happen again.
Them females showing their ankles, that's begging for rape.
In this case, it would be blamed on inadvertently showing their ankles while the rape was occurring.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
No, the problem with the TSA is that they exist in the first place. Airlines should be responsible for ensuring their flights are safe. When airlines handle safety they can be held accountable if they do it poorly or they mistreat their customers. The TSA can clearly never be held accountable for anything.
I read this as "We can't profile, so we are less efficient." Police say the same thing and it's probably true. This is one of those trade-offs for liberty where it is good that we recognize the cost of the decision.
Just remember: it doesn't mean this was the wrong decision. It doesn't mean that phony whole-body scanners that don't work are a good idea. It's not an excuse for detaining people who recite the constitution. It doesn't justify searching laptops without a warrant.
Last question: What information does the TSA want that they don't have? We know they get the names of passengers, and they have a list of "detain these people." Do they want to know our religious beliefs? Ethnicity? Country of origin? Shopping habits? It is interesting that the article points out that the people doing the border searches get a lot more information than the TSA.
They have had the data since 2008.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secure_Flight
Every person's name that has flown, what airline, what flight, gender, etc.
ALL OF IT FOR ALMOST FIVE YEARS.
And have they caught anyone using it? Not that I've seen.
With no information about travelers, TSA had no choice but to treat them all alike,
What a horrifying reality, in which the government is forced to treat all citizens as equal. If the government were only allowed to pick and choose the dissidents to subject to harsh treatment and intimidation, all the properly submissive subjects would be free to do anything that doesn't irritate the lordship. You see, it is not the ruling elite who are imposing these restrictions that are harming you, it is your filthy fellow peasants. If you could all simply learn to kneel and submit to the natural authority of the nobility, you would all be happier.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Pedestrian's unwillingness to voluntarily surrender the contents of their pockets is the primary reason for so many of today's muggings.
The TSA checkpoints, pat downs, nude scanners, and so forth are a complete waste. No competent terrorist would be deterred by such things -- and "competent" here means "able to do more damage in an airplane than out." It is easy enough to make a makeshift weapon past the checkpoints, and the 9/11 hijackers all used makeshift weapons. I am not even plotting an attack and I can think of a half dozen ways to arm myself on the other side of a TSA checkpoint.
Basically the TSA is cover-your-ass security theater. If there is any kind of attack, nobody wants to be the politicians who voted to remove the TSA from our airports, regardless of whether or not the checkpoints make a difference.
Palm trees and 8
I'm a foreigner. I had the honor to be subjected to both your border guard and TSA. I wouldn't trust them with a fucking fruitcake.
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
Dear Mr/Mrs Member of Congress,
Anyone that impedes process of Authority by invoking their Constitutional Rights is an un-American terrorist sympathizer who should be locked up in one of our Secret Prisons under Secret laws to be tried at some future date in a Secret court.
The Constitution is the most Un-American thing about America and should be abolished. The TSA and DHS need swift, unquestioned Authority to protect us from those who would harm America and to speed up those long lines at Airport Security Checkpoints and the long lines we shall soon be seeing at Security Checkpoints at Shopping Centers, Train and Bus Terminals and many other major facilities across the Nation
Love,
Stewart Baker
gets in the way of all of our law enforcement efforts.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
I have little to no trust with the people working within my government at this time and none in the people from bottom to the top levels in the TSA . They (TSA) needs flushing down the gape of the porcelain maw.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
The checkpoints are a waste of time and money that have not stopped a single realistic terrorist plot. Profiling is irrelevant, already performed, and does not improve the effectiveness of the TSA checkpoints. This is a distraction from the real issue: billions of wasted dollars, millions of travelers intimidated into giving up their civil rights, and nothing to show for any of it.
Palm trees and 8
CAPS and CAPS 2 , forced the airline to deliver so many data on traveler going *into* the USA it ain't funny. If it was the case that more data would lead to less ivnasive search, I would not have to go thru one , as do my fellow traveller, travelling *into* the USA.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Far less intrusive? Flying out of Ben Gurion, you have to stop and be questioned by airport employees at some three or four checkpoints, and when your bags are being swabbed down and tested for chemical agents, they might decide to question you yet again. Yes, they are efficient and they move you through the airport somewhat faster than you might expect, but they get up in your face much more than TSA staff.
In any event, while the Israeli method does involve scrutinizing everyone's responses to the security agents' questions, it also allows profiling of passengers according to national origin, race or religion. Barring major changes to law, the USA is not able to adopt their methods entirely.
but then I read a hundred other posts saying the exact same things. Out of anybody but a government, this reasoning in use is, in a nutshell, a fast-track to getting convicted as a felon. She wouldn't have sex with me, so I had to rape her. He protected his face, that's why I had to beat him senseless. She wouldn't give me her lunch money voluntarily, that's why I had to punch her in the stomach until she gave it to me. He wouldn't give me his bank account information, that's why I had to go through his mail.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
The thing about international terrorism is that they are patient. If you go by profiles and you stop searching 70 year old grannies, eventually they will find a way to radicalize 70 year old grannies. We aren't talking football hooligans here. The 9/11 attackers didn't fit the profile for "professional terrorist" either, they looked like I.T. people in Kakkis.
So... maybe we should, I dunno, stop doing shit that gives people incentive to attack us? Like, say, invading sovereign nations on made-up evidence, or bombing the holy living hell out of civilian populations because we think there might have been a 'terrorist' somewhere in their village?
Oh, right, how could I forget - they don't attack us because we attack them, they do it because Dur, they hates our freedom! That explains why Canada is basically one big crater...
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Or they could just treat everybody equally and assume they're NOT terrorists. Which side are the odds on?