Florida Airport to Opt of out TSA Screening

[PedOncoDoc]

I wonder if this will start a sweeping motion across the country that will end in the folding of TSA?

Link to article here:

Florida airport to opt out of TSA screening

Build it and they will leave.

Amid concerns over radiation from scanners, civil lawsuits over pat-downs, and general ineptitude on the part of TSA airport personnel, one Florida airport has thrown in the towel. Orlando Sanford International Airport has announced that it will opt out of the TSA’s screening program.

How, you may wonder, can an airport get away with this? Suffice it to say the law is on their side. The Aviation and Transportation Security Act, created after 9/11, contains an opt-out clause. Under it, any U.S. airport is free to hire its own private contracting firm to conduct screenings so long as it used Federal screeners for a period of two years.

The Washington Examiner reports that Rep. John Mica, who will soon chair the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, wrote to the heads of more than 150 U.S. airports to remind them they can and should opt out. He wrote:

When the TSA was established, it was never envisioned that it would become a huge, unwieldy bureaucracy which was soon to grow to 67,000 employees. As TSA has grown larger, more impersonal, and administratively top-heavy, I believe it is important that airports across the country consider utilizing the opt-out provision' and use private screening.

In the wake of recent controversies over airport screenings, Orlando Sanford has taken the congressman’s suggestion to heart. The airport’s director, Larry Dale, is quoted at the website of WDBO, a central Florida radio station, as having said:

All of our due diligence shows it's the way to go. You're going to get better service at a better price and more accountability and better customer service.

The private sector doing a better job for less money? What a crazy idea. Just look at the snazzy job the federal government has done at stimulating the moribund economy and fixing our broken health care system.

[Buffalobob]

Let us hope so. Half of this stuff is because the politicians are afraid of what the opposing political party will say at election time if an attack is successful. The other half of it is that people are truly scared of their own shadow and will do anything and give up any freedom to be safe and out of harms way. I have always thought of the Patriot Act as the Cowards Act but the more I live with it the more I believe it is better characterized as the Politicians Act.

[dadof18x'er]

Originally Posted by PedOncoDoc

I wonder if this will start a sweeping motion across the country that will end in the folding of TSA?

Link to article here:

new marketing ploy....TSA free airports! could be big

[Richard]

Paul Blart - Security Screener.

I'm feeling safer by the second.

Richard

[PSM]

I'm afraid that the Fed's will refuse to allow non-TSA screened pax into their sterile areas. They have to protect their monopoly.

Pat

[EX-Gold Falcon]

I find it highly ironic that both the far left and the right very closely agree about these new scanners. www.alternet.org has at least three articles condemning the TSA and their so-called "porno scanners".


Travis

[The Reaper]

Krauthammer calling it like he sees it.

I tend to agree.

TR

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...111804494.html

Don't touch my junk

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, November 19, 2010

Ah, the airport, where modern folk heroes are made. The airport, where that inspired flight attendant did what everyone who's ever been in the spam-in-a-can crush of a flying aluminum tube - where we collectively pretend that a clutch of peanuts is a meal and a seat cushion is a "flotation device" - has always dreamed of doing: pull the lever, blow the door, explode the chute, grab a beer, slide to the tarmac and walk through the gates to the sanity that lies beyond. Not since Rick and Louis disappeared into the Casablanca fog headed for the Free French garrison in Brazzaville has a stroll on the tarmac thrilled so many.

Who cares that the crazed steward got arrested, pleaded guilty to sundry charges, and probably was a rude, unpleasant SOB to begin with? Bonnie and Clyde were psychopaths, yet what child of the '60s did not fall in love with Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty?

And now three months later, the newest airport hero arrives. His genius was not innovation in getting out, but deconstructing the entire process of getting in. John Tyner, cleverly armed with an iPhone to give YouTube immortality to the encounter, took exception to the TSA guard about to give him the benefit of Homeland Security's newest brainstorm - the upgraded, full-palm, up the groin, all-body pat-down. In a stroke, the young man ascended to myth, or at least the next edition of Bartlett's, warning the agent not to "touch my junk."

Not quite the 18th-century elegance of "Don't Tread on Me," but the age of Twitter has a different cadence from the age of the musket. What the modern battle cry lacks in archaic charm, it makes up for in full-body syllabic punch.

Don't touch my junk is the anthem of the modern man, the Tea Party patriot, the late-life libertarian, the midterm election voter. Don't touch my junk, Obamacare - get out of my doctor's examining room, I'm wearing a paper-thin gown slit down the back. Don't touch my junk, Google - Street View is cool, but get off my street. Don't touch my junk, you airport security goon - my package belongs to no one but me, and do you really think I'm a Nigerian nut job preparing for my 72-virgin orgy by blowing my johnson to kingdom come?

In "Up in the Air," that ironic take on the cramped freneticism of airport life, George Clooney explains why he always follows Asians in the security line:

"They pack light, travel efficiently, and they got a thing for slip-on shoes, God love 'em."

"That's racist!"

"I'm like my mother. I stereotype. It's faster."

That riff is a crowd-pleaser because everyone knows that the entire apparatus of the security line is a national homage to political correctness. Nowhere do more people meekly acquiesce to more useless inconvenience and needless indignity for less purpose. Wizened seniors strain to untie their shoes; beltless salesmen struggle comically to hold up their pants; 3-year-olds scream while being searched insanely for explosives - when everyone, everyone, knows that none of these people is a threat to anyone.

The ultimate idiocy is the full-body screening of the pilot. The pilot doesn't need a bomb or box cutter to bring down a plane. All he has to do is drive it into the water, like the EgyptAir pilot who crashed his plane off Nantucket while intoning "I rely on God," killing all on board.

But we must not bring that up. We pretend that we go through this nonsense as a small price paid to ensure the safety of air travel. Rubbish. This has nothing to do with safety - 95 percent of these inspections, searches, shoe removals and pat-downs are ridiculously unnecessary. The only reason we continue to do this is that people are too cowed to even question the absurd taboo against profiling - when the profile of the airline attacker is narrow, concrete, uniquely definable and universally known. So instead of seeking out terrorists, we seek out tubes of gel in stroller pouches.

The junk man's revolt marks the point at which a docile public declares that it will tolerate only so much idiocy. Metal detector? Back-of-the-hand pat? Okay. We will swallow hard and pretend airline attackers are randomly distributed in the population.

But now you insist on a full-body scan, a fairly accurate representation of my naked image to be viewed by a total stranger? Or alternatively, the full-body pat-down, which, as the junk man correctly noted, would be sexual assault if performed by anyone else?

This time you have gone too far, Big Bro'. The sleeping giant awakes. Take my shoes, remove my belt, waste my time and try my patience. But don't touch my junk.

[EX-Gold Falcon]

Investigate the TSA, Not the Guy Who Refused to Go Through Its 'Porno Scanners'
The TSA is opening an investigation targeting John Tyner, who recieved an aggressive "pat down" at the airport when he refused to go through with the TSA's 'porno scanners.'

http://www.alternet.org/rights/14888...o_scanners%27/

Alternet is left of Pelosi


Travis

[rdret1]

http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/8657083/

If that wasn't bad enough, this flight attendant, who is a breast cancer survivor, was on her way to work AS A FLIGHT ATTENDANT, and was asked to remove her prosthetic breast!

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1203081505.htm

What is wrong with "sniffers?" An older, much less intrusive technology and probably better at actually finding explosive residue and narcotics. The TSA will probably withold federal funds from airports that "opt out." Personally, I haven't flown commercially in years and don't plan too anytime soon.

[PedOncoDoc]

Another story of the brilliant minds at the TSA...

source here:

As the Chalk Leader for my flight home from Afghanistan, I witnessed the following:

When we were on our way back from Afghanistan, we flew out of Baghram Air Field. We went through customs at BAF, full body scanners (no groping), had all of our bags searched, the whole nine yards.

Our first stop was Shannon, Ireland to refuel. After that, we had to stop at Indianapolis, Indiana to drop off about 100 folks from the Indiana National Guard. That’s where the stupid started.

First, everyone was forced to get off the plane–even though the plane wasn’t refueling again. All 330 people got off that plane, rather than let the 100 people from the ING get off. We were filed from the plane to a holding area. No vending machines, no means of escape. Only a male/female latrine.

It’s probably important to mention that we were ALL carrying weapons. Everyone was carrying an M4 Carbine (rifle) and some, like me, were also carrying an M9 pistol. Oh, and our gunners had M-240B machine guns. Of course, the weapons weren’t loaded. And we had been cleared of all ammo well before we even got to customs at Baghram, then AGAIN at customs.

The TSA personnel at the airport seriously considered making us unload all of the baggage from the SECURE cargo hold to have it reinspected. Keep in mind, this cargo had been unpacked, inspected piece by piece by U.S. Customs officials, resealed and had bomb-sniffing dogs give it a one-hour run through. After two hours of sitting in this holding area, the TSA decided not to reinspect our Cargo–just to inspect us again: Soldiers on the way home from war, who had already been inspected, reinspected and kept in a SECURE holding area for 2 hours. Ok, whatever. So we lined up to go through security AGAIN.

This is probably another good time to remind you all that all of us were carrying actual assault rifles, and some of us were also carrying pistols.

So we’re in line, going through one at a time. One of our Soldiers had his Gerber multi-tool. TSA confiscated it. Kind of ridiculous, but it gets better. A few minutes later, a guy empties his pockets and has a pair of nail clippers. Nail clippers. TSA informs the Soldier that they’re going to confiscate his nail clippers. The conversation went something like this:

TSA Guy: You can’t take those on the plane.

Soldier: What? I’ve had them since we left country.

TSA Guy: You’re not suppose to have them.

Soldier: Why?

TSA Guy: They can be used as a weapon.

Soldier: [touches butt stock of the rifle] But this actually is a weapon. And I’m allowed to take it on.

TSA Guy: Yeah but you can’t use it to take over the plane. You don’t have bullets.

Soldier: And I can take over the plane with nail clippers?

TSA Guy: [awkward silence]

Me: Dude, just give him your damn nail clippers so we can get the f**k out of here. I’ll buy you a new set.

Soldier: [hands nail clippers to TSA guy, makes it through security]

This might be a good time to remind everyone that approximately 233 people re-boarded that plane with assault rifles, pistols, and machine guns–but nothing that could have been used as a weapon.

[Richard]

I was just watching the news and the TSA has now said that pilots will not have to go through the scanner/pat down searches but flight attendants will - wanna take a guess at whose union is pissed off now?

And so it goes...

Richard

[The Reaper]

Having flown out of Bagram recently, I can tell you that I believe that is the most thorough search I have ever had.

And the list of things that you are not allowed to bring back is incredible, especially considering that you are departing a combat zone, with weapons.

Anyone who thinks they are going to hijack an airplane full of soldiers headed home with a set of nail clippers can try, and I will buy the nail clippers, as long as I get a video of it. Should be the ass-whipping of the century.

TR

[Richard]

Having flown out of Bagram recently, I can tell you that I believe that is the most thorough search I have ever had.

For me, it was when I was in 1-10th during the height of the RAF/AD/RZ/BM attacks in EU/ME/AFR and returning from the Med thru the Munchen Flughafen in civilian clothing - strip searched (down to underpants) in a booth by one BGS guy while another stood by with his MP5 and watched.

They asked a lot of pointed questions...but they didn't seem too concerned about my carrying nailclippers with me.

Richard

[B36reconman]

Knee-jerk..Knee-Jerk..brings back so many memories of dealing with the TSA...after I figured out their system, I used put everything from my person in my flight bag so as not to delay the screening process...then one day the screener says "I need to look in your flight bag"...go ahead...she pulls out my keys and points to the p38 Ive had since basic and tells me I can't take this on my aircraft as I could hurt someone with it..I told her I could hurt someone with my hands did she want to take them as well..that dumbfounded her, but she wasn't going to give it back.. I finally convienced her to give to the ground personel so they could comat it to my chief pilots office[sentimental value]..they gave it back to me on the plane..there, now don't all feel so much safer????

[Pete]

I used to have to go to the local court houses a number of times during the week.

When they started scanning I found out my shoes had metal wedges in them and my belt also set off the alarm. Plus the Group Coin and other sundry stuff I kept in my pockets.

What did I do? I changed shoe brands to ones without metal inserts, use a belt with a plastic fastener and limited pocket items to keys - something that can be put in a small basket with little effort.

True, travelers might not know if their shoes have a metal insert and the TSA rules say take off shoes and belts - but come on TSA - what the heck can a lady hide in a pair of high heels or paper thin flats?

TSA has dumbed down the reguirements where even a moron or child molester can have fun and be government protected.