Oh, hell no. The last thing we need is more dumbshits, who couldn't hack it at McDonalds, groping people and clogging up the transportation networks. We need to shut the TSA down, not expand its scope.
I take the train a lot despite it taking longer and not being a good deal specifically to avoid dealing with the TSA. This would just keep me from traveling in general
Regardless of what laws are on the books of the respective countries, the state interferes in my day-to-day life vastly less in Germany than in the United States, and the interactions I do encounter are generally way, way less brain damaged than the idiocy perpetrated continuously by the TSA, idiot American cops, et al.
I'm not running any more than someone who moved from e.g. Detroit to Manhattan (something I did in 2006).
Nations are terrible, leaky abstractions (intended to make you feel proud of things you have not done and hate people you have not met) and their use is discouraged.
Fighting for change against cowardly authoritarians themselves armed with machine guns and drones (like the Department of Homeland Security) is pointless without your own weapons, and I do not wish to take up arms. Anything less is ineffective, as Snowden and al-Awlaki and Nacchio (and perhaps Obama) have shown us.
Running from the USA would mean you run to another country which probably has the same proportion (or worse) of people that mindcrime is complaining about.
Exactly, not to mention the fact that trains can stop. Buses can stop. We have all the security in planes not because they move, but because they have to keep moving.
>Oh, hell no. The last thing we need is more dumbshits, who couldn't hack it at McDonalds, groping people and clogging up the transportation networks
What a shitty and ignorant comment to insult the employees as if they are the ones creating the rules and guidelines they follow. And just because they choose to work at TSA instead of McDonalds somehow makes them dumber is even more stupid.
"Just following orders" isn't a good enough excuse. There are plenty of jobs that I wouldn't take because I fundamentally disagree with what they entail. Being a stagehand for security theatre is one of them.
In my experience, the TSA has difficulty distinguishing curves from angles. It is perhaps permissible that an X-ray machine lacks the appropriate resolution, but the human eye and brain are clearly capable of determining curved-tipped scissors from sharp-tipped scissors. Not so the federal security officers who beggar that species classification, and must query and ponder whenever they encounter examples of the former among my possessions.
I don't understand how a TSA-like organization is going to secure ground transportation. To get total safety, you'd have to secure every grade crossing, bridge, bike-path-near-the-tracks, and so on. Any idiot can be texting and stall their car at a grade crossing and kill way more people than most terrorists dream of. Happens quite often. What are some security guards looking for drugs in your luggage going to do about it?
Air travel is nice because there is basically one area that needs to be secured; once the plane is in the air, there's not much you can do to it. (Modulo 9/11!) I don't think the TSA does much (any airport employee can smuggle whatever they want into the secure area), but at least the task is theoretically possible. And, with air travel, the risks are higher; you can hijack the plane and use it as a missile. Trains run on tracks, so there is really no way the thing can take out the World Trade Center.
Anyway, this pattern of money grabs after botched terrorist attacks is depressing and distracts us from the real problems in New York City. Kids die every week walking to school because of people not driving carefully. Actual deaths. Kids. How do we react? By not filing charges, and by removing traffic calming devices because they interfere with parades. (http://gothamist.com/2016/08/29/nypd_safety_west_indian_para...) Are we going to address real problems, or are we going to waste our limited money on things that simply don't happen because the possibility scares us?
Not to mention the countless rural flag stops across the country where there isn't even a physical Amtrak station, the trail just stops at some town of a few hundred or thousand people if someone has purchased a ticket there, or otherwise just passes through without stopping. They're never going to have security at those stops.
If US citizens are subject to being brow beaten and humiliated by the TSA on buses and trains in addition to air travel then the terrorist will have succeeded in fundamentally alerting the lives of Americans on a daily basis.
> Since grade-crossing accidents typically do not lead to fatalities on board the train, investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) were particularly interested in determining why the fatalities occurred.
I think this story buries the lede - it is pretty clear that this is not about creating TSA checkpoints at train stations and bus depots:
"A bipartisan bill introduced Thursday by Senator John Thune (R-S.D.) would require the TSA to use a risk-based security model for these transport modes and to budget money based on those risks. It would require a wider use of the agency’s terrorist watch list by train operators and more detailed passenger manifests along with tighter screening of marine employees. The legislation also would increase the TSA’s canine use by as many as 70 dog-handler teams for surface transportation."
"Lest you begin hyperventilating, it’s virtually impossible to envision airport-style screening detectors or security queues snaked around America’s train and bus passenger depots. “This is very much not creating for bus or rail transportation the [security] model that exists for aviation,” said Frederick Hill, a spokesman for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, which Thune chairs."
This is a key point - airport-style security at train stations would be a disaster. Stricter employee screening and more dog-handler teams, on the other hand, is a reasonable proposition. I think it's difficult though to trust the TSA to do this well and to trust it not to escalate into something much more intrusive.
Also notable though, is that it seems that much of this is about increasing TSA intelligence / data analysis:
The new bill “addresses gaps in TSA’s approach to assessing security risks and will help the agency better fulfill its role as a hub of analysis, planning, and information...”
If you want to "opt out" without opting out, simply tell the TSA that you can't lift your arms above your head. They'll let you bypass the scanner - sometimes even the metal detector - and swab your hands.. and you're done. I've done it 20+ times in the last year. If they ever ask why, I say "it's a college basketball injury." I'm a 5'8" (1.72m).
And if you get really brave, you can try my thing "I can't lift my arms like this" while lifting my arms.
I have been Opting Out since the backscatter machines were used and they were "safe". What a boondoggle, wasted $800mm on those. The only downside is traveling with friends & family you get a few jokes cracked at your expense, but that never bothers me. Most agents I talk with acknowledge that its security theatre, only once is a while do you get an agent who thinks they will be the next rambo and having that extra .5oz of liquid over the limit in your bag is a threat to national security and treats you as such.
When I travel with friends of family, I encourage them to not acknowledge me for a few minutes and then turn opting out into a fun experience for everyone! Except the TSA. ;)
Money money money moooooney... MONEY. There's nothing else that could inspire the sheer balls for an organization with such a crushing track record of failure (95% last tested, right?) to imagine that this is a good idea.
If congress and their staff were forced to go through the same process as everyone else (and not through a VIP precheck line) they might realize what a clusterfuck it has become.
Last flight I had some water left in my bag which I realized just before going through the security scanner. So instead of letting it go to waste, I thought it'd be best to quickly drink it. But I was stopped by a TSA agent saying it's a security risk and I'd need to either leave or give him the bottle clear bottle of water.
He had nonchalantly took it, he had no doubt it was plain water and threw it in a trash container full of other bottles. Kind of ridiculous, if they really thought a clear liquid was a liquid bomb or something, why would they give me the option of leaving it with it? And how could it possible be a bigger security risk for me to ingest it, than give it to them to put in the open
While it's not like it ruined my day, it's certainly enough to convince me the whole thing is a joke.
Well, if TSA checks through diapers of babies just in case - you know - you as a parent might have put a bomb there, why not swallowing some sort of magical liquid that let you live for next 45 minutes, and explode/destroy aircraft once you get aboard and in the air?
The thing to remember here is that we gave up some of our liberties at the airport because airplanes were demonstrated to be credible weapons for attacking any location in the nation.
Trains and buses (to a lesser degree) do not share that attack vector. Trains ride on externally-controlled rails, and often depend on externally-provided power. Buses are slow, depend on roadways to reach any targets, and don't really offer any novel attack vectors vs. trucks.
Can we just have martial law with curfew, checkpoints, and papers already? I don't know about you but having no rights would make me feel so much safer.
Not sure why the downvotes, you're just taking the TSA bullshit through it's logical progression a few steps. (hint: it never was about security for the people)
It boggles my mind how certain countries are becoming safer day by day, yet people feel compelled to vote for pervasive surveillance and control. I think it is a mental disorder, a complete disconnect from reality, bordering on schizophrenia.
I call them scared little bunny rabbits. People freaked out over a statistical 0.0% increase in the local population let alone nationally, for refugees coming into the country. And these people are all, "no they're dangerous, they're not vetted, we're being stupid..." And when I say, "no we're being generous, because we can be and should be." And these types just cock their heads and frown. Yep, scared little bunny rabbits. Life contains dangers, there is no life guarantee, but so many people are scared of bullshit. Go put some sunblock on, or stop smoking, or something useful.
The pervasive surveillance did help them hone in on a lead the very night of the attack. I wonder if the actual intel will ever be revealed. Presumably cell phone records with the IMSI numbers from the detonators might have led to the traffic stop of his buddies.
You only have to look at where people get information from to see why they might be suffering from a complete disconnect from reality. When the people providing "news" have a monetary incentive to keep peoples' eyes glued on the screen/app they have no reason to report that everything's mostly ok and large scale bad things are very rare.
The country is simply too large to physically secure everything.
We'd have to become a police state to even begin to protect every potentially sensitive area. You can kill people with almost everything and it is infeasible to prevent it altogether by force of arms.
Why does anything need to change? This is another in a long line of ineffective terrorist attacks, and if anything strengthens the case for keeping on as usual (if you want to argue that security at the best targets is already so good that people are resorting to random dumpsters). No one died and as far as I can tell no one even has serious injuries.
The US Switchblade Knife Act of 1958 prohibits the import or interstate commerce of switchblades. Plus a bunch of state laws about possession and carry.
Note that almost all knives people consider to be switchblades are actually "assisted open" knives instead.
The law very specifically requires a switchblade be opened by pressing a button on the handle. (They're generally implemented by a spring pushing on the blade and a catch released by the button). An assisted open knife has you start opening the knife by applying pressure to a stud on the /blade/ which causes a spring which had been holding it closed to continue opening it instead. These do not meet the definition of "switchblade" and are not illegal in most jurisdictions.
They are in Canada or at least in my province they are the law states that any knife you can open with one hand is illegal.
Yet somehow a man managed to open a business in a strip mall selling just switchblade knives near a school and sold them to teenagers. He was caught and fined. Opened his store again and was caught selling them to teens again.
Explanation: only a few congressional districts have airports, but a lot more have bus stops & train stations. TSA are the kind of shitty patronage jobs that appeal to them.
and there are only 435 Congressional districts. (Of course some districts have more than one primary airport.) I suspect most of these have TSA checkpoints; remember that there are much smaller airports than these, and all of these airports have scheduled commercial air carrier service! The smallest airports on this list that I've flown to, BLI, SBA, and CMI, all have TSA checkpoints.
Further expansion of the TSA seems a pretty universal nightmare to me. Maybe it's a bit out of place here, I'm not sure - their presence at train and bus stations wouldn't be a "new phenomenon" though[1]. I do think the TSA/DHS et al encourage unhealthy forms of paranoia[2], and my own experience with them warrants loathing. They've also hard-earned a pretty bad reputation, which doesn't exactly merit additional responsibilities.
