TSA Feels For You

The more I read about the abuses endured by American citizens at the hand of TSA workers, the more I begin to take seriously the theory that our country is being consumed by a government seeking to enslave us under the guise of being "for our own good".  I haven't flown since the body scanners were implemented in some of the major airports but when I heard that Homeland Security chief, Micahel Chertoff, was benefiting financially from the machines' placement, it sounded like a bad idea from the get go. 

Additionally, it didn't take much of a bet that there would be TSA workers misusing the scanned images in humiliating ways.  A multitude of cases are documented where the images were not only passed among the TSA workers but on to some sheriff and police departments strictly due to the gawk factor.  As if invasion of privacy and humiliation isn't enough to call an end to body scanner use but the worst part is the level of radiation emitted with each scan.  The Inter Agency Committee on Radiation Safety said the levels were not acceptable, especially to people who fly regularly.  From the government's perspective, exposing hundreds of thousands to radiation is worth the cost in order to cover their butt.  Don't you crazy citizens get it?  You give us your tax dollars and we pretend to keep you safe from bombs while you get the added bonus of humiliation mixed with radiation for good measure.  Now, get to work and stop thinking so much!

Luckily, every passenger has the "right" to refuse the dangerous and humiliating body scan and opt instead for sexual molestation.  Sign me up!  It's really mind blowing to think the government can hire some minimum wage goons whose job it is to feel peoples' genitalia for weapons.  Boy, does that give me some ideas!  Only within a government gone insane would this exist.

 Apparently the fact that the measures now underway in our airports violate the 4th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

is of no concern to our government.  There is account after account of every day citizens, young teenage girls with prosthetic legs having breasts groped, old men being forced to drop their pants in public due to a knee replacement, young children having their groins examined for explosives.  REALLY?  This is happening in America today.  This is exactly why ALL airport security needs to be taken out of the control of government and placed back into the business of private firms.  Unlike the government where incompetence is never grounds for termination, private firms can be fired, hired and held to standards of common sense and decency!  The government has never operated decently let alone applying rules of common sense.

These absurd measures do NOT keep us safer in the skies, they are merely another way to strip us of our rights as citizens.  And the next step to save us from terrorists being discussed is to implement these same measures at all large sporting events and concerts.  What then?  Screening us each time we step outside our front door?

Safety in the skies is an important goal but nothing in life is risk-free.  Common sense is the best tool any of us have to increase our chances of staying safe.  However, government replaces adaptable common sense with rules that apply to limited scenarios, resulting in more harm than good.  Why then does government pretend they are improving a situation when the facts do not bare them out?  If I were really paranoid, I'd think our government were creating this outrageous atmosphere in the airports specifically to limit our travel as well as stifling the numbers of those coming from the outside.  Tourism and business travel to the United States has dropped at a time when we can least afford it.  Reagan's advice regarding the words Americans should all fear, have never been truer than they are today..."We're from the government and we're here to help".  Help who, exactly?  Maybe if pat downs and groping of private parts is the best way to keep us all safe, perhaps we as travellers should be allowed to do the same search to the TSA agents.  With Liberty and Groin grabbing for ALL!