Chris Deaton of The Weekly Standard related his recent involvement in the war on freedom terror. Everything except a reach-around at Hartsfield-Jackson:
Ludicrous.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD’s John McCormack wrote last September about his interaction with the TSA’s new “enhanced” pat-down procedure, wherein an agent “runs his hand inside a passenger’s waistband and also runs his hand up the back of each leg until he ‘meets resistance’ and then does the same from the front of each leg.” John (who is among the most genial people humankind is capable of producing) was randomly selected for his inspection.
I, on a recent trip from Jackson-Hartsfield International, was not. The advanced imaging technology (AIT) scanner at the security checkpoint detected something amiss on my person. As ProPublica reported in 2011, “Any potential threat is indicated by a yellow box that shows up roughly where the software detected it—on the right ankle, for example, or the left elbow.” For me, it was my back.
It follows that isolating such an area would allow travelers to forgo the unpleasant experience of being felt up indiscriminately—or, as John wrote, “right over the zipper area of one’s Gap Outlet comfort-stretch khakis.” If the imaging produces a yellow box only over the back, and an agent explains it as such, then clearly the back is the place of concern. The person already has held the mid-jumping-jack pose inside the fancy photo booth and had all other bodily areas, including the left ankle, the head-shoulders-knees-and-toes, and the crotch, cleared for takeoff.
And yet.
Just the same as John and doubtless thousands of other individuals, a professional, shall we say thorough TSA inspector explained to me how he was going to run his hands inside my waistband (which, the imaging resulting in what it did, is arguably passable)—but also run them up and down my legs, in a manner of unwelcome and quite awful foreplay. As part of the sheeple, I allowed the employee to proceed without objection, as well as swab my fingers, and continued on my way after being green-lit several moments thereafter.
They do this to women, children, the elderly, the infirm, and maybe even to service animals. For his part, the key statement in Deaton’s writing was: “As part of the sheeple, I allowed the employee to proceed without objection.” Part of the sheeple.
Here, I pause to wonder if one can request that an attractive female agent do the molesting. Eight or nine, that’s just fine! Probably not. Anyway…
In Washington, District of Corruption, under some heavy glass, appropriately housed relatively near dinosaur bones and other relics of the ancient past, there lies an old, worn, and completely disregarded piece of paper. There are words scribbled on it for those who can still read. Some of them say: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated…”
Get it? Used to be “shall not be violated;” now it’s “violated like your on Harvey’s casting couch.” You are the punch line. Baa. Baa. Baaaaaa.
After the sexual assault, one then gets to sit next to an obese lunatic with an attitude, watch some drunk pee on a seatback, and hear someone cry about their dead prize rabbit. Then they regrettably inform you your luggage is elsewhere, your connecting flight is delayed, and, here, have ten dollars in free drinks and peanuts at the local bar. But, hey, you get all those points. Maybe you’re a “trusted” ewe traveler.
Please do fly commercial. At your own risk. Sheeple.
If they ever commence this foolishness in general aviation or on the highways, then you’ll likely read about that too. Probably on one of those posters at the post office.
