When One Person Takes a Stand Amazing Things Can Happen [View All]

[sabrina 1]

The battle with the TSA over Rapiscan's full body scanners, is not a new one. It has been going on since they were first introduced years ago and were met with almost immediate outrage from all sides of the political spectrum. Democrats, Independents, Libertarians and many Conservatives all expressed deep concerns about the creeping totalitarianism in this country under the Bush Administration all in the name of 'terror'.

There were legal challenges to keep them out of airports. And even the EU weighed in stating that they did not 'enhance the effort to fight terror'. Scientists and public health officials were also opposed to them because of the threat of harmful exposure to cancer-causing rays.

The only thing new about the controversy now is that they have finally and sadly made their way into our lives. Using the failed attempt by the Underwear Bomber to bring down a plane, advocates for these controversial scanners had a field day and within a year, they finally succeeded in installing them in over 68 Airports.



As everyone knows by now, one the fiercest advocates for their use, Michael Chertoff, was all over TV demanding that they be installed, falsely claiming they would have stopped the Underwear Bomber. He did not disclose that one of the manufacturers of the scanners, Rapiscan, was a client of his consulting firm. Like so many other fear-mongers, he had a huge financial stake in them.

His own failure to provide security for the American People during Katrina, Giuliani's failure to protect the city of NY, has not deterred these two fear-profiteers from using the tragedy of 9/11 to enrich themselves.

But the opposition only intensified by those already involved in the battle for the preservation of our rights. The 'left' has, almost unanimously, always opposed them. Now, seeing them in action, many people are realizing how far a government will go wrt destroying rights if they can get away with it.

Initially, in order to try to minimize the expected outrage, the TSA had allowed people to opt out of the screening by agreeing to a pat-down. Many people chose that option. But this past August, the TSA announced plans to introduce what they called 'Enhanced Pat-downs' for those who would opt out of the scanners.

Blogger Bob, the TSA blogger, posted this information on the TSA blog. However, Blogger Bob did not provide any information on what an 'enhanced pat-down was. This despite the hundreds of questions his post received from commenters on the blog. You can see the hundreds of comments on the TSA blog here:

The TSA Blog: Enhanced Pat-downs

RB Said...

TSA to grope flyers who don’t want to submit to naked X-ray scans
By BILL SANDERSON

Last Updated: 1:05 PM, August 27, 2010

"TSA tried out similar aggressive patdowns in 2004, but abandoned the idea after the American Civil Liberties Union began investigating.

Imposing the patdowns on people who won’t submit to full-body electronic scans would be "punitive," said ACLU legislative counsel Chris Calabrese.

"It seems like another erosion of privacy — yet another indignity the traveling public has to endure," Calabrese said. "Modesty and decency seem to count for very little, but security seems to count for everything."

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/tsa_naked_grope_flyers_who_don_want_L8TOJlYDkGzOULNhSsE6IK#ixzz0xrggZzoH

Just one of the hundreds of comments responding to the announcement. This one pointing out that this was tried way back in 2004 and failed. You can also see some of the responses from the TSA throughout the thread.

And since the word 'enhanced' has become a euphemism for 'abuse' in this country these days, as you can see commenters became concerned that the reluctance of the TSA to explain what they meant, indicated that there would be more government-sanctioned abuses.

Many of the comments from that blog posting in August as it turns out, were pretty prescient. Almost as soon as the 'enhanced pat-downs go into effect, the outraged responses from travelers began to be heard.

One group that was particularly opposed to them, were Airline Workers, especially Pilots who were expected to go through these procedures each day they showed up for work.

About four weeks ago, one of those pilots stood up and simply refused to subject himself to these abuses on a daily basis.

Pilot Refuses Full-Body Scan, Says It Would Violate His Rights

A Memphis pilot who refused an airport security search said the procedure violated his rights and wouldn't make passengers any safer.

Michael Roberts, a first officer with ExpressJet Airlines, refused to submit to a full-body scan and then to a pat-down by Transportation Security Administration officials on Friday, the Memphis Commercial Appeal reported. He left Memphis International Airport without boarding a plane.

Roberts, who has worked for ExpressJet for more than four years, was wearing a pilot's uniform and identification at the time.

The security procedures left him with the choice of being physically assaulted or having his privacy violated, Roberts said.

"I was trying to avoid this assault on my person, and I'm not willing to have images of my nude body produced for some stranger in another room to look at either," Roberts told CNN.

He is still waiting to hear from ExpressJet if this stand for privacy will cost him his job.

.......

Roberts railed against the new security measures long before he was actually selected, auto blog Jalopnik reported.

Roberts wrote a message on a pilots' forum in July calling the new security measures as an "outrage" and a "significant step" on the road to tyranny.

The new measures were simply a power grab by the state, Roberts wrote

"You'd have to have your head buried completely in the sand to believe that the Dept. of Homeland Security really gives two s---s about preventing terrorism," Roberts wrote, according to Jalopnik.

His protest was followed by others. The Pilots Union backed their pilots up, in fact this battle between Pilots and the TSA has been going for years.

Michael Roberts didn't just refuse to subject himself to the scanners, he, and another female pilot, Ann Poe, have both fialed lawsuits against the TSA for violating their rights.

This weekend, TSA's Pistole stated that the TSA would not 'back down' on the scanners or the pat-downs despite the public outrage.

But last Friday, TSA had in fact done just that:



TSA exempts U.S. airline pilots from pat-downs and body scans

Reporting from Washington — After weeks of pressure from pilot unions over controversial new airport screening measures, the Transportation Security Administration agreed Friday to exempt pilots from enhanced pat-downs and full-body scans.

........

Pilots who believe the TSA's search methods are excessive have sued the agency. Michael Roberts, a commercial pilot from Memphis, filed a lawsuit Tuesday alleging that the new procedures violate his constitutional protection against unreasonable search and seizure.

This was not the only victory for the people last week. After the filing of those two lawsuits and outraged complaints by many parents, the TSA also backed down on the abusive screening and pat-downs of young children:

No 'enhanced' pat-downs for kids, TSA says

Children going through airport security will no longer be subject to the aggressive pat-downs that have riled some passengers and will instead face less-intrusive hand searches from screeners, the Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday.

........

The TSA decision to ease screening for children came as the agency was sued Tuesday by two airline pilots seeking to block the use of body scanners and enhanced pat-downs. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., by Michael Roberts, an ExpressJet Airlines pilot who created a minor stir last month when he refused to undergo a body scan and a pat-down at Memphis International Airport, where he was trying to board a flight to his base in Houston. The other plaintiff is Continental Airlines first officer Ann Poe.

As of November 16th, Michael Roberts was still on leave of absence. He is a hero, someone who is willing to lose his job rather than assist the government to violate the rights of the American people. His actions have caused the TSA to pause and reconsider their actions.

The installation of these machines last year reversed all of the work done over the past six years. So we have to start all over again. But in just a few weeks, simply because of a few people taking a stand, progress has been made in the right direction.

I am grateful to all those who helped turn this back just a little.

Thank YOU Michael Roberts.

Thank YOU Continental Airlines first officer Ann Poe.

Thanks too to the bloggers who recorded their experiences and reported on these latest Government excesses.

And thanks to all the citizens who registered their outrage, especially parents and other child advocates who understand the kind of lasting damage these abuses would have on children.

But mostly thanks to all those Liberals who have been fighting this battle for so long, and to all those others from different political backgrounds, who joined them through-out the past several years.

This country owes so much to the 'Left' even if they do not realize it. But that's a whole other subject.