When Will The Obama Administration And TSA Wake Up?

TSA body scans and pat downs are an issue that just won't go away. The Obama administration is once again demonstrating its lack of experience in dealing with the nation's problems. The recent TSA directives are NOT making flying any safer for Americans. Instead they are needlessly causing delays at the airport and aggravating a public that wants less and less government interference.

Look at the general aviation sector(private planes and jets) of air travel. General aviation land on the same runways and airports that commercial carriers use for passenger travel. There are no security checkpoints at the fixed based operators who tend to the needs of general aviation aircraft.

The TSA has a "secure voluntary" program for fixed based operators. TSA’s Secure Fixed Base Operator Program is a proof of concept, public-private sector partnership program that will allow FBOs to check passenger and crew identification against manifest or eAPIS filings for positive identification of passengers and crew on board general aviation aircraft. If you click on the link above you will find this question and answer.

The passengers and/or crewmembers do not wish to participate in this program. Is the flight prohibited from departing the Secure FBO location, or from entering U.S. airspace?
No. The Secure Fixed Base Operator Program is a voluntary initiative. No flight should be delayed or otherwise affected if an individual chooses not to participate in the program. Go figure. Who is the moron at TSA that came up with body scans and pat downs?

Hangars are not monitored where the planes are stored. In many cases one can drive onto the airport environment by simply punching in a code that is not unique to each pilot at a gate designed to keep the public out. There is usually only one code for the entire airport.

Turning a general aviation aircraft into a "bomb laden wagon" is simple. If Timothy McVie was able to load a truck with incendiaries terrorists would have no problem doing the same with small aircraft.

In 1994 Frank Eugene Corder flew a single engined Cessna into the White House. Despite being detected on radar the Secret Service was not able to stop the crash into the presidential mansion. Even if a private aircraft were detected in an airport environment there is simply no credible way of knowing whether it is a threat or not. This comment was made about the White House incident.

"The scenario for a crackpot pilot being able to do that is within reason," said Leo Janssens, president of the Ohio-based Aviation Safety Institute. "It's almost impossible to keep planes out of that area because it's so close to National Airport." It is definitely impossible to keep private aircraft out of the airport environment.

You can't take a file or scissors on an airplane. But those lucky enough to carry an American Express Centurion Card(also known as the American Express Black Card) have a tool that can slice anyone at any time. It is made of titanium. Holders are only required to put it through the scanner at the airport, not place it in their baggage for stowing underneath in the cargo hold.

The TSA has not solved one problem with body scanning or pat downs. What they did was convince more and more people that the government wants more control over our lives. Liberty and justice for all is out the window. If a teacher can be fired and arrested for groping a student what gives the government the right to ignore the law and take away our civil liberties?

Damon Root writes this assessment on body scanners and pat downs.

Air travelers now face a few bad choices: Submit to the body scanner, endure an invasive manual pat-down or accept an $11,000 civil fine. This is security theater at its finest. Congress needs to revisit these protocols completely—starting with a total halt to the obscenely expensive and jarringly ineffective full-body scanner.

Despite what their proponents would have us believe, body scanners are not some magical tool to find all weapons and explosives that can be hidden on the human body. Yes, the scanners work against high-density objects such as guns and knives—but so do traditional magnetometers.

And the scanners fare poorly against low-density materials such as thin plastics, gels and liquids. Care to guess what [Christmas bomber Farouk] Abdulmutallab's bomb was made of? The Government Accountability Office reported in March that it's not clear that a scanner would've detected that device.

Read this New York Post Op-Ed on the cost of the scanners.

If the ineffectiveness of body scanners is not enough to give the public pause, the cost ought to be.

An army of executives for scanner-producing corporations -- mostly former high-ranking Homeland Security officials -- successfully lobbied Congress into spending $300 million in stimulus money to buy the scanners. But running them will cost another $340 million each year. Operating them means 5,000 added TSA personnel, growing the screener workforce by 10 percent. This, when the federal debt commission is saying that we must cut federal employment rolls, including some FBI agents, just to keep spending sustainable.

Why cut funding for the people who actually catch terrorists to add more pointless hassles at the airport? (Going through a body scanner also takes longer -- the process is slower than magnetometers.)

Scanners clearly fail an honest cost-benefit analysis. Yet it's privacy that has the traveling public up in arms. Understandably so -- the message the TSA is sending us is: "Be seen naked or get groped."

We tell our children not to talk to strangers, but now a government functionary gets to fondle away just because he has a badge?

Since when are airplanes the only things terrorists want to blow up? Evidently the Obama administration didn't pay attention the last election.

Kanjorski Is Out Of Touch

In today's Standard Speaker Paul Kanjorski wants to remind Americans that the Democrats should be proud of what they accomplished.

"First, and foremost, when I say Democrats, stand up tall, be proud. My God, the Democratic Party did everything that was good for this country and good for the working individuals of this country, and good for the middle class of this country. We have nothing to apologize for."

"You know why I'm charged up?" Kanjorski said in an interview later. "Because I think it is one of the most definitive elections in our lifetime. And that's why I'm in it. Because I think we can't afford to make the mistake of going in the wrong direction. And all of these people who are talking about going in another direction, they're (like) pre-Franklin Roosevelt people."

Evidently this chart is what he means.

"They want to go back to when Wall Street billionaires or millionaires controlled this country and their kids could just slosh around, didn't have to work, didn't have to produce and they were guaranteed their membership at the country club and their membership at the yacht club," Kanjorski said. "I don't believe in that. I believe in a merit society.

Paul, are you talking about the firms that gave you $4 million in political contributions? Paul, are you talking about the people who had American working?

This statement by Kanjorski is going to resonate over the next few days.

"The fight's not about the damn mosque in New York," he tells the Democrats at Waldorf Park. "All of us are annoyed at the fact that ... they want to build that mosque, but it's not going to have an effect on our lives.

Kanjo, you tell that to these people.

I feel sorry for you. When you are used to this it is hard to remember the sacrifices I guess.

Freedom- Keep It Alive

New controversy near the site of Ground Zero is emerging as St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, a tiny, four-story building that had been located directly in front of the second tower has been stymed in its attempt to rebuild by the Port Authority of New York. According to FoxNews the Port Authority has killed the relocation project.

To those who claim the erection of a mosque near Ground Zero is all about religious freedom please the video below. It is obvious God was integral with our founding fathers as part of the creation of the United States of America. If religious freedom is paramount then why is the phrase "One Nation Under God" undr attack?

Try to practice religious freedom in an predominantly Muslim country and see what happens. Tell it to these Christian medical workers' families who were killed for allegedly "preaching Christianity" in Afghanistan.

Janet Napolitano- Quit Being A Huge Embarassment To The U.S.

In the wake of the latest terrorist incident Janet Napolitano proved she is the wrong person to head Homeland Security. Her flip-flop statements signal two things. One, the flow of information up the ladder is seriously flawed. Two, once the information reaches the top nothing but garbage comes out of the mouth.

Karl Rove was on Hannity last night outlining how this administration blew a chance to interrogate the suspect. Instead they allowed him to lawyer up and shut up as a criminal and not treated as a terrorist. We lost the opportunity to find out who trained him, who sent him, who funded him, who fed him, and who he answered to.

Right now Fox News is reporting there were 17 full body scanners at Amsterdam airport. An Israeli spokesperson stated he would not use full body scanners on Muslims due to their faith. He made a compelling and convincing argument that Muslim distrust of the western world would only be heightened if goverment mandates a full body scan of their women and children.

This mess points to a systemic failure in our security policies. Profiling behavior, not skin color or faith, is a much better approach than scanning. Terrorists come in all forms and styles. Behaviors will be easier to spot.

Here is an editorial from the Tribune Review out of Pittsburgh.

Flight 253: Failure
Buzz up!Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Welcome back to reality, America. Nasty people seeking to do nasty things in any nasty way possible remain alive and despicably well as we put the wraps on 2009.

Witness the passenger-foiled attempt by a Nigerian man to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight on Christmas Day. But witness first the horrible failure of a very expensive worldwide security apparatus to keep Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab off Flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit.

The suspect was on terrorist watch lists in the United States and Great Britain. He was refused a student entry visa to the U.K. in May after applying for a bogus college course. He paid cash for his Northwest ticket. He had no checked baggage. There's a report that he didn't even have a passport. The explosive he carried in his underwear is supposed to be easily detectable through screening. The terrorist's father even warned authorities that his son was a risk.

Thus, it was outrageous when Homeland Security boss Janet Napolitano went on TV on Sunday to claim "the system worked." She was in full retreat Monday, claiming her contention was taken out of context. Hardly. Her boss, President Obama, has ordered a full review of security measures. He should fire Ms. Napolitano as a start.

The Flight 253 debacle is a sobering reminder that the world remains a dangerous place requiring eternal vigilance. The people know that. Sadly, government doesn't.

Politics aside, let's get the system fixed to restore the faith of the travelers. If government can accomplish that goal then maybe, just maybe, politics on both sides can cease fire and get on with the business of putting people back to work so our economy will recover.

Obama Wants U.S. Incaceration For Terrorist

This news item from ABCnews.com says it all.

With President Barack Obama showing the way, some Senate Democrats are signaling a willingness to permit transferring terrorism suspects from Guantanamo Bay to prisons in the United States despite a high-profile vote to the contrary.

Eric Holder's Law Firm Represents Gitmo Detainees

In today's emails I received the following "Washington Recap" so I decided to check its authenticity:

The American people elect a President with a total of 42 days experience as a U S Senator from the most politically corrupt state in America whose Governor is ousted from office. The President's first official act is to close Gitmo and make sure Terrorists civil rights are not violated.

The U.S. Congress rushes to confirm an Attorney General, Eric Holder, whose law firm we later find out represents seventeen Gitmo Terrorists.

Michelle Malkin brings us this news, Pay attention to Eric Holder’s law firm and Gitmo detainees.

[A]s nearly 100 of the remaining detainees are Yemenis, reflecting that country’s refusal to assure security for repatriated Yemenis, note that AG nominee Eric Holder is a senior partner with Covington & Burling, a prestigious Washington, D.C. law firm, which represents 17 Yemenis currently held at Gitmo. From the C & B website:

Human Rights

The firm represents 17 Yemeni nationals and one Pakistani citizen held at Guantánamo Bay. The Supreme Court will soon review the D.C. Circuit’s ruling that ordered the dismissal of a number of habeas petitions filed by Guantánamo detainees; some of our clients are petitioners in the Supreme Court case. We expect to play a substantial role in the briefing. We also plan to petition the Supreme Court to hear our Pakistani client’s appeal from the D.C. Circuit’s order dismissing his case. Further, we are pursuing relief in the D.C. Circuit under the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 for all of our clients. On a separate front, we filed amicus briefs and coordinated the amicus effort in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld in which the Supreme Court in the summer of 2006 invalidated President Bush’s military commissions and in which we have obtained favorable rulings that our clients have rights under the Fifth Amendment and the Geneva Conventions.

From the Times in the U.K.

Even before he got to work yesterday, the new Administration had halted all military trials of terror suspects at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Mr Obama is expected to sign an executive order today that will close the camp within a year “to further the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States and the interests of justice”. Judges have agreed to stop the trials of five Guantánamo detainees who have been charged in connection with the 9/11 attacks.

So let me get this straight. The President of our United States halted military trials of suspected terrorist detainees who will now be represented by the firm where the Attorney General of the United States is a senior partner. Seems to be self-styled lobbying to me.

I have to ask this question. Are they pro bono, meaning the detainees not being prosecuted at all is good for the firm, or is the government going to pay the legal bills of the detainees.

The fact that Mr. Holder, while Deputy Attorney General, pushed for the release of 16 violent FALN terrorists against the advice of the FBI, the US Attorneys who prosecuted them and the NYPD officers who were maimed by them, suggests that he was perfectly willing to put politics before the national security interests of this country. He is not suited for the job of attorney general, which is central to the issues surrounding the disposition of war on terror detainees.

Read this one son's account of the loss of his father at the hands of the FALN in a vicious, cold-blooded attack on Jan. 24, 1975, the lunchtime bombing at New York City’s historic Fraunces Tavern.

In a September 1999 letter to House Judiciary Chairman Henry Hyde, FBI Director Louis Freeh explained that “the FBI has consistently advised the DOJ in writing that the FBI was opposed to any such pardon and or commutation of sentences for any of these individuals.” Freeh said clemency “would likely return committed, experienced, sophisticated and hardened terrorists to the clandestine movement.” Mr. Freeh emphasized “the FBI was unequivocally opposed to the release of these terrorists under any circumstances and had so advised the DOJ.” Moreover, in a letter to me dated Jan. 6, 1998, (more than a year before the pardons) a senior official from Holder’s own Justice Department expressly referred to the FALN members as “terrorists.”

Yet, according to Edward Lewine of the New York Daily News, despite this opposition, “Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder, the Justice Department official most involved with this issue, reportedly supported clemency.” Indeed, rather than consult with attack victims and their families, Mr. Holder instead met privately with members of Congress and recommended what the FALN members should do to facilitate a grant of presidential clemency.


“What an opportunity we have to change this country,” he said, as he reminded them of the vast crowd “as far as the eye could see” that had watched his inauguration on Tuesday. Blame the American public for not asking the definition of "change."

They Are Terrorists, Not Soldiers of War

The United States of America is not at war with Iraq or Afghanistan. We are in a security battle with terrorists. The bleeding hearts can cry all they want about their treatment, their incarcaration, and their quality of life. Who is defending the innocents they slaughter and continue to slaughter.

Soldiers proudly wear a uniform of the country they represent. They don't hide in mosques. They don't hide their ammunition in mosques. They don't hide in elementary schools. They take their fight to the enemy.

This following conversation has been the subject of many emails. Judge William Youncg couldn't have said it any better in 2003.

"This is the sentence that is provided for by our statutes. It is a fair and a just sentence. It is a righteous sentence. Let me explain this to you.

We are not afraid of any of your terrorist co-conspirators, Mr. Reid. We are Americans. We have been through the fire before. There is all too much war talk here. And I say that to everyone with the utmost respect.

Here in this court where we deal with individuals as individuals, and care for individuals as individuals, as human beings we reach out for justice.

You are not an enemy combatant. You are a terrorist. You are not a soldier in any war. You are a terrorist. To give you that reference, to call you a soldier gives you far too much stature. Whether it is the officers of government who do it or your attorney who does it, or that happens to be your view, you are a terrorist.

And we do not negotiate with terrorists. We do not treat with terrorists. We do not sign documents with terrorists.

We hunt them down one by one and bring them to justice.

So war talk is way out of line in this court. You're a big fellow. But you're not that big. You're no warrior. I know warriors. You are a terrorist. A species of criminal guilty of multiple attempted murders.

In a very real sense Trooper Santiago had it right when first you were taken off that plane and into custody and you wondered where the press and where the TV crews were and you said you're no big deal. You're no big deal.

What your counsel, what your able counsel and what the equally able United States attorneys have grappled with and what I have as honestly as I know how tried to grapple with, is why you did something so horrific. What was it that led you here to this courtroom today? I have listened respectfully to what you have to say. And I ask you to search your heart and ask yourself what sort of unfathomable hate led you to do what you are guilty and admit you are guilty of doing.

And I have an answer for you. It may not satisfy you. But as I search this entire record it comes as close to understanding as I know.

It seems to me you hate the one thing that to us is most precious. You hate our freedom. Our individual freedom. Our individual freedom to live as we choose, to come and go as we choose, to believe or not believe as we individually choose.

Here, in this society, the very winds carry freedom. They carry it everywhere from sea to shining sea. It is because we prize individual freedom so much that you are here in this beautiful courtroom. So that everyone can see, truly see that justice is administered fairly, individually, and discretely.

It is for freedom's seek that your lawyers are striving so vigorously on your behalf and have filed appeals, will go on in their, their representation of you before other judges. We care about it. Because we all know that the way we treat you, Mr. Reid, is the measure of our own liberties.

Make no mistake though. It is yet true that we will bear any burden; pay any price, to preserve our freedoms.

Look around this courtroom. Mark it well. The world is not going to long remember what you or I say here. Day after tomorrow it will be forgotten. But this, however, will long endure. Here, in this courtroom, and courtrooms all across America, the American people will gather to see that justice, individual justice, justice, not war, individual justice is in fact being done.

The very President of the United States through his officers will have to come into courtrooms and lay out evidence on which specific matters can be judged, and juries of citizens will gather to sit and judge that evidence democratically, to mold and shape and refine our sense of justice.

See that flag, Mr. Reid? That's the flag of the United States of America. That flag will fly there long after this is all forgotten. That flag still stands for freedom. You know it always will. Custody, Mr. Officer. Stand him down."
Mr. President Obama, please remember these words.