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Okay folks. Time to connect the dots. With the whole Xmas day Nigerian terrorist story floating into the background, I thought I would cross reference with another couple of stories to try and make a point.
First, this story:
Meet Mikey, 8: U.S. Has Him on Watch List
Let me summarize the story for you. Mikey Hicks who is 8 has been on the terror watch list for at least the last 7 years. His first experience was getting the pat down at the airport when he was two. Try as they might, the parents can't seem to get the issue cleared up...
A third grader at a parochial school in Clifton, N.J., Mikey recites the drill like the world-weary traveler he is. Leave early for the airport, always with his passport. Try to get a boarding pass at the counter. This will send up a flag. The ticket agent, peering down at tiny bespectacled Mikey, will apologize or roll her eyes, and call for a supervisor. The supervisor, after a phone call — or, more likely, a series of phone calls — will ultimately finagle him onto the plane. But the Hickses are typically the last to select seats and the last to board, which means they sometimes can’t sit together.
Mrs. Hicks, a photojournalist who herself got Secret Service clearance to travel aboard Air Force II with then-Vice President Al Gore, anticipated additional chaos following the attempted underwear bombing. Before leaving for the Bahamas on Jan. 2, she reached out to Congressman Pascrell’s office, which then enlisted a T.S.A. agent to meet the family at the airport. Even this did not prevent Mikey from an extra pat-down.
On the way home last Friday, Mikey’s boarding pass showed four giant red S’s at the airport in Nassau.
Meantime, we can't seem to stop a terrorist whose own father turns him ahead of time:
Source: Terror suspect's father tried to warn authorities
I think most of us know the story at this point. Father in Nigeria warns U.S. authorities that his son was a potential threat. His son still manages to get on a Detroit bound flight and attempts to blow up the plane.
Conclusion: our government is incapable of telling the difference between an 8 year old cub scout from New Jersey from a Nigerian terrorist whose own family turns him in.
Of course, your government has a solution. Yes, you guessed it: body scanners.
Wide use of U.S. airport body scanners depends on Obama
So the solution is to run suspected 8 year cub scouts through body scanners at $150K a unit to make sure they don't have explosives in their underwear. Brilliant.
Conclusion: the government has no idea how to protect us. Most of the things they are doing are so they can say they are doing "something." Most of these "somethings" usually involve spending huge sums of tax payer money.
Folks, do you hear the giant sucking sound? That's the money leaving your wallets and bank accounts. That is what you get when you combine the corporate profit motive with unlimited public funding: huge sums of money spent on "solutions" all under the guise that the private sector can do it better or more efficiently. This is why we need all those private security contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq instead of enlisted military personnel. Why would we bother paying a grunt private next to nothing when we can pay $200K a year for an equivalent contractor?
Please tell me. How do we put a stop to this? :mad:
First, this story:
Meet Mikey, 8: U.S. Has Him on Watch List
Let me summarize the story for you. Mikey Hicks who is 8 has been on the terror watch list for at least the last 7 years. His first experience was getting the pat down at the airport when he was two. Try as they might, the parents can't seem to get the issue cleared up...
A third grader at a parochial school in Clifton, N.J., Mikey recites the drill like the world-weary traveler he is. Leave early for the airport, always with his passport. Try to get a boarding pass at the counter. This will send up a flag. The ticket agent, peering down at tiny bespectacled Mikey, will apologize or roll her eyes, and call for a supervisor. The supervisor, after a phone call — or, more likely, a series of phone calls — will ultimately finagle him onto the plane. But the Hickses are typically the last to select seats and the last to board, which means they sometimes can’t sit together.
Mrs. Hicks, a photojournalist who herself got Secret Service clearance to travel aboard Air Force II with then-Vice President Al Gore, anticipated additional chaos following the attempted underwear bombing. Before leaving for the Bahamas on Jan. 2, she reached out to Congressman Pascrell’s office, which then enlisted a T.S.A. agent to meet the family at the airport. Even this did not prevent Mikey from an extra pat-down.
On the way home last Friday, Mikey’s boarding pass showed four giant red S’s at the airport in Nassau.
Meantime, we can't seem to stop a terrorist whose own father turns him ahead of time:
Source: Terror suspect's father tried to warn authorities
I think most of us know the story at this point. Father in Nigeria warns U.S. authorities that his son was a potential threat. His son still manages to get on a Detroit bound flight and attempts to blow up the plane.
Conclusion: our government is incapable of telling the difference between an 8 year old cub scout from New Jersey from a Nigerian terrorist whose own family turns him in.
Of course, your government has a solution. Yes, you guessed it: body scanners.
Wide use of U.S. airport body scanners depends on Obama
So the solution is to run suspected 8 year cub scouts through body scanners at $150K a unit to make sure they don't have explosives in their underwear. Brilliant.
Conclusion: the government has no idea how to protect us. Most of the things they are doing are so they can say they are doing "something." Most of these "somethings" usually involve spending huge sums of tax payer money.
Folks, do you hear the giant sucking sound? That's the money leaving your wallets and bank accounts. That is what you get when you combine the corporate profit motive with unlimited public funding: huge sums of money spent on "solutions" all under the guise that the private sector can do it better or more efficiently. This is why we need all those private security contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq instead of enlisted military personnel. Why would we bother paying a grunt private next to nothing when we can pay $200K a year for an equivalent contractor?
Please tell me. How do we put a stop to this? :mad:
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