It's Official: A Majority Of Americans Would Give Up Liberty In Order To Be Safe From Terrorism
The Truth
January 15, 2010
"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security."
-Benjamin Franklin
It is now official. A majority of Americans are willing to give up liberty in order to be safer from terrorism. A stunning new McClatchy-Ipsos poll has found that 51 percent of Americans agree with this statement: "it is necessary to give up some civil liberties in order to make the country safe from terrorism."
Only 36 percent of those polled agreed with this statement: "some of the government's proposals will go too far in restricting the public's civil liberties."
So are Americans really this stupid?
Have they really been brainwashed into willingly giving up their essential liberties just so they can feel a little safer?
Maybe they have.
After all, a new USA TODAY/Gallup poll says that 78 percent of Americans approve of the new full body scanners that the U.S. government wants to install in all U.S. airports.
So almost 4 out of 5 Americans are perfectly fine with letting airport security officials gawk at their naked bodies just so they can feel a bit safer from terrorists.
How sick is that?
The truth is that when Americans allow themselves to become so wimpy and so fearful that they are willing to throw many of their most important freedoms out the window, those responsible for the terror scares have won.
In fact, Amerika (formerly America) is very quickly becoming a brutal police state where privacy is a thing of the past and where free speech and alternative points of view are openly repressed.
For example, in a 2008 academic paper President Barack Obama's appointee to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs advocated "cognitive infiltration" of groups that advocate "conspiracy theories".
Infiltration of groups with alternative viewpoints that the government doesn't like?
Do we live in East Germany?
Apparently we do.
Americans do not care about their freedoms and liberties anymore, so now they are being taken away.
And apparently the message of the most recent polls is that Americans are perfectly fine with that.
Could you be mixing up freedom with convenience? I suppose you consider road checks for impaired drivers "anti freedom" too. Nobody is preventing you from flying. It's just not as simple as it used to be. The airlines own the planes, they want to attract customers, so they try to keep the customers safe.. You show up on a no fly list, then yes, you have lost a freedom, probably for good reason!
Can they actually see the naked body in those things? :o :o Or just the skeleton or just metal?
You can count me in with the 36%. It annoys me that cops look in your car to see if you're wearing your seatbelt or not. To me, that's the same as looking in the windows of my house to see if I might be doing something illegal.
Well Sarah, when I was younger, I got undressed by somebodys' eyes all the time. Now the only danger is if the person operating that machine would die laughing, or worse, get sick! ;D No kidding though, I would not be reticent to use one of those machines if it makes everybody safer. Heck to those people it would just be another carcass in a long line of carcases on just another day. I can't see that it is a loss of freedom, just an inconvenience so the idiots can be foiled.
The scanners, while not in color, provide full body detail to include the genitals. Frankly, I don't care if somone sees me naked, however adults are not the only ones having to go through these scanners. Are you honestly ok with TSA agents viewing naked images of children in the name of so-called safety? Frankly, I think it is sick.
As for D.U.I checkpoints, yeah I have an issue with them. If I'm not doing anything wrong than the police have no right to stop me.
As for ending up on a no fly list, heres one for ya....
The article is about an 8 yr. old boy that wound up on a suspect list simply because he has a similar name with a suspious person.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34855425/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times/from/ET (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34855425/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times/from/ET)
So I ask you Diane, what good reason could there be for infringing on this child and his family??
well unfortunately the airport screening is useless as tits on a boar hog. The terrorists aren't going to attack us that way again like they did on 911. They know they can't get through to do such a thing.
the next attack on our soil will be bigger than 911. It will involve many major cities all timed to go off at the same time and will happen in places that inflict maximum casualties like stadiums, malls, things like that. Think about the impact of 10 of them going off at the same time.
And they don't have to sneak into the US now to do it. They already have muslims that have been raised here all their lives, know the customs of americans, an habits and they will be the ones that carry out terror.
There was a test done a while back. briefcases were set down in public in 5 different cities. The test was to see if anyone alerted 911 or the authorities. Not one call came in nor were these unattended brief cases investigated. 1 briefcase in chicago was stolen promptly by someone.
What should have happened is that civitzens should have alerted someone, in fact someone should have yelled unattended briefcase, evacuate. THis is how the irish, english both keep from getting blown up over there. IF it were to happen there, the whole area would be cleared by the citizens, not the leos. They would then contact the appropriate authorities to come investigate it.
Another thing thats going to happen is cities that have rush hours. what better place to carry out attacks. all one would have to do is place 100 IED's in the center divider of the interstate and wait til rushour hits and everything is standing still. Then detonate. In atlanta that would most likely kill over 100,000 people since the interstate usually has over 500,000 drivers on it at rush hour.
Quote from: Varmit on January 18, 2010, 08:35:56 PM
The scanners, while not in color, provide full body detail to include the genitals. Frankly, I don't care if somone sees me naked, however adults are not the only ones having to go through these scanners. Are you honestly ok with TSA agents viewing naked images of children in the name of so-called safety? Frankly, I think it is sick.
I agree that's sick and I would have a fit if they scanned my children. I don't care if people think that these guys see bodies day in and day out and don't care. Hog wash. Some perv would get that job so that he could look.
Srkruich, I'm not so sure that the next attack will be bigger. If I was in their shoes I wouldn't plan it that way. I think a series of smaller attacks throughout the country would be not only easier to plan and carry out but would also have a better psychological effect. When an attack occurs people will automatically avoid places like malls and stadiums, but what if the first series occured in places like schools and hospitals then moved on to retail outlets then transportation hubs. They wouldn't need to be that big to scare this country to a standstill.
I amazed at all of the comments about the TSA airport scanners, it is much faster, easier and more accurate. It takes just a few seconds. Tulsa Airport is one of the locations that has had one for sometime and my wife and I both go through it probably 1 to 3 times a month. My wife has a pacemaker and I have a Titanium Knee joint, 2 steel rods and 12 screws in my back, before they had the full body scanner we had to both be hand patted, we like the scanner much better and it is much quicker.
They don't see anything that is sexy or wild to look at. To me it is no different than when I have had Nurses or X-Ray techs x-ray me, or a nurse in the room helping me after the surgeries I have had.
I hope the TSA keeps on checking all of passengers on all of the flights, we have to do everything we can to reduce the possibility of hijackings and/or terrorists attacks.
I travelled overseas for many years and on two trips in the Middle East I was stripped search, the first time it happened I said what if I refuse and I was promptly told I would not be allowed to board the plane if I refused. It didn't take me long to undress.
well the thing about airports is that they are usually international airports. IF thier international, they don't fall under one country's law. They follow an international law. For example, if your escorting a prisoner and fly from tulsa to Atlanta, and that prisoner escapes from you in the airport, you as a law enforcement agent can go after them anywhere in the world. There are not extradition treaties needed to go aprehend that suspect and bring them back.
So basically the screening falls under international law. I suppose you can say a airport is like a world embassy.
YOu do have a choice. So technically rights are not being violated, by using the airport, your submitting your rights in order to fly. And the flight is that of a private corporation which is not subject to constitutional rights. The constitutional rights we have are between Government and the people, not corporations and the people.
Now where the problem lies is that since the government has taken over the security screening, then the constitution can come into play. But being that it is done on international territory i don't know if the constitution can hold authority over that piece of real estate.
its a complicated mess.
So Frank, are you telling us you were a stripper in a Mid east country ??? Does Myrna know about this ?? :)
Quote from: jarhead on January 18, 2010, 10:19:23 PM
So Frank, are you telling us you were a stripper in a Mid east country ??? Does Myrna know about this ?? :)
ROTFLMBO
Quote from: jarhead on January 18, 2010, 10:19:23 PM
So Frank, are you telling us you were a stripper in a Mid east country ??? Does Myrna know about this ?? :)
Jarhead, I was a stripper twice in India. I had been in South India as long as I wanted to be and when they said I would not be boarding the plane if I didn't submit to a luggage search and strip search, I didn't argue.
Sky Harbor here in Phoenix has had a scanner at terminal #4 since 2007. It is used for secondary screenings of passengers who set off metal detectors. New ones are being installed as we speak. There have been terrorist threats against the Hoover Dam on the Arizona-Nevada border and the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station west of Phoenix. There have also been concerns that Islamic and other terrorists might try to enter the U.S. from Mexico. I fly out of SH 6 or 7 times a year and it wouldn't bother me a bit going through a scanner and would feel a hell of alot safer knowing everyone on my plane has done the same.
Some info on the scanners:
Nicknamed "nude" scanners, they work by bouncing tiny microwaves off passengers and producing a very detailed outline of what lies beneath their clothes.
They are controversial because the image is so detailed it shows male genitals and female breasts and critics argue they are an invasion of privacy akin to a "virtual strip search".
In order to allay these fears, the technology is being tweaked to blur the head of each scanned individual or obscure the individual's genitals.
The scanning procedure can also be arranged so that the machine operators do not see the images of the people they scan.
In that case, the images produced can be analyzed by staff members in an isolated room elsewhere in the airport, who then notify workers at the terminals if a problem appears.
Whatever your position on full-body scanners, if you're going to do some heavy traveling during 2010, there's always the chance that you might be faced with having to virtually strip down for one. We'll get into how it works and your rights with full-body scanners later this week, but for now let's focus on where exactly these big bad boys hang out...
What airports have full-body scanners in use?:
According to the Washington Post, there are only forty units at 19 airports currently. Although London and Nigerian airports have theirs on order, they aren't delivered yet, so you'll not have to worry about them yet.
You will find full-body scanners at the following airports:
· Albuquerque International Airport (ABQ)
· Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson Airport (ATL)
· Baltimore-Washington International (BWI)
· Dallas/Ft. Worth Airport (DFW)
· Denver International Airport (DEN)
· Detroit Metro Wayne County Airport (DTW)
· Indianapolis International Airport (IND)
· Jacksonville International Airport (JAX)
· Las Vegas-McCarran Airport (LAS)
· Los Angeles International Airport (LAX)
· Miami International Airport (MIA)
· Phoenix Sky Harbor (PHX)
· Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU)
· Richmond International Airport (RIC)
· Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC)
· San Francisco International Airport (SFO)
· Tampa International Airport (TPA)
· Tulsa International Airport (TUL)
· Washington DC's Reagan National (DCA)
· Amsterdam-Schipol Airport (AMS)
Checkout http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/03/AR2010010301826.html
to see how they work.
I'm so glad I don't fly. What a mess. And even with all their technology.........people still manage to get past them. Where there's a will there's a way.......or they find something else to blow up.
Quote from: Sarah on January 19, 2010, 06:13:07 AM
I'm so glad I don't fly. What a mess. And even with all their technology.........people still manage to get past them. Where there's a will there's a way.......or they find something else to blow up.
The problem is that all their equipment searches for metal. Now days they use plastic explosives, liquids. The future will probably bring carbon fiber or ceramic weapons on board. No way to scan for those items.
Quote from: srkruzich on January 19, 2010, 08:27:17 AM
The problem is that all their equipment searches for metal. Now days they use plastic explosives, liquids. The future will probably bring carbon fiber or ceramic weapons on board. No way to scan for those items.
I would assume that's what these full body scans are for if they're that detailed. I would suppose it would pick up anything unusual.
I went through the SFO airport recently, it looked like they had a special scanner off to the side. Things were pretty busy, 4 of the normal scanners operating at full capacity and nobody got pulled out to the special scanner that i can see.
I think the whole thing is stupid. Is it not obvious that the people doing these things have greant ingenuity? Ask any IRaq war veteran. Anytime we come up with a way to protect ourselves, the other side changes tactics. We do not have the initiative, we are merely reacting to our opponent.
I don't believe in giving up freedom for safety, I'd rather find a way for us to be at peace and to maintain our way of life.
On a side note, i wonder how long it will be before people start going through those scanners with a bananna in their shorts?
I hear that alot of SF area women already got a" banana" in their bloomers---but that's just hearsay.
Quote from: jarhead on January 20, 2010, 03:08:52 PM
I hear that alot of SF area women already got a" banana" in their bloomers---but that's just hearsay.
ROTFLMBO
I could say something about banana splits, but that would be beneath me wouldn't it? :o ;D
good one Diane
I also hear that there are a lot of males in Sf that have more than one banana in theur skivvies! ;D
I personally think the full body scanners are great for what they were designed for, and hopefully they will be available in every Airport soon. They are primarily used to scan passengers that cannot go thru the normal or old style metal detectors. My wife and I cannot go thru the old style metal detectors and in airports that do not have the new full body scanners we had to be hand patted down, the full body scanners are much easier, quicker and less annoying and less invasive .Also some of you seem to forget that the passenger checks are not just for terrorists, they are also for domestic idiots or derranged passengers that want to hijack a plane to somewhere or for some other idiotic reason.
frawin, my brother has a metal plate in his arm. He got a pretty bad compound fracture when he landed wrong in a judo match. When he flies, they use the wand on him normally, not pat him down. I thought the wand was the standard procedure for someone who couldn't be scanned.
Al gets wanded (is that a word?) and his braces and cane are wiped down for "offending" residue. He is rarely patted down, but that's the whole idea I think, so people never know for sure and won't try to get away with anything. We haven't had a scanner yet.
An engineer (ex-NASA project director) has what I think is
the near perfect solution for airport security!
*Here's a solution to all the controversy over full-body
scanners at the airports. Have a booth that you can step into
that will not X-ray you, but will detonate any explosive device
you may have on you.*
*It would be a win-win for everyone, and there would be none of this
concern over racial profiling and this method would eliminate a long
and expensive trial. Justice would be quick and swift..*