TSA Subpoenas Bloggers Over New Security Directive 379
Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that TSA special agents have served subpoenas to travel bloggers Steve Frischling and Chris Elliott demanding that they reveal who leaked a TSA directive outlining new screening measures that went into effect the same day as the Detroit airliner incident. Frischling said he met with two TSA special agents for about three hours and was forced to hand over his laptop computer after the agents threatened to interfere with his contract to write a blog for KLM Royal Dutch Airlines if he didn't cooperate and provide the name of the person who leaked the memo outlining new security measures that would be apparent to the traveling public. 'It literally showed up in my box,' Frischling told The Associated Press. 'I do not know who it came from.' Frischling says he provided the agents a signed statement to that effect. The leaked directive included measures such as screening at boarding gates, patting down the upper legs and torso, physically inspecting all travelers' belongings, looking carefully at syringes with powders and liquids, requiring that passengers remain in their seats one hour before landing, and disabling all onboard communications systems, including what is provided by the airline. In a December 29 posting on his blog, Elliott said he had told the TSA agents at his house that he would call his lawyer and get back to them."
Re:Because obscurity... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Because obscurity... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:government goons (Score:1, Interesting)
Maybe that's the point - that we're no longer participating in a free government. Without input, there is total control - no way to safeguard against tyranny or corruption. If the guidelines are secret - they can be interpreted any way that the people enforcing them see fit - without control or oversight. I am starting to believe that if they thought they could get away with it - they would just -disappear- this guy like corrupt regimes usually do.
Re:Because obscurity... (Score:5, Interesting)
Hypothesis: either anonymity, or total information, can provide equivalent security. If everyone had access to all the information anyone else had, anonymity would no longer be necessary. As it is, anonymity is a kludge to protect those with less access to information from those who have more. It protects the guilty as well as the innocent. If everyone were totally informed (yes, this is purely hypothetical) then no one could act against another's interests unless the majority of humanity agreed with that act. While this would still leave open the possibility of a tyranny of the majority, I doubt a majority of totally informed people would act against a minority in a punitive way, as this would leave each individual open to punitive acts from a different majority.
Re:I still say... (Score:3, Interesting)
I think there is a bit of irrational egotism involved in that cowardice.
If I'm a afraid of sharks, I can at least read up on what to do in the ocean, or even lay on the beach while other people are surfing. As an old man, your chances are probably much less, most old men aren't in the ocean all the time.
You say there is a 1 in 1,000,000 chance to die in a house fire. I can bet you that as a educated upper class white male, my chances are less. I actually change batteries/maintain my fire alarm. I don't live in shittily constructed housing, don't smoke, have no kids running around playing with matches. Sure there could be a freak accident, but I'd like to see the stats recalculated to my demographic. Surely they are 10 times less than the uneducated black smoker down the street with kids running around...
Then get to flying. Imagine and old, rich, white, male. Way over represented on aircraft. What are his odds of dying in a terrorist plane attack?
Now look at the senate, or the house, or the upper management at CNN. Maybe you'll see why we get so much attention paid to plane attacks.
Stanford Prison Experiment (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Forced? (Score:4, Interesting)
I wonder where the "interfere with his contract" language came from.
I only wonder because "tortious interference with contracts" pretty much establishes the legal basis for a lawsuit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tortious_interference [wikipedia.org]
When one of my old employers wanted to hold me to an overly broad NDA, every lawyer I spoke with said tortious interference was the first place we'd go.
Re:I still say... (Score:3, Interesting)
That’s the modern terrorist’s strategy: Why work hard to fuck up the enemy, when you can work little, and let them fuck themselves up, better than you ever could.
Sometimes I wonder, if I would have a better life, if I were with them...
Re:Fuck George Bush! (Score:2, Interesting)
Sure, you have the right to choose your health care plan? Do you live in the same America I do? I have never had a choice of healthcare plans. I essentially have to swallow the "choices" my employer deigns to offer me. Sure, _theoretically_ I could choose a plan, but practically, there is no choice.
I'm fine with allowing people the "right" to choose no healthcare plan (you still have that right btw, although it will increase your taxes), as long as they also acknowledge that along with that right comes the right for healthcare workers to leave you bleeding on the road when they discover that you don't have insurance, and couldn't pay for their services. I don't want my taxes and insurance fees paying for their healthcare if they're not willing to do the same.
I personally think that a "free" economy is possibly the worst thing that could happen to the country. Everyone always talks about how great free economies are. Bullshit. Every time regulations get relaxed, the companies involved completely screw us over, and then come crying back to us when their current pyramid scheme fails. Take a look at the causes of the current economic woes. Or look at the deregulated California Power market.
Libertarianism is nice in theory, but there's a reason there isn't a single functioning libertarian society on earth.
Re:Fuck George Bush! (Score:2, Interesting)
everybody gets a basic 'level' of insurance
1) No. Everyone is FORCED to get a basic level of insurance, or pay extra taxes or fines or whatnot if they don't. It is also likely that many employers will need to change their existing plans to be compliant and will pass that cost to the employees. http://www.politico.com/livepulse/0909/Ensign_receives_handwritten_confirmation_.html [politico.com]
http://www.newsweek.com/id/227310 [newsweek.com]
Here's what I know from personal experience in dealing with the VA, the SSA, and Medicare. I know that finding someone to talk to is extremely difficult. I know that if a claim is denied there is almost zero recourse in appealing. I DO NOT want to have to deal with a similar bureaucracy for my family's health care.
Re:I still say... (Score:3, Interesting)
A total of 4371 [icasualties.org] US military deaths have occured since the invasion began in Iraq.
Merry Fucking Christmas (Score:3, Interesting)
Welcome to the police state. Pretty soon, we'll have "pre-screened" passengers wearing armbands and we all know where it goes from there
Does Homeland Security have this authority? (Score:3, Interesting)
That guy needs a lawyer. But looking at the authorities referenced in the "subpoena", there are some real questions. It's an "administrative subpoena", not one issued by a court. Some agencies can do that. (The FBI has been refused that authority by Congress). The Department of Transportation has subpoena authority for its hearings and investigations [house.gov], and Homeland Security inheirited that authority when TSA was transferred from DOT to DHS. For all administrative subpoenas, the party served can file a motion to quash the subpoena with a District Court, and the court has to rule before anything happens.
But that section (49 USC 46104) refers to a "hearing or investigation", a formal proceeding presided over by a hearing officer. This is just some "special agent", and the subpoena is signed by someone with the title "Senior Counsel - Civil Enforcement". There's a list of people who can sign these things at 49 CFR 1503.303, and a "Senior Counsel" isn't high enough up the food chain to sign off. A Deputy Chief Counsel or the Chief Counsel [tsa.gov] is supposed to sign. This probably reflects who the TSA had in the office on December 26. A more senior official probably would have considered the political implications of doing something this embarrassing.
This is a touchy area, related to the "National Security Letter" debacle. See this Congressional Research Service analysis. [fas.org] The FBI got in trouble for issuing demands for documents without statutory authority. [washingtonpost.com]
The Associated Press reports that the blogger is going to challenge the subpoena in court. [latimes.com]
Re:Because obscurity... (Score:5, Interesting)
Step one: stop making sex into a mysterious, shameful activity with negative religious connotations and thus make it possible for people of all ages to discuss it openly. By removing the shame element, combating the social peer pressure elements and creating easy access to information and counseling for children, one can easily detect non-consensual activity (i.e. they will be unafraid to complain). Two: if the kids insist on screwing, ensure that the results are managed: easily available contraception, education etc. Whatever you do, the religious woo-woo based medieval approach currently so much in vogue is the worst possible answer, having the dubious distinction of being ineffective, counter-productive, conductive to authoritarian abuse (which in fact its the reason why authoritarians of all stripes love it) and wholly illogical.
The logical purpose of a society is for all of its members to be better off as compared to them not participating. Subsequently it is society's business that individuals are given the best possible start in it, this includes protection from preventable diseases, genetic disorders included. You porking your sister is none of my business, until she gets pregnant and has a severely damaged child on the way. If we allow that, we fail the primary logical reason for the formation of a society.
Due to the way our genes propagate, the likelihood of genetic errors (normally corrected by DNA that took a slightly different evolutionary path) increases rapidly with decreasing genetic distance. Having said so, it is not absolutely certain that an offspring of siblings has to be damaged, only that it is very likely. Thus the correct procedure would be to test the embryo in early stages of development to determine if any damage is present. Decisions to be made based on the outcome of the tests.
Well, the truth sometimes hurts. If one cannot logically explain himself/herself, one has no business being an "opponent" in any logical discussions, be it with myself or anybody else. I guess you could call it "poisoning of the well" from the point of view of peddlers of all kinds of illogical woo-woo.
Re:Read the 5th amendment (Score:3, Interesting)
Context is determinative in interpreting any text. The US Constitution starts: "We the People". Which people? Everyone in the world? No. Only the ones who are forming "a more perfect union" - ie: those citizens of the United States.
Context, exactly. The full phrase that you cite is "We the People of the United States" - the difference is clear, I hope.
Otherwise, you'd have a point, if Constitution always consistently used the term "People" to mean "citizens". But it does not, so we have to assume that any difference is therefore intentional. For example:
"No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President"
"The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States."
"... Controversies between two or more States; between a State and Citizens of another State; between Citizens of different States; between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects." (note how there's a full explicit enumeration)
On the other hand, with regard to suffrage:
"The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States"
And historically it has indeed been the case that you didn't need to be a citizen to vote in federal elections in many states, strange as it may sound today - see the list [wikipedia.org] for yourself.
And, of course, the famous:
"the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
Now this is one of the most abused amendments, but even then, historically, before gun control creep-in, this really meant everyone residing, not just citizens. And even today, in the State of Washington, when they tried to remove the gun licensing program for aliens, a court ordered [reuters.com] to put the program back in, since denying aliens the right to bear arms would restrict the rights they have under the Second Amendment. So now it's back to what it was, meaning that you can get a license to own a gun even if you're just on a visitor visa.