TSA Facing Death By a Thousand Cuts 493
OverTheGeicoE writes "The Transportation Security Administration is getting a lot of negative attention, much of it from the U.S. government itself. A recent congressional report blasted the TSA for being incompetent and ineffective (PDF). A bill to force the TSA to reduce its screening of active duty U.S. military members and their families was approved unanimously by the House of Representatives. After a TSA employee was arrested for sexually assaulting a woman while in uniform, a bill has been introduced to prevent TSA agents from wearing police-style uniforms and badges or using the title 'officer.' The bill's sponsor calls these practices 'an insult to real cops.' The FBI is getting involved by changing its definition of rape in a way that might expose the TSA's 'enhanced pat-down' screeners to prosecution. Lastly, public support for the TSA's use of X-ray body scanners drops dramatically when people realize there is a cancer risk."
Re:Friggen finally (Score:3, Informative)
More like nine years, son.
So Sad (Score:2, Informative)
NOT ENOUGH CUTS (Score:2, Informative)
Not enough cuts. Thousand cuts won't cut it, it needs millions of cuts. It needs everybody to step up and cut it.
YOU THERE! Yes, YOU. You have to cut TSA as well (cut an agent, get some bonus points in your next life).
Re:My Pet Rock Is Better (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Something has to take its place. (Score:4, Informative)
It's not the TSA so much as it is the DHS. It's inherently problematic to give an agency responsible for both defining the problem and solving it. It's not surprising that the scope has been ever increasing when decreasing the scope would result in layoffs and budget cuts for itself.
Re:About Time! (Score:5, Informative)
"Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship. ...voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."
Hermann Göring
Re:Friggen finally (Score:5, Informative)
The Mobile Informational Call Act of 2011 would allow for robo-calling to all cell phones, leaving consumers to foot the bill, especially those who pay by the minute.
http://www.wpri.com/dpp/news/12_for_action/telemarketers-soon-targeting-your-cell-phone [wpri.com]
TSA enhanced pat-downs may kill people (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Oh look, the pendulum. It swings back. (Score:5, Informative)
Russia effectively didn't exist until the collapse of the Mongol Empire(s), and could even be argued as a primary effect of the power vacuum created by that collapse after the previous consolidation. The Rus simply reconsolidated in an imperial conquest, and those holdings were reconsolidated a second (or third, depending on your perspective) time when the communists took over. However the identities of the locals were largely unaffected even over the centuries of Russian and earlier Mongol rule, which is what lead to the many breakaways after the USSR's collapse.
The take away to these lessons from history is that the 'empire' only lasts so long as the people at the core of it have the will and the power to rebuild it over and over. That is the case with China and Russia (to a far lesser extent). It *almost* happened with Rome, people are largely unaware that the Byzantine Empire was on the verge of a massive campaign to retake the West that was only scuttled by the cruel twist of the arrival of the plague from Asia. Hard to say how different history might have been if such an effort were successful.
Re:My Pet Rock Is Better (Score:5, Informative)
What's perplexing is why they haven't shifted to softer targets
They have. Off the top of my head -
- London Underground Bombing
- Madrid Train Bombing
- Bali Night Club Bombing
- Mumbai Hotel Attack
- Times Square Bomber (foiled)
- Oslo, Norway Shootings
- Moscow Theatre Attack