When U.S soldiers with nail clippers and flight attendants who've survived breast cancer are treated as potential terrorists, you know the TSA is "acting stupidly." Yet the administration thinks everything is fine.
Imagine the department of motor vehicles with cattle prods, and you're close to the mentality exhibited by Transportation Safety Administration chief John Pistole on CNN's "State of the Union" show Sunday. He told host Candy Crowley that what the Israelis have "is top-notch security," but the U.S. won't use these techniques because America does not profile.
Excuse us? The U.S. won't use what the world's No. 1 terrorist target has shown to be effective because it's allegedly discriminatory, but is willing to strip-search grandmas and little children at random? This is cruelty and inefficiency raised to a science.
On Saturday, President Obama called the full-body scanners and groin checks being performed "a huge inconvenience for all of us."
He said, "In the aftermath of the Christmas Day bombing, our TSA personnel are properly under enormous pressure to make sure that you don't have somebody slipping on a plane with some sort of explosive device on their persons." Like cancer survivors with prosthetic breasts?
As tennis star John McEnroe might put it, Mr. President, you cannot be serious. The Israelis manage to avoid disaster by checking the passenger lists, doing background checks on prospective fliers and personally interviewing those they deem suspicious.
They do not disrobe their passengers looking for the explosive device du jour. They focus on who might be carrying explosives, not on the objects themselves. They profile, Mr. President, they profile. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab never would have been allowed in the same ZIP code as an El Al aircraft.
What's next? Full-body cavity searches? As columnist Ann Coulter relates, last year an assassin attempting to murder Prince Mohammed bin Nayef of Saudi Arabia blew himself up with a bomb stuck where suppositories normally go. Luckily, he didn't try to board an American aircraft this Thanksgiving or all air travelers would probably have to bend over and cough.
We are trying terrorists in civilian courts because we're trying to show the world our system of justice protects everybody's rights. Yet as a TSA thug told John Tyner, the young man who thought touching his "junk" was unreasonable: "By buying your ticket, you gave up a lot of rights." If we've surrendered this and other rights, just what are we fighting to protect in the war on terror?
Flight attendant and breast cancer survivor Cathy Bossi, who works for U.S. Airways, opted out of the body scanner for fear of possible radiation. "What is this?" she was asked during her "pat-down." "It's my prosthesis," she told the TSA agent, "because I've had breast cancer." "Well," the agent replied, "you'll need to show me that." So she removed he prosthesis for the agent.
Thomas Sawyer, a retired teacher on his way to a wedding, wears pants two sizes too big to accommodate the urostomy attached to an opening in his stomach. In the "enhanced pat-down," a TSA agent broke the seal, and it leaked over Sawyer's body and clothing.
Then there were the 100 Indiana National Guardsmen returning from duty in Afghanistan who were forced to exit their plane during a stop. They were all carrying unloaded M4 Carbines and M-240B machine guns. One had his tool kit confiscated and had to give up his nail clippers because a soldier on his way home from protecting his country might use them to take over the aircraft.
Mr. President, this is more than an inconvenience. This is barbaric, inhumane, unnecessary and arguably unconstitutional. It's a sad day when Khalid Sheik Mohammed has a greater presumption of innocence than American soldiers and the civilians they fight and die to protect.
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