GDQ Special Report: More proof that government can't do ANYTHING right.
US Marine Daniel Brown was recently detained at LAX, missing his flight while he was interrogated by our fearless incompetentocrats at TSA. Now, I'll be the first to admit that it'd be a shrewd ruse indeed: plant an American caucasian---a Marine in uniform and traveling with a group of Marines in uniform, all possessing valid military identifications along with their official orders to report to such-and-such military installation---into a group of unsuspecting military folks and have him blow up a plane.
Oh yeah, did I forget to mention that he was on his way home from Iraq?
OK, I can admit also that some overpaid, under-IQ'd, screener was simply doing his duty when his gizmotron started beeping wildly.
But, what I can't admit is that TSA are the right people for the job; because if they were, they would have by now figured out some way of eliminating (or at least mitigating) the possibility that anyone, especially such unlikelies as Daniel Brown, would have to go through such nonsense---twice.
That's right, he's already been through the TSA interrogation drill---for the exact same thing. What's that(?), you ask: baggies of C4 explosive in his carry on? Nitro-glycerin? High exposive grenades in his checked bags? No, no and no. Not even something so trivial as forgetting to declare a sidearm in your checked baggage.
Evidently he was detained (again) and thoroughly interrogated (again) for the crime of having gun powder residue on his boots! Imagine that. A Marine with (non-explosive) gun powder residue on his boots. Now, as if it's not ludicrous enough, detaining a marine for trace amounts of gun powder on the soles of his shoes; detaining the poor guy twice for the same thing is just too idiotic. Even worse, Daniel Brown, a guy who's thrown himself headfirst into the, albeit dubious, "War on Terror," had been put on a permanent "no fly" list (a place I nearly ended up after inadvertenly attempting to "smuggle on board" a tiny credit card tool with, among other non-life-threating gizmos, a one-inch knife blade. Seriously, I was photographed, fingerprinted, put on a "watch list" and sent away with a warning not to leave the country, and to not try anymore of this weapon smuggling stuff).
The whole sad story is just more proof (for anyone club-headed enough to not yet be convinced) that governments, and government automatons (i.e. TSA employees) are neither the best nor the most cost-effective answer to protecting the civilian population of our country. Indeed, they are precisely the opposite: THE worst and THE most expensive. And they cannot be held responsible for even the stupidest of actions.
Even if, all else being equal, TSA really was capable of protecting us, the fact that they will utilize four or five people for every one-person task: this alone is reason enough to bump the feds from the list of viable "security providers."
And even if the money issue wasn't enough, well, there's always that pesky ol' issue of limiting government to doing only what it was originally intended to do: protect our coasts and borders from invasion (an even bigger failure); collect some import tarriffs where absolutely necessary; attempt to settle grievances between states and massage away the insults and damaged collective egos that tend to happen in the process; to maintain a high court to determine cases which have somehow been unable to be solved in their home states; and a very few other specific tasks, which were VERY CLEARLY ENUMERATED in the original contract: the Constitution of the United States of America.
Jefferson
Oh yeah, did I forget to mention that he was on his way home from Iraq?
OK, I can admit also that some overpaid, under-IQ'd, screener was simply doing his duty when his gizmotron started beeping wildly.
But, what I can't admit is that TSA are the right people for the job; because if they were, they would have by now figured out some way of eliminating (or at least mitigating) the possibility that anyone, especially such unlikelies as Daniel Brown, would have to go through such nonsense---twice.
That's right, he's already been through the TSA interrogation drill---for the exact same thing. What's that(?), you ask: baggies of C4 explosive in his carry on? Nitro-glycerin? High exposive grenades in his checked bags? No, no and no. Not even something so trivial as forgetting to declare a sidearm in your checked baggage.
Evidently he was detained (again) and thoroughly interrogated (again) for the crime of having gun powder residue on his boots! Imagine that. A Marine with (non-explosive) gun powder residue on his boots. Now, as if it's not ludicrous enough, detaining a marine for trace amounts of gun powder on the soles of his shoes; detaining the poor guy twice for the same thing is just too idiotic. Even worse, Daniel Brown, a guy who's thrown himself headfirst into the, albeit dubious, "War on Terror," had been put on a permanent "no fly" list (a place I nearly ended up after inadvertenly attempting to "smuggle on board" a tiny credit card tool with, among other non-life-threating gizmos, a one-inch knife blade. Seriously, I was photographed, fingerprinted, put on a "watch list" and sent away with a warning not to leave the country, and to not try anymore of this weapon smuggling stuff).
The whole sad story is just more proof (for anyone club-headed enough to not yet be convinced) that governments, and government automatons (i.e. TSA employees) are neither the best nor the most cost-effective answer to protecting the civilian population of our country. Indeed, they are precisely the opposite: THE worst and THE most expensive. And they cannot be held responsible for even the stupidest of actions.
Even if, all else being equal, TSA really was capable of protecting us, the fact that they will utilize four or five people for every one-person task: this alone is reason enough to bump the feds from the list of viable "security providers."
And even if the money issue wasn't enough, well, there's always that pesky ol' issue of limiting government to doing only what it was originally intended to do: protect our coasts and borders from invasion (an even bigger failure); collect some import tarriffs where absolutely necessary; attempt to settle grievances between states and massage away the insults and damaged collective egos that tend to happen in the process; to maintain a high court to determine cases which have somehow been unable to be solved in their home states; and a very few other specific tasks, which were VERY CLEARLY ENUMERATED in the original contract: the Constitution of the United States of America.
Jefferson
posted by Jefferson | 2:08 PM
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