The TSA bashing first started on RW media (Rush, Fox) as an issued talking point

[AnotherMother4Peace]

(as indicated by the timing and similar verbiage). This sudden focus on TSA by the radical right wing immediately raised my suspicions. What was their motivation? Their sudden onslaught was similar to their attacks on unions, teachers, Muslims, ACORN, etc: make them evil, stir up a public outcry, and then call for their demise. Well, sure enough - the radical right wing is now calling for privatization of TSA. This is so classic RW strategy.

So I take all this TSA bashing with a grain of salt. It would be impossible for problems not to occur with the tremendous amount of TSA/public contact and duties - and those problems should be remedied. I, personally, have found TSA personnel professional & courteous. So color me skeptical about the whole controversy, who is generating the controversy, and their motivations.

[veganlush]

1. exactly. and the attacks on TSA workers have

been way over the top. You don't call someone a child molester for doing their job. If they are child molesters, than pediatricians are too, simple as that.

[ProdigalJunkMail]

4. if that person is unnecessarily frisking my child

then child molester works. comparing this to a doctor's examination is ridiculous at best. and to be honest, the doc doesn't grab my daughter's crotch in a routine examination...

sP

[veganlush]

38. it's a canard

this meme that a comparison only works if it's exact, as in "that TSA worker acted like a TSA worker" and you must know it's a canard. As for the "unnecessarily" charge, that's more childish, meaningless language. There are either underwear bombs or there are not. If, in the course of doing their respective jobs, the doctor or the TSA worker touch genitals, doing the job as they were trained to do it, those facts don't change them in child molesters.

[ixion]

29. Wel, no, not exactly...

And the only thing over the top is the TSA and DHS, which are both distinctly un-American.

[damntexdem]

53. But the attacks on TSA and its policies are fully deserved.

I won't fly if it is in any way feasible to avoid it -- and that was before the recent changes in procedures.

[Canuckistanian]

2. How will privatization change anything?

Whoever gets in will still has to enforce the same TSA rules.

And the searches will be done with LOWER paid and LESS VETTED employees.

[Jackpine Radical]

5. Precisely--

but it will be a nice coup for whoever gets the contract. H'mmmmmm…Blackwater Xe?

[leftstreet]

3. Big K&R

[ProdigalJunkMail]

i have found on many occasions

that TSA personnel are surly, obnoxious and rude...I do about 200K a year in the air so I am in the airport a good bit.


sP

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. (Adjusting tinfoil hat) Maybe what the righties want

is for the TSA to back off on their security protocols (mind you, I'm not defending the nudie scans and grope-searching here), perhaps hoping another undie-bomber makes it through security and a plane blows up, or people at least get the bejeebers scared out of them. Then the righties can blame it all on Obama and the Democrats for not Keeping America Safe.

[Stinky The Clown]

7. It wouldn't be a talking point if it wasn't so distasteful

It wouldn't be a talking point if it wasn't so intrusive.

It wouldn't be a talking point if it wasn't so worthy of universal revulsion.

It wouldn't be a talking point if it didn't have such a cell-phone-video Top 40 chart.

It wouldn't be a talking point if it had a record of some success.

It wouldn't be a talking point if it hadn't been termed stupid by most people who have the creds to make such comments - like pilots.

It wouldn't be a talking point if it wasn't applied with such out of touch disdain for we the people.




I could go on.

Obama could have ended this anytime he wanted to. Now he can't because he will appear to be caving to the RW - again. He is in a no-win situation of his own making.

[boston bean]

12. not only that Stinky. Liberals have been talking and complaining

About this for quite a long time. To try and make this out to be Obama hating and liberals falling for RW bullshit is quite disingenuous.

[laughingliberal]

34. Exactly! I remember many here when this was first floated after underpants were against it.

I distinctly remember a lot of DUers and liberals being aware the push to institute use of these scanners was coming from Chertoff and his need to profit off this investment.

Would be interested in knowing what the RW was saying back then.

[somone]

14. The scanner/groping scheme should be opposed by anyone who values

personal safety and human dignity. It's very simple, which is why there is revulsion across the spectrum.

[Individualist]

8. Reading suggestions -

They Thought They Were Free by Milton Mayer
It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
1984 by George Orwell

[AnotherMother4Peace]

59. Books about the abuse of power: Demonize, Dismantle, Privatize

[woo me with science]

9. So if Rush comes out against anal probing,

does that mean we have to sign up?

[lpbk2713]

13. THAT ...

... is something that will NEVER happen.






:eyes:

[woo me with science]

15. ...

:rofl:

[smiley]

28. why, why, why,

:puke:

[Skidmore]

10. Yup and DU, as always, is ready to jump on the bandwagon and

aid and abet the RW mouthpieces. The firing squad has assembled and is progressively shooting itself in the....er....err....junk.

[Stinky The Clown]

18. Lefties have been opposed to this forever. You're being disingenuous.

It isn't as if any of us just discovered this issue. Most have been opposed to it since before Obama was a Senator. So can you're "liberals are so extreme" crap.

This is all of Obama's making.

[Skidmore]

33. I don't think so, Stinky.

I just don't think so. I must disagree with you, my friend.

[Stinky The Clown]

51. Are you actually saying that lefties didn't get upset at TSA until now?????

Really?

[damntexdem]

55. The Department of Hoaxland Security was perpetrated by the Dubya Administration.

nuff said

[sally cat]

11. Actually started bigtime with Mr. Don't Touch My Junk, John Tyner. Pilots thing didn't help either.

[AnotherMother4Peace]

16. Actually started weeks before him, & he became a regular guest on the RW media circuit. nt

[sally cat]

31. No,and if you want to use the way back machine,it started with the left pushing back against the TSA

from the get go.

[pacalo]

17. I had the same impression: sources, motivation, rightwing s.o.p.

I think the procedure is invasive & wrong, but the wildfire-generated information has the same stink of those "pass this on to 10 friends in the next 10 minutes" rightwing chain-mail forwards.

A lot worse was done during the boy king's reign; where was the firestorm then?

[Stinky The Clown]

21. The firestorm on the left was a conflagration! The media didn't cover it.

Because the media didn't cover it, you seem to think it didn't exist. Lefties have been on this since before Obama was a Senator.

[pacalo]

44. I'm talking about the firestorm by the rightwing.

I took a peek at a thug-loving discussion board & they're angry about it, too, blaming, of course, Obama. These are the same folks who were cheerleaders for greater security, no matter what the cost of their now-beloved "freedom".

Nice to see the chickens come home to roost, but I smell propaganda. I think it's worth checking up on the background on this procedure to see where the thugs came into its implementation before I help their p.r. maneuvering.

[Stinky The Clown]

52. Of **course** its propaganda. They figured out that this policy is so odeous that . . . .

. . . . even the left will share their anger. Except it is the left that has been angry about TSA since its inception. It is only now that the right has come around to think this. The fact is, however, they don't actually care about the policy; they only care about discrediting Obama.

The other fact is, Obama endorsed the very worst of this shit just a few days ago. He has painted himself into a corner of his OWN MAKING.

[Stinky The Clown]

57. Just because they're using it for propaganda doesn't mean the TSA is a good thing

The TSA was started by bush. Let's never forget that. Just because Obama enhanced it doesn't leave bush off the hook.

But its true. The worst of it in the here and now is all Obama and all avoidable. The optics and politics of this are awful for him. They laid a trap and he walked right into it.

[pacalo]

61. I'm totally with you on these points. Well said, Stinky.

[FourScore]

19. That's exactly what I've been saying.

Liberals just feed right into the right wing sometimes.

[Stinky The Clown]

22. Did you miss the liberals decrying TSA during the bus years?

Liberals have been opposed to this FOREVER. Where have you been?

[laughingliberal]

35. +1 nt

[FourScore]

40. So do you think it should be done by a private agency?

What is the solution?

[Stinky The Clown]

60. That was intended to be an insult, right?

How about this for an answer: End all passenger screening, accept some level or risk, and do some fucking police work.

Under the logic behind ANY airport screening, why do we allow cell phones in cars? Why do we allow cigarettes to be sold? Why do we allow alcohol to be sold? Or guns? Or motorcycles? All of that kills lots more people than have terrorists. All of that represents a greater - far greater - threat than an guy with C4 in his shorts.

We're a nation of fucking wussies.

[Xenotime]

20. TSA is working to keep the country safe.

[ixion]

30. ...

:rofl:

Yeah, right.

[nadinbrzezinski]

23. In what parallel universe?

I have found TSA methodology to be somewhat of a joke for YEARS... I guess I have been listening to Rush too.

:sarcasm:

[frylock]

24. if that's the case, then i side with the RWers on this..

but since it isn't the case, as has been pointed out in several posts here, it makes your opinion on this moot.

[sally cat]

25. You have this exactly backwards. See the link:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9610798

[Pathwalker]

26. So, we shouldn't be bothered by the indignities suffered by cancer survivors?

If a bladder cancer survivor has his urinoscopy bag ripped off him and it leaks his urine on him, that's not a problem for a liberal?
If a breast cancer survivor must rip her breast prosthesis off her chest to prove she's not a terrorist, that's okay, too?
The right wing is also pissed about the foreclosure fraud - does that mean liberals should applaud the banksters ripping off homeowners?

[ixion]

27. Well, no. The TSA 'bashing' or rather, oppostion to such an agency began the day it was spawned

and those of us in the reality-based community has always maintained this premise.

[Cleobulus]

32. Rewriting history? How stupid. n/t

[Atypical Liberal]

36. Meh...

I'm not buying this as an anti-government or anti-union movement.

People are just fed up with the new choice for flying: be seen naked or undergo a "Freedom Fondle".

It seems that conservatives and progressives alike are annoyed by the whole thing. It's ineffective, invasive, and expensive. Then you follow the money and see that a lot of money has been spent lobbying to get these tools in place, taking advantage of the whole "war on terror" bullshit.

[MadHound]

37. Amazing. Now opposing sexual harassment and wishing to retain one's dignity is "bashing"

Thanks for being part of the problem instead of part of the solution. Because of people like you, Osama has won. Now, let's go be good little sheeple *baaa*:eyes:

[katnapped]

39. Sorry but you gotta take one for Team O

If you resist, the Republicans will win :sarcasm:

[JoePhilly]

41. I noticed the same thing regarding "privatization" ...

I was getting a few subs for lunch last weekend and the place I go to always has Faux News on ... and the Faux clowns were pushing for PRIVATIZATION of the TSA.

And after that, as I listen to the right wing perspective on this, that motivation seems to become much clearer.

The right wing, has done a great job scaring the right wing into hating the government ... so now they are shifting tactics, with the goal of scaring the left wing into the same fearful position.

This is not to say that there are not important issues here ... but the Faux News folks have figured out that you can actually play both sides of the coin ... use one framing to scare the right wing and another to scare the left ... both of which weaken the government and increase the power of Faux and the uber-rich.

[Xithras]

42. Liberals argued against the formation of the TSA 8 years ago, and have consistentlyslammed it since.

The only thing that is "revealed" here is something that we've all suspected for a long time.

If liberals care about an issue and protests against it, the media paints us as a "fringe" element unworthy of coverage.

If conservatives care about the same issue and protest against it, the issue suddenly becomes headline news on every TV station in America.

The TSA shouldn't exist. It should have never existed. As to the fact that the rightwingers are finally waking up to that reality...well, better late than never.

[AnotherMother4Peace]

43. My post has generated a lot of discussion, been on & off the greatest page several times (rec/unrec)

And was replied to with inflammatory language: grope, molest, stupid, humiliation, etc., etc. Discussion is always good & correcting problems is always optimum. But reactionary rhetoric is not good, and it often goes hand in hand with the “pile on, let’s get them” approach so often used by RW media (ACORN, unions). RE: problems within TSA, as with problem within any type of employment (Troopergate, Joe the Unlicensed Plumber, Addicted Physicians): correct them, find a solution, deal with them. Don’t privatize the TSA like the radical right wing media/politicians are now calling for. Blackwater is salivating at the sound of this, as are the RW benefactors. My skepticism remains because this appears to be the same modus operandi (demonize & destroy) that has been used repeatedly by Karl Rove and his ilk.

[Cleobulus]

46. The problems is that you lied, the TSA has been attacked by the left since it started under Bush...

don't get out of lying by saying its all reactionary, its just that NOW the right has finally got a fucking clue, and now the left is supposed to support what it opposed since the beginning? How is that consistent?

[leftstreet]

47. It's like Iraq War propaganda

They're really perfecting their strategies

Good post!

FLRA Accepts AFGE Petition for Union Election at TSA

WASHINGTON, Nov. 12, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire
The Federal Labor Relations Authority today accepted the petition from the American Federation of Government Employees to hold a union election at the Transportation Security Administration.

"AFGE argued, and the FLRA agreed, that the right for employees to elect an exclusive representative and the right to engage in collective bargaining are two separate and distinct rights," AFGE National President John Gage said. "We have always said the choice to unionize and the task of winning collective bargaining rights at TSA would be a two-part process.

"While we wait for the decision on collective bargaining rights that TSA Administrator Pistole has indicated will come soon, the election process can begin to move forward," Gage added. "TSOs have waited long enough for both formal representation in the workplace and for the same collective bargaining rights held by Border Patrol and Federal Protective Service officers, ICE agents, FEMA employees, DoD civilians—as well as those screening officers that work for TSA contractors.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/flra-accepts-afge-petition-for-union-election-at-tsa-107570868.html

TSA to hold union election

By Emily Long November 12, 2010

Transportation Security Administration employees soon will be able to vote for exclusive union representation.

The Federal Labor Relations Authority on Friday accepted a petition from the American Federation of Government Employees and the National Treasury Employees Union to hold an election to determine which group will represent TSA workers. Petitions filed by AFGE and NTEU earlier this year were denied by an FLRA regional official, but Friday's decision reverses that ruling. Both unions have been vying for exclusive representation of 40,000 TSA employees. FLRA will set the timeline for the election, count the votes and certify the results.

AFGE National President John Gage praised the decision, arguing Transportation Security officers have waited too long for union representation.

http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/111210l3.htm

(insert two weeks worth of M$M Grope-gate and hysteria)

TSA Is 'Far Behind The Curve' On Security, Lawmaker Says

NPR NewsBlog 11/22/2010
While the Transportation Security Administration says there's reason behind its new security processes at airports, the Republican congressman who's in line to become chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee says the agency is behind the times when it comes to protecting Americans.

"What they're doing really doesn't even address the current threat," Rep. John Mica, R-FL, told All Things Considered co-host Melissa Block this afternoon. Pat-downs and body scans of travelers might catch some of the would-be bombers of past years, Mica said, but won't stop terrorists intent on putting bombs on cargo planes.

Mica is an advocate of making more use of private contractors to do the screening and security work at airports. Melissa noted, as has Fox News, that Mica has come under some criticism because contributors to his campaigns have included companies that might benefit from such work. Mica called such talk "a lot of malarkey":

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/11/22/131517640/tsa-is-far-behind-the-curve-on-security-lawmaker-says

Traveler Anger Has Some Cities Considering Private Screeners

POSTED: 8:06 pm MST November 20, 2010

DENVER -- One city councilman in Colorado Springs is so fed up with new TSA security procedures he's ready to ask about switching to private contractors.

"I think we're kind of reaching a tipping point in this country right now," said Sean Paige, Colorado Springs city councilman. "Americans are tired of being treated like cattle and criminals every time they go out to the airport. We all understand the need for security, but I think we could do it with more dignity and more respect."

Paige said he'll ask airport managers to explore the pros and cons of switching to private screeners, something Sanford International Airport in Orlando, Fla. is already considering

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/25865627/detail.html

[AnotherMother4Peace]

50. Thank you for this information. I have a feeling it is very germane to the discussion. nt

[Igel]

45. I've never fallen for that kind of non-reasoning.

It tries to get beyond thinking and evaluating an issue on the basis of the issue itself and ridicule people into defining themselves solely in opposition to something else.

Denial of thinking isn't cool.

Allowing knee-jerk "I'm not like him" reactions to allow those you dislike to dictate your actions is one possible result. "He says we should avoid shooting lead bullets into our brains, but he's a Nazi Neandertal knuckledragger out to get sweet, non-judgmental people like me. Gee, I know he's not somebody I want to be like, so there has to be some secret benefit to having lead tear through my skull."

I found have the TSA personnel to be professional in the same sense that my high school janitor was professional: brutish, not particularly professional or pleasant, not somebody you want to allow in your car without seat covers, but he got the job done reasonably well most of the time.

From time to time they've been brutish and professional in their stupidity, and more than once really rude.

It was truly amazing when I had to fly with $50k of eye-tracking equipment and a couple of laptops. The TSA response ranged from, "Gee, look at all that wiring and stuff, I don't understand it, here--just walk on through" to the cretin who wanted me to completely disassemble it to make sure it wouldn't go "boom" at the wrong time. (And, yes, when we finally got set up in our host lab in Central Europe I had to take a couple of days getting it to work again.)

The TSA was something * didn't want to begin with. The idea was first strongly pushed by people with (D) after their name and adopted as a kind of compromise. It was almost immediately taken as a * project and decried by the left as fascistic and intrusive. Even with these scanners there was the attempt to say that it was a * initiative to have them; Chertoff, as one of the people involved on the side of the manufacturer, is responsible. People didn't like that Napolitano used Obama stimulus money to buy them as part of a program put in by an Obama political appointee.

I guess the only way to save the entire mess is by decreeing that it is actually a good program, the problems are fictive and imaginary, and in fact the entire process is great. (Of course, the revision has to be projected back in time when you take into account people like my brother, who refuses to fly on principle because of the TSA--*'s or Obama's.)

But what do I know? I'm just like Hitler. I breathe oxygen.

[Matariki]

48. I see. So due to our Us vs. Them political discourse - I guess you propose

that Liberals embrace being radiated and groped?

[sally cat]

49. To follow your logic, if the RW media said don't jump off a cliff, you would take the opposite view?

[AnotherMother4Peace]

54. It would probably be one of those cool cliffs I jumped off as a kid, the ones above

the deep spots in the river. I so enjoyed jumping off those cliffs.

But no, you're wrong, that's not my logic.

[kgnu_fan]

56. Thank you for this information.

[amborin]

58. K&R

[flyarm]

62. AS a 33 year flight crew of one of the 9/11 airlines ..Flt Attend of the year for the NY Base of my

airline in 2001..(now retired) I will not go through one of those radiation machines ..period..and I fly all the time!

And Until this government of our, explains to me how and why the underwear bomber got on a USA bound aircraft without a passport and who in our government gave the order to put him on that aircraft,( becuase an order would have to have been in place for that guy to get through european security and the airline gate agents , to get on that aircraft without a passport! And do not try to tell me other wise, I flew International for years!!)).. I will boycott their fucking machines.

Get that ..I will not submit to these dangerous machines , nor will anyone in my family put our health at risk with machines that do not provide anymore security than traditional security measures. Nor will my family nor I allow our health to be compromised by people who have had 6 weeks of training and are not specifically trained on Xray Technology and radiation.

Besides the radiation, My rights say I do not have to !

Since when am I guilty before being proven innocent???????????

There is no reason security can not be performed without taking our constitutional rights away!

[AnotherMother4Peace]

63. Thank you flyarm. This is the discussion & input that is needed for remedy, not privatization. nt

[lynne]

64. So you think the child groping, prosthetic breast removal and urine bag spilling isn't -

- a big deal just because the right said it was a big deal? My mother calls that "cutting off your nose to spite your face."

Maybe WE should have talked about it first, ever think of that?

[underpants]

65. I completely agree

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=9594006

[TheKentuckian]

66. Un Fucking rec

Why would I flip my own long held beliefs to get on the opposite side of the TeaPubliKlans or to rah rah a President.

You folks and I have a wide gulf of separation of our interpretation of the constitution and the value we put on those enumerated rights.

I don't give a crap what anyone's motivations are either way because I have every confidence this is a substantial overreach and violation of our basic right.

[Swamp Rat]

67. Fuck the TSA and Rash Limpballs!

[DirkGently]

68. There's no grounds to question "the controversy" just because RWngers join in.

You don't need a scurrilous agenda to have a problem with the Nudie Scan 'n Child Grope. They're pointless, expensive, hazardous, degrading nonsense. Rightwingers bashing the TSA in general likely just want to hire their private contractor friends, but that hardly disqualifies the entire discussion.