News of the Day

[Sotnos]

Originally Posted by Flycoon

Unless you are as orange as Boehner or Snooki....

Now now, he's laid off the spray a bit & it looks almost a natural skin tone now.

Forget members of congress, I'm glad they decided to let the pilots skip the TSA crapola, that was absurd. If they wanted to do harm they don't need a weapon to do it.

Calling what they're doing "pat downs" is a bit of a misnomer from the footage I've seen, they get more intimate with you than a doctor does. For some reason I got chosen for the body scan last year in Indy, the plate with huge screws in my wrist scared the crap out of them, they didn't make me put my hands up like they do now.

[Avery86]

Originally Posted by WaiverWire

I have no problem with members of our government being able to skip the TSA.

I do. If children aren't exempt from pat-downs, what makes members of government exempt?

This stuff makes me insane. How can these people possibly think that they're working for our best interests when they place themselves above the laws they enact?

[Hoek]

And let's face it.. politicians aren't vitally important. So what if they miss a flight? Nobody's life is on the line. If we're going to make exemptions then at least make it stuff like pilots, U.S. Marshals, etc. Otherwise suck it up and practice what you preach (or at least look the other way on).

Originally Posted by Hoek

And let's face it.. politicians aren't vitally important. So what if they miss a flight? Nobody's life is on the line. If we're going to make exemptions then at least make it stuff like pilots, U.S. Marshals, etc. Otherwise suck it up and practice what you preach (or at least look the other way on).

The solution is allowing the TSA the right to profile. After all when getting a ticket one now has to provide a full name, date of birth and some sort of ID. Names are ran against data bases. Those that ring the bell or meet certain requirements would then have to go through the more stringent checks.

[Avery86]

Originally Posted by WaiverWire

The solution is allowing the TSA the right to profile. After all when getting a ticket one now has to provide a full name, date of birth and some sort of ID. Names are ran against data bases. Those that ring the bell or meet certain requirements would then have to go through the more stringent checks.

So my father in law, whose name is Michael Smith, should continually go through stringent security checks just because he wasn't fortunate enough to have a more unique name?

Profiling is never the answer. Violence comes from everywhere. And how long would it take before people who want to cause harm realize "hmm, the white guys don't get profiled that often, let's recruit one."

The solution is .. there is no solution. So this illusion of safety is just pointless.

[ChaseSpace]

The TSA is a theater act.

Originally Posted by Avery86

So my father in law, whose name is Michael Smith, should continually go through stringent security checks just because he wasn't fortunate enough to have a more unique name?

Profiling is never the answer. Violence comes from everywhere. And how long would it take before people who want to cause harm realize "hmm, the white guys don't get profiled that often, let's recruit one."

The solution is .. there is no solution. So this illusion of safety is just pointless.

Have you purchase a ticket lately? When doing so online you have to provide date of birth and the ID number of a drivers license or passport. If you are purchasing the day of the flight there should be a cut off for when you can make that purchase, how the purchase is made and if you have luggage and a return flight. Other wise you are subject to a strict security check at the airside.

Have you ever heard of "behavior profiling"? From our own records we know who flies to certain countries and how long they have been there. We also know who has never left the States. Seems that with these records we could come up with a better, safer and more convenient way to do things. After all this is information we already have within our own data bases. This is not even close to racial profiling and is legal.

Since 9/11 not one act of terrorism has occurred on a flight that originated in the US. But we continue to come up with ridiculous requirements for passengers.

[Avery86]

Originally Posted by WaiverWire

Since 9/11 not one act of terrorism has occurred on a flight that originated in the US. But we continue to come up with ridiculous requirements for passengers.

You raise some good points, WW. I agree with this one the most, though. My problem is that those in the government point to this fact as proof of the security measures working. The simple fact is, it's not necessarily correlated. So why does the TSA keep making things increasingly more strict?

Could it be that former HS head Michael Chertoff is head of the company supplying body scanners? Who knows.

Originally Posted by Avery86

You raise some good points, WW. I agree with this one the most, though. My problem is that those in the government point to this fact as proof of the security measures working. The simple fact is, it's not necessarily correlated. So why does the TSA keep making things increasingly more strict?

Could it be that former HS head Michael Chertoff is head of the company supplying body scanners? Who knows.

I do think that Chertoff has a lot to do with it.

And since 9/11 the only reason a plane did not go down when someone was on board with a device was because the other passengers reacted.

Our security in places over sea's is the down fall. Even the devices that got on board the cargo planes were able to make it past security with no problems because we didn't care about cargo planes. But the fools in charge never even thought that packages are sent on passenger planes most of the time.

[Donnie D]

Its already started:

Gov.-elect Rick Scott’s campaign has come under fire for paying campaign workers with American Express gift cards. Now a new report suggests more than just a few people were given gift cards instead of paychecks.

According to a report by WTSP.com on Tuesday, Scott paid campaign workers with hundreds of thousands of dollars in gift cards, while those workers expected to receive paychecks.

The campaign said in the past that the gift cards were an “isolated” incident, yet WTSP.com reported that they have obtained internal campaign emails that have Scott’s campaign finance director, Chester Spellman, stating that “we have close to $350,000 in gift cards …”

After Scott won the Republican primary, the Republican Party of Florida took over Scott’s campaign finances, since donors can give unlimited amounts to the party. RPOF spokesman Dan Conston said that “the amount purchased does not change anything.”

Although the campaign was mostly financed with more than $70 million of Scott’s own money, the RPOF and Scott’s campaign has stated that they had to resort to giving gift cards because there was an “issue” with providing paychecks.