Are we losing our rights in the name of safety?

[simms3]

I just went through airport security yesterday in Atlanta, world's busiest airport, and it was a breeze.  There was nothing new, and I didn't even have to go through the body scanners.  I was in and out in 5-10 minutes (I thought I was going to be there for at least an hour so I arrived really early).  As I was sitting at a bar getting drunk for 2 hours waiting for my flight, I chatted with a few other patrons about the "added security".  Everyone that I talked to thought it was fine and better a grope than a bomb or hijacking midway through flight.  I agreed.

This added security which I did not even see yesterday has been in place overseas for a long time, and anyone who has traveled extensively overseas knows that other countries have been doing this already.  The lady who had to remove her prosthetic breast underwent embarassment, but frankly there was apparently a Jihadist doctor in the UK who was outfitting prosthetic breasts with explosive material.  And frankly these TSA people don't want to do this any more than we do, but they have to live with themself if they let a terrorist through who ends up at least attempting something.

[BridgeTroll]

Thanks for the report... this matches the experience of the vast majority of people who have travelled via airline since the new procedures have been in effect.

[BridgeTroll]

All news reports I have read and seen confirm simms experience... across the nation.

[BridgeTroll]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40355090/

Holiday travel smooth despite new security

.By Michelle Nichols and Bernd Debusmann Jr.
Reuters 
updated 11/24/2010 5:34:30 PM ET 2010-11-24T22:34:30
Share Print Font: +-NEW YORK â€" Millions of Americans took to the skies on Wednesday for the start of the Thanksgiving holiday but air travel flowed smoothly as passengers largely ignored calls to protest more invasive security procedures.

The enhanced screening methods that have drawn complaints from some Americans and lawmakers in Congress involve revealing full-body imaging scanners and physical patdowns for travelers who opt out of the scans or raise security concerns.

By Wednesday evening -- traditionally one of the busiest U.S. travel days -- there were no reports of wide-scale protests or disruptions at major airports. The Federal Aviation Administration website also showed few weather delays.

"I'm going to ask for a (body) scan. Like that guy said, I don't want them touching my junk," said Nick Mazzanti, 36, who works in public relations in New York, referring to an Internet video that fueled protests against more invasive security.

The video captured audio of a California man telling an airport security official, "If you touch my junk, I'm going to have you arrested." Critics also waged an Internet campaign urging passengers to refuse having their bodies scanned.

But a post on a Transportation Security Administration blog, http://blog.tsa.gov/, said, "We're receiving reports of minimal wait times across the entire country -- from Honolulu to Myrtle Beach and everywhere in between -- and no disruptions."

Music student Emile Trisfith, 19, was traveling home to New York City from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport for Thanksgiving and said he had been prepared for the worst. "There is always a long line but today there wasn't," he said.


.Thanksgiving travelers were also expected to throng Amtrak rail service and highways to reach family for the holiday.

24 MILLION AIR TRAVELERS EXPECTED

The new airport security follows attempted attacks on airliners. Last month, authorities thwarted the bombing of U.S.-bound cargo flights. Last Christmas Day, a man tried to set off a bomb in his underwear on a flight to Detroit.

The Yemen-based group al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed responsibility for both plots.

Airlines expect 24 million people to fly during the Thanksgiving holiday period. Many U.S. families come together for Thanksgiving, which marks the European Pilgrim settlers' first successful harvest in 1621 shared with American Indians.

The TSA estimates that fewer than 2 percent of the 2 million passengers screened daily, or 40,000, are given the patdowns.

"I'm glad they take the extra precaution," said Stacy David, 46, at Orlando International Airport in Florida. "I feel sorry for the guy who has to look at (the body scans) all day."

But a handful of patdowns made headlines recently. The TSA apologized after a bladder cancer survivor's urostomy bag opened during a security patdown and covered him with urine.

TSA chief John Pistole told CNN on Wednesday he believed the full-body scanners and patdowns were necessary but that officials were trying to work out if there were less invasive ways of ensuring airline security.

At least half of Americans say the airport patdowns go too far, recent polls showed. Yet most support the full-body scanning machines at airports and give more priority to preventing terrorism than protecting their privacy.

[uptowngirl]

I might add this is not the norm travelling overseas, unless you are travelling to say Mynamar. I love it when someone travels twice a year and all of a sudden becomes an expert on security procedures! Mules have carried drugs hidden in their anus for years, it would be a prime spot for a bomb, perhaps everyone should bend over and have a rectal exam prior to getting on a plane, train, or hell even entering a prime target like the Everbank stadium?

It is A.O.K.  to humiliate and belittle your FELLOW citizens because of some jihadist Dr in the UK??!! What is wrong with you people? Using your logic it should be OK to just shoot down on spot anyone wearing a read bandanna no? I mean they MUST be a Crip right....

[uptowngirl]

http://abcnews.go.com/Travel/wireStory?id=11979353

European Airlines Say US Security Goes Overboard
European air officials say US security goes overboard; British Airways calls demands excessive
The Associated Press
116 comments By ROBERT BARR Associated Press
LONDON October 27, 2010 (AP)
PrintRSSFont Size:  Share:EmailTwitterFacebookMoreFarkTechnoratiGoogleLiveMy SpaceNewsvineRedditDeliciousMixxYahoo

More Video        European air officials accused the United States of imposing useless and overly intrusive travel security measures, calling Wednesday for the Obama administration to reexamine policies ranging from online security checks to X-raying shoes.

British Airways' chairman made the first in a wave of complaints, saying in a speech to airport operators that removing shoes and taking laptops out of bags were "completely redundant" measures demanded by the U.S.

He was joined less than 24 hours later by British pilots, the owner of Heathrow airport, other European airlines, and the European Union. The EU submitted formal objections to a program that requires U.S.-bound travelers from 35 nations to complete online security clearance before departure. It called the system burdensome and said it could violate travelers' privacy.

The EU said the U.S. Electronic System for Travel Authorization would process some 13 million registrations from Europeans in 2009 alone. The program applies to Europeans who don't need visas to travel to the U.S.

[uptowngirl]

now this is really BS, so if you are from/travelling from a terrorist country you are treated better and allowed more rights than a US citizen?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/02/airport-security-checks-r_n_522694.html


 

Airport Security Checks Revamped For Travel To U.S.
EILEEN SULLIVAN | 04/ 2/10 09:23 PM | 

Airport security rules are being revamped for travelers flying to the U.S. Get World Alerts
 
WASHINGTON â€" The U.S. government is refining its terror-screening policy to focus on specific terror threats and not travelers' nationalities. The new policy replaces a security requirement put in place after the attempted bombing of a jetliner en route to Detroit on Christmas Day that singled out people from 14 countries that have been home to terrorists. It also expands the pool of foreign travelers targeted for extra screening beyond those whose names are on a U.S. terror watch list.

The changes, announced Friday by the Homeland Security Department, come after a three-month review of counterterrorism policies ordered by President Barack Obama in the wake of the near-miss attack.

Officials hope the new procedures will close a dangerous security gap that that allegedly allowed Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board a Detroit-bound airplane in Amsterdam with a bomb hidden in his underwear.

It should also significantly decrease the number of innocent travelers from the 14 countries who have been inconvenienced by the extra screening, said a senior administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security issues.

The countries that had been affected include Afghanistan, Algeria, Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

Under the refined policy, a person traveling to the U.S. would be stopped if he or she fits a specific description of a potential terrorist provided by U.S. intelligence officials â€" even if the suspect's name is unknown.

Currently, passengers' names are compared to names on U.S. terror watch lists. If air carriers have a potential match to a watch list, the passenger is either banned from flying to the U.S. or subjected to extra screening such as a full-body pat-down before boarding the airplane.

For example, if the U.S. has intelligence about a Nigerian man between the ages of 22 and 32 whom officials believe is a threat or a known terrorist, under the new policy all Nigerian men within that age range would receive extra screening before they are allowed to fly to the U.S.

If intelligence later shows that the suspect is not a terrorist, the extra screening for others matching the description would be lifted.

One of the reasons Abdulmutallab was able to board the flight in Amsterdam was that his name was not on a U.S. terror watch list. However, officials intercepted a conversation in Yemen about a Nigerian man being trained for a special mission.

If officials in Amsterdam had known to screen passengers who fit the profile, it is possible Abdulmutallab would have been caught, the senior administration official said.

Mohammed Albasha, spokesman for the Yemeni Embassy in Washington, called the changes a good step for U.S. diplomacy.

"Smart intelligence will provide good security," he said.

One of the biggest challenges in keeping terrorists off U.S.-bound planes is that the U.S. does not have the authority to screen passengers in foreign airports.

In the past three months, senior U.S. security officials have been meeting with foreign countries to discuss how to improve aviation security, and many countries have adopted enhanced screening methods, including the use of body-scanning machines.

"Anytime we can make better and more sophisticated use of intelligence, that's a step forward," said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. King is the top Republican on the homeland security oversight committee and a member of the intelligence committee. "This should have been done before."

[simms3]

Ok Uptowngirl...you are the travel expert, sorry.  Since you know how often I travel via air and all...  Many countries overseas have actually had much stricter security measures than the US for a while, and I have been a user of this stricter security for a while (when you have family in Sweden, Colombia, Cyprus, and live in a family that likes to travel...you kinda get the swing of things).  India certainly has had quite a security process since the 70s.

I am working on getting a job that will require 80% travel time.  If I get the job, I will let you know my experiences then, but I'm sure that if they are not what you want to hear I will still not be a travel expert.

If I had my way, I would actually profile and screen more Muslims than WASPY grannies and northern European 15 year olds.  Adding pressure and stigmatizing terrorism as largely being due to extremist Muslims would hopefully get more Muslims to speak out and help stop the terrorists themselves.  Saying that an 80 year old Quaker grandmother from PA traveling with her family has the same probability of carrying a bomb as a 25 year old Muslim male traveling by himself is beyond me and part of the reason why it's so easy for certain activities to take place.  Sounds like the new procedures attempt to do just this, so I am happy.  If enough Muslims from the Middle East/N Africa/SE Asia are inconvenienced, maybe they will get as upset at the extremists that have taken over their religion as we in America have.  I also believe in stigmatizing mothers who have kids out of wedlock, and I believe in stigmatizing other devious behaviors, but then again I am an extremist in the eyes of extreme liberals.

[JC]

How perfectly imperceptive of you... It does not describe me at all...

Buddy... I might just take the time to show how much of a hypocrite you are when it comes to issues of government overreach. 

Whats stopping you?

Oh, I dont know, a wife, three kids, a job and the simple fact that such a project would be only for the amusement of a few and would not change the way BT thinks in any way shape or form.  

[cityimrov]

If enough Muslims from the Middle East/N Africa/SE Asia are inconvenienced, maybe they will get as upset at the extremists that have taken over their religion as we in America have.  I also believe in stigmatizing mothers who have kids out of wedlock, and I believe in stigmatizing other devious behaviors, but then again I am an extremist in the eyes of extreme liberals.

This is off the topic but have we actually gotten control of the extremist in this country?  We're upset, in a way yes, but have we actually done anything about it other than grandstanding?  How exactly do we get control over them without violating any of their civil & moral rights?  Our extremist span more then religious ones.  

Bashing the Middle East, Africa, Asia which population composes most the world about their problems is hard to do when we ourselves have similar problems in our country.  We too, as a country, have people dying in our streets every day.  We have people who attack each other and our police force.  We are fighting an internal war and from the various reports, we are loosing - badly.  I'm not sure we actually have controlled our extremist who are wrecking not only parts of this country but various other countries around the world.  

From what I see, we haven't even controlled our own problems.

[simms3]

Yeeeaah, umm I don't believe we have the same degree of problems or even the same problems over here.  That's not to say we don't have our fair share of problems, but we don't really export many of them, and aside from some drug smuggling most of our internal problems are separate from airports.  All of the major problems we have had in the last decade with our air travel aside from the geese that brought down the one airliner are extremist Muslims trying to hijack or bomb our planes.

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

I might add this is not the norm travelling overseas, unless you are travelling to say Mynamar. I love it when someone travels twice a year and all of a sudden becomes an expert on security procedures! Mules have carried drugs hidden in their anus for years, it would be a prime spot for a bomb, perhaps everyone should bend over and have a rectal exam prior to getting on a plane, train, or hell even entering a prime target like the Everbank stadium?

It is A.O.K.  to humiliate and belittle your FELLOW citizens because of some jihadist Dr in the UK??!! What is wrong with you people? Using your logic it should be OK to just shoot down on spot anyone wearing a read bandanna no? I mean they MUST be a Crip right....

FYI...

Crip = Blue, Blood = Red   or if you meant the bandana = "'read' that bitch like a crip"  but WTFE, why should all of us non-travelers know more than someone from NOLA about gangs, their colors, TSA and such as those of you who are so well travelled and versed.......

[uptowngirl]

I might add this is not the norm travelling overseas, unless you are travelling to say Mynamar. I love it when someone travels twice a year and all of a sudden becomes an expert on security procedures! Mules have carried drugs hidden in their anus for years, it would be a prime spot for a bomb, perhaps everyone should bend over and have a rectal exam prior to getting on a plane, train, or hell even entering a prime target like the Everbank stadium?

It is A.O.K.  to humiliate and belittle your FELLOW citizens because of some jihadist Dr in the UK??!! What is wrong with you people? Using your logic it should be OK to just shoot down on spot anyone wearing a read bandanna no? I mean they MUST be a Crip right....

FYI...

Crip = Blue, Blood = Red   or if you meant the bandana = "'read' that bitch like a crip"  but WTFE, why should all of us non-travelers know more than someone from NOLA about gangs, their colors, TSA and such as those of you who are so well travelled and versed.......

that was the point, but I guess you missed it. I find it interesting that you are more upset about the fact that Europe and India actually do have less invasive security than America despite the comments posted here, but feel no outrage over grandma or grandpa being throughly humilated, or that people travelling from a terrorist country do not have to go through what you or I going on business trip do in a security line.

[Ocklawaha]

HAPPY DAY'S ARE HERE AGAIN!

OCKLAWAHA

[BridgeTroll]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/26/AR2010112603025_pf.html

Israeli air security experts insist their methods better than U.S.

By Janine Zacharia
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, November 26, 2010; 10:29 PM


JERUSALEM - Israel has long held the reputation as home to the world's most stringent airport security procedures. But most passengers aren't frisked, there are no intimately revealing body-imaging scanners, and security experts dismiss as misguided the new, more intrusive American approach that requires pat-downs or highly detailed scans of every passenger.

"Taking the bottle of water from the 87-year-old woman at JFK, you will never find an explosive material that is coming from bin Laden," said Shlomo Harnoy, head of the Sdema Group, an Israeli security consultancy that advises airports abroad. "You are concentrating on the wrong thing."

Israel's approach allows most travelers to pass through airport security with relative ease. But Israeli personnel do single out small numbers of passengers for extensive searches and screening, based on profiling methods that have so far been rejected in the United States, subjecting Arabs and, in some cases, other foreign nationals to an extensive screening that comes with a steep civil liberties price.

"I know personally of people who came to Israel for a conference and were asked if they had met an Arab. After that, they were stripped and their laptop was confiscated," said Ariel Merari, a terrorism expert at Tel Aviv University who has researched aviation security. "There is a lot to be improved in this approach towards innocent, foreign citizens. Also, the attitude towards Israeli Arabs has to be reevaluated.

"The profiling system is good," Merari said. "But it has to be done with more sensitivity.''

Pini Shif, a founder of the security division at Ben Gurion International Airport outside Tel Aviv, estimates that about 2 percent of passengers flying from the airport are subject to the more intensive screening. For the others, the air-travel experience can be a delight, compared with flying in the United States.

"The security here is far more professional," said Sandy Kornhauser, who arrived with her daughter at Ben Gurion from Philadelphia on Wednesday to attend a wedding.

"I think they know who they are looking for," she added. "In the States, they don't know."

Israeli airport security authorities don't disclose the methods by which they single out passengers for extra scrutiny. They say only that they have a list of suspicious signs that they look for.

Sometimes a Muslim-sounding name is enough. Donna Shalala, a 69-year-old American of Lebanese descent who was President Bill Clinton's secretary of health and human services and is now president of the University of Miami, was detained and questioned for 21/2 hours at Ben Gurion in July. The Israeli news media said she was subject to a humiliating security debriefing because of her Arab last name.

In another incident that made headlines here this fall, Heather Bradshaw, an Indiana University professor, was subjected to a body search and forced to turn over her bra to authorities as she tried to board an El Al flight from Britain's London Luton Airport to Tel Aviv to attend an academic conference. All her belongings except her passport and credit cards were taken from her before she was allowed to board. She got them back three days later, after friends in Israel intervened.

Israeli Arabs, who make up about one-fifth of Israel's population, are regularly subjected to a more intensive questioning that goes beyond the routine queries, such as "Where did you just arrive from?" and "Who packed your bags?" They also are subjected to body and bag searches more frequently than Jewish passengers.

"They began with my hair, even though it is only two centimeters long. They began feeling through it, then examining behind my ears, the neck, the shoulders. They began feeling me under my bra, and then continued on to my tummy. I felt as though I was under a sexual assault," Hunaida Ghanem, an Israeli Arab resident of Jerusalem who has a PhD from Hebrew University in sociology and a postdoctoral degree from Harvard, said as she recalled an incident at the airport in June 2009.

"I have been through searches in the U.S. But what they did here was very different. It was very humiliating," she added.

Since then, Ghanem has declined six invitations to attend conferences abroad, saying she finds it emotionally difficult to go to the airport.

Israeli civil rights organizations have repeatedly appealed to Israel's High Court of Justice to end the alleged discrimination against Israel's Arab citizens. The court is scheduled to hear another appeal Dec. 22.

"If you are a Jew, you can celebrate your journey. You can go to the duty-free," said Amnon Be'eri, co-executive director of the Abraham Fund, an organization that works to advance coexistence between Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs. "If you are an Arab, you are discriminated against, separated, humiliated."

Be'eri says he believes that in addition to violating basic equal rights, Israel is feeding a longer-term security problem by "creating generations of citizens who feel alienated from the state."

However uncomfortable the procedures are for some, Israeli security experts insist that Israel's methods are better at preventing terrorist attacks than the U.S. Transportation Security Administration's reliance on technology or pat-downs. Israeli experts say that even advanced scanners can fail to detect explosives.

Profiling may be too politically controversial and time-consuming to implement at much busier American airports. Still, Israeli experts say they believe it is inevitable that the United States will move in their direction, rather than continuing to evaluate millions of passengers as if they are potential threats.

"The profile system gives you the right, logical way to know who to check," Shif said.

Special correspondent Samuel Sockol at Ben Gurion International Airport and in Jerusalem contributed to this report.