Open Letter to TSA head John Pistole
Dear TSA supreme overlord John Pistole,
On November 12, 2010, you lashed out at American citizens who dared to protest your totalitarian rent-a-cop “security” tactics at U.S. airports. “It is irresponsible,” you said, “for a group to suggest travelers opt out of the very screening that could prevent an attack using non-metallic explosives.”
To which I respond: YOU, sir, are irresponsible.
It is irresponsible for you to suggest that by opting out of the full-body scanner (as is my right), I am endangering my country. Just because you can’t tell the difference between me and a terrorist, doesn’t mean I can’t.
It is irresponsible for you to opt out of the very screening that really could prevent a terrorist attack: explosives-sniffing dogs, basic investigative profiling methods, and a little common sense.
It is irresponsible for you to wait until now to implement the “enhanced pat downs” you claim are necessary to stop terrorism, when you could have done so shortly after the terrorists flew two planes into the World Trade Center.
It is irresponsible for you to steamroll over the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Does the term “unreasonable search” mean anything to you?
It is irresponsible for you to expose children, pregnant women, and medical patients to unnecessary doses of radiation, the effects of which are still being debated.
It is irresponsible for you to require airline employees to expose themselves to the full-body scanner on a daily basis, knowing full well that radiation has a cumulative effect on a person’s health.
It is irresponsible for you to subject innocent Americans to a virtual strip-search and to the danger that the images will be saved and stored somewhere for the viewing pleasure of your rent-a-cops.
It is irresponsible for you to respond to the statistically small risk of a terrorist attack by imposing the statistically greater risk of skin cancer.
It is irresponsible for you to ignore the corruption of the sweetheart deal that was made with former Homeland Security head Michael Chertoff, who benefited financially from the sale of the full-body scanners.
It is irresponsible for you to bully us into submission to your scanner by making the alternative unendurable.
It is irresponsible for you to use the genital groping of men, women, children, and sex assault victims as a means of humiliation to force us into compliance. There’s a legal term for this strategy: sexual assault.
It is irresponsible for you to threaten exorbitant fines against Americans who don’t want their genitals to be seen or touched. If you were truly interested in stopping terrorists, rather than controlling the innocent, you would realize you can’t slap a fine on Mohammed Akbar’s blown up bits.
It is irresponsible for you to treat innocent Americans like criminals, while HS overlord Janet Napolitano considers a religious exemption for Muslims. That’s right – FOR MUSLIMS, the very people who made your tyrannical policies “necessary” in the first place! Thus I ask: Who is the target of your scanners? Who are you here to protect? Why would those most likely to commit terrorism on a plane be exempt from the molestation to which the rest of us are compelled by threat of fines and arrest?
No, sir, it is not I who put personal preferences above the safety of this nation. It is not I who put political correctness above proper procedure. It is not I who, for a decade, and with billions of dollars in federal funding at my disposal, has failed to catch a single terrorist.
No, my good sir, that would be the TSA.
And so I ask: Why should I give a rip what you think about national security? Even a zombie wouldn’t buy your lies.
