11/17/2010

Democrats like what the TSA is doing?

I guess that I shouldn't be too surprised. But even Democrat comics are having a field day.

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TSA Full-Body Scanners - Jeffrey Goldberg
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Democrats though seem down right giddy about the screening being implemented.

Mr. Pistole, you're doing a great job," Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat and chairman of the Senate committee overseeing air travel, told TSA chief John Pistole, a former FBI agent who's had the job since July. For emphasis, Rockefeller added a few minutes later: "I think you're doing a terrific job."
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota Democrat, admitted right away that "I have been a fan of the advanced imaging technology." American air travelers, she said, "have to understand that this is being done for their best interests and their safety." . . .
Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat, suggested that the public outcry was a problem of education: if Americans learned more about the TSA's new procedures, they wouldn't object to the new searches.
The federal government needs to "make sure they understand the risks that we're trying to address," McCaskill said. "And then I think we can--the majority of Americans I think--I hope will become supportive of the measures that TSA is trying to do to keep us safe."
That echoes what Sen. Joe Lieberman, the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, said yesterday afternoon. As CNET previously reported he said the TSA is "doing the right thing," and that the scans and more invasive pat-downs are "necessary for the security--homeland security--of the American people." (Lieberman is an independent senator from Connecticut who caucuses with Democrats.) . . .


No one is presumably defending cases such as this involving an Amarillo woman:

The suit, filed earlier this year in Amarillo's U.S. District Court, alleges the woman was singled out for "extended search procedures" while preparing to board an aircraft destined for Amarillo on May 29, 2008.

The Amarillo Globe-News has declined to identify the woman for privacy reasons.

"As the TSA agent was frisking plaintiff, the agent pulled the plaintiff's blouse completely down, exposing plaintiffs' breasts to everyone in the area," the lawsuit said. "As would be expected, plaintiff was extremely embarrassed and humiliated."

The suit said the woman filed an administrative claim against the TSA, but the agency never responded, sparking the lawsuit.

The suit also claims that other TSA employees continued to joke and laugh about the incident for an extended period of time. The woman was distraught over the incident and left the screening area so an acquaintance could console her, the suit said.

When the woman re-entered the boarding area, employees once again began joking about the matter, the suit said.

"One male TSA employee expressed to the plaintiff that he wished he would have been there when she came through the first time and that 'he would just have to watch the video,'" the suit said.

The lawsuit claims, among other allegations, that federal employees were negligent and that employees intentionally caused the woman severe emotional distress by joking about the incident after the woman re-entered the airport screening area. . . .

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