Subscribe via RSS Feed

Scan My Junk, Please.

[ 39 ] November 22, 2010 | Charli Carpenter

William Saletan on the idiocy of Airport-Scanner Opt-Out Day.

Comments (39)

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. Flypaper says:
    November 22, 2010 at 7:39 pm

    I read that entire article, looking for some kind of acknowledgement that he was in on the joke, overt sarcasm tags, *something*.

    …Couldn’t find any. What am I missing? I mean, I assume he can’t be *serious*, right?

    Reply
  2. md rackham says:
    November 22, 2010 at 8:16 pm

    Guess who’s flying on Wednesday.

    Reply
  3. hv says:
    November 22, 2010 at 8:19 pm

    Naked scanners are exactly the kind of agile response al-Qaida requires.

    Really? Exactly? No way to improve by moving even slightly in any direction? (Funny, doesn’t Saletan hate it when conservatives try to frighten people with al-Qaida?)

    Mr. Saletan also appears willing to take privacy guarantees from the TSA about back-scanners that have already proven worthless. Sigh.

    =======

    Shorter William Saletan: I hate the thought of other people’s causes delaying my travel.

    Reply
    • Midwest Product says:
      November 23, 2010 at 12:28 pm

      Shorter William Saletan: I hate the thought of other people’s causes delaying my travel.

      Longer Charli Carpenter: I fully support allowing government agents to irradiate myself and my children in order to view us nude if it means not delaying William Saletan on his next trip to deliver a lecture about how women don’t deserve equal protection under the law.

      Reply
  4. Malaclypse says:
    November 22, 2010 at 8:35 pm

    Delays at airports: intolerable

    Delays in getting a legal medical procedure: a sensible compromise everyone should agree with, because abortion is icky.

    Reply
    • danC says:
      November 23, 2010 at 12:44 am

      You left out a part

      Delays in getting a legal medical procedure that William Saletan personally never has to worry about getting

      Reply
  5. elm says:
    November 22, 2010 at 9:16 pm

    While I agree with Saletan (I hate writing that phrase) that National Opt Out Day is ridiculous and will accomplish little but make a hectic travel day worse, the rest of his article defending the TSA for being nimble, necessary, effective, and concerned about our privacy is pretty idiotic. I’m hoping Charli only meant to approve of the first part of the article and not the second.

    Reply
    • Scott de B. says:
      November 22, 2010 at 9:48 pm

      Making a hectic travel day worse is part of the point. To have every major airport descend into gridlock over these pointless procedures would be a glory to behold.

      Reply
      • elm says:
        November 22, 2010 at 10:05 pm

        Only if you think TSA or the administration would change anything in response to airport gridlock. I’m quite confident the TSA will only change if forced to by the politicians, and this is one area where I don’t trust the President or his administration to do anything. Nor, obviously, Congress.

        Reply
        • Midwest Product says:
          November 23, 2010 at 7:20 am

          Yeah, let’s all just give up and do nothing!

          Reply
        • Left_Wing_Fox says:
          November 23, 2010 at 10:17 am

          Do I trust congress to listen directly to a protest? No.

          Do I trust congress to listen to corporations negatively impacted by this sort of gridlock? Oh yes.

          Reply
          • elm says:
            November 23, 2010 at 10:23 am

            That’s a fair point, though my understanding is that the airlines do not currently have much in the way of political clout. I don’t know what I’m basing that understanding on, so I might be wrong, and maybe there are other corporations who would face a negative impact from this that I can’t think of off the top of my head.

            So, if this protest is likely to bring pressure from organized interests and corporations that have political power, then I’m willing to concede it has value. I have doubts, though.

            As to Midwest Product, I didn’t realize the choices were between doing this and doing nothing. But if those are the only choices, given that I’m somewhat lazy, I’d choose doing nothing over spending lots of effort to no effect every day. Though I may be underestimating the effect, as I say above.

            Reply
  6. ema says:
    November 22, 2010 at 9:20 pm

    Ugh, Saletan is such a sniveling, incompetent idiot. He links to the JH study w/out reading it [they tested a demo (p23), not the models in use; they found increased risk of exposure in several areas (p40, 60)], ignores Rep. Holt’s concerns (scalp basal cell ca), proclaims the machines effective and the storage of scans of no consequence.

    But, hey, as long as pregnant women cheerfully and gratefully surrender their access to safe and effective medical procedures all is well in the world.

    Reply
  7. Alex says:
    November 22, 2010 at 9:32 pm

    We went through the stupid scanner at Schipol airport in Amsterdam a few weeks back, and “clear you in 10 seconds” is definitely not true. It took over a minute for each of us to go through, and both of us got got a secondary screening for no reasonable cause that we could determine, but clearly the scanner reported a false positive of some sort. The upshot: the scanners are not a fast path to security and freedom, and certainly aren;t faster than metal detectors. The other thing is that I saw an article that also said that the scanners aren[‘t all that safe: http://www.nationalpost.com/news/Naked+scanners+airports+dangerous+scientists/3819955/story.html. So I call bullshit on his fine story both from personal experience and citing a source from the same medical authority that he does.

    Reply
    • djw says:
      November 22, 2010 at 9:57 pm

      Yeah, I’ve been through the body scanners about 4 times now and each time it’s been much, much slower than the old metal detectors.

      I have to say, my initial response to the opt-out day idea was that it’s idiotic, and I probably still think that, but Saletan’s inspiring me to reconsider.

      Reply
  8. DrDick says:
    November 22, 2010 at 10:20 pm

    If I may quote the Founders for a moment:

    “”Those who are willing to sacrifice their basic liberties to assure their security deserve neither.”

    Really says it all.

    Reply
  9. Bill White says:
    November 22, 2010 at 10:53 pm

    This article asserts that the Dutch are using scanners that use different wave-lengths and therefore

    Do not image private body parts;

    Are less expensive; and

    Are better at detecting threats.

    http://bit.ly/cONRH1

    Reply
  10. wengler says:
    November 22, 2010 at 11:21 pm

    That Saleton piece is total dreck. The fact that these searches are random in the first place indicts the entire process as security theater.

    In this post, I don’t see eye-to-eye with Saleton, Ms. Carpenter or John “don’t touch my junk” Tyner. In fact in subsequent interviews, Tyner has endorsed having security inspections go back from the TSA to the airlines, which doesn’t necessarily follow from his concerns about having a TSA agent touching him inappropriately. Also, even as a white guy I would never think that I could have a federal government official arrested for doing a security check.

    I really think that comes to why this has become issue #1: affluent white people are finally feeling the intrusiveness of the security state that their pissy-pants fear created. It probably also helps that a lot of those TSA agents aren’t white.

    And while watching small-dicked conservatives worry that their secret will get out is satisfying, this security theater has got to end. It’s about time people in this country grow a fucking backbone and stop being scared of every single potential danger in the world. You WILL die. But chances are that Big Mac is going to send you on your way a lot faster than someone carrying a load a C4 in their underpants.

    Reply
    • Bighank53 says:
      November 23, 2010 at 8:46 am

      Uh, in order to be effective in any way, the searches have to be random. If we adopt a policy of only searching people with the last name of “Smith”, for example (a process that can be determined by simple observation) then any would-be bombers will just make sure they’re named Jones instead.

      Yes, al-Quaida are currently the folks with the biggest hard-on for blowing us up. You think they don’t have any female suicide candidates? Or white? Or European?

      Read some Bruce Schneier, who has some excellent online essays about security theater in general, and airlines in particular.

      Reply
    • Tyto says:
      November 23, 2010 at 12:22 pm

      I really think that comes to why this has become issue #1: affluent white people are finally feeling the intrusiveness of the security state that their pissy-pants fear created. It probably also helps that a lot of those TSA agents aren’t white.

      Bingo. As someone said on an earlier thread, though, the clear solution in the minds of these folks is racial profiling, never mind various terrorist groups’ access to non-semitic volunteers.

      Reply
  11. danC says:
    November 23, 2010 at 12:42 am

    William Saletan

    lolz

    Victim-blaming and deliberate obtuseness, just the quality of posting I’ve come to expect from LGM on this issue.

    Reply
  12. Professor Coldheart says:
    November 23, 2010 at 7:50 am

    And to the claim that the TSA’s new scanners and pat-down procedures institutionalize sexual harassment, Saletan’s response is …

    I know that there are pundits who like to prove their seriousness by wearily – or cheerfully – siding with Those In Power, no matter what they do. But I have to ask Saletan (and apparently Charli as well): if a federal policy of sexually harassing every American traveler is not a grotesque harm, what would be? A policy of punching every fiftieth traveler in the solar plexus, to make sure they haven’t swallowed plastique? Cutting off someone’s finger if they opt out of a search?

    In all seriousness: how monstrous would things have to get before you saw the TSA in the light we do?

    Reply
    • The Wrath of Oliver Khan says:
      November 23, 2010 at 9:43 am

      I get the sense from reading her posts here that Charli Carpenter is more or less a William Saletan-style “sensible” liberal by nature. I could be wrong, though, since I don’t read every word posted at LGM. But that’s the impression I’ve come away with.

      Reply
      • hv says:
        November 23, 2010 at 4:38 pm

        As an academic model for her students, I expected Ms. Carpenter to be a bit more interested in measuring things than Mr. Saletan.

        Reply
    • piny says:
      November 23, 2010 at 5:10 pm

      I like those odds!

      Reply
  13. witless chum says:
    November 23, 2010 at 8:43 am

    Lord Saletan siding with those in power? Consider my pearls clutched.

    Tyner is an ass and wants to ruin people’s Thanksgiving? True. But I like a little pointless rebellion. (Especially one that won’t make me miss my connection, to be honest) And Tyner is at least striking a blow against security theater at airports. He’s going to inconvience a lot of people if he pulls this off, but maybe that’ll cause a few to pull their heads out of their asses.

    The claim from Lord Saletan that these scanners are a “nimble response” is asinine. There’s at least disagreement over whether they’d have found the underpants bomber’s crotch bomb. And it’s goddamned obvious up what orifice the next bomb is going if they are effective. It’s more of the same confiscate my knitting needles and corkscrew pointless crap. When it’s not about fooling fools into thinking Something Is Being Done, it’s apparently about profiteering.

    Go ahead and ruin people’s Thanksgiving, libertarian doofus. You may be right for the wrong reasons (really, turning things over to a private company wouldn’t get you reamed 10 times worse, possibly literally?) but sometimes that’s close enough.

    Reply
  14. Kal says:
    November 23, 2010 at 8:58 am

    Charli – are you deliberately trolling us? Posting an article that ends with this:

    Those words could just as easily have been written by the underwear bomber. Research the airports, look for the weak link, and pray that you don’t have to go through a scanner that can see what’s between your legs. So, yes, Mr. Tyner. Before you board my plane, I want the guys from TSA to look at your junk. And if you refuse, I want them to touch it.

    Come on.

    Also, I fail to see why, just because I think we needed way more outrage than we got about torture, rendition, indefinite detention, and assassination programs than we got, I am supposed to be unhappy that we are now finally getting some outrage at a bad but less damaging aspect of the paranoid security state.

    Reply
    • norbizness says:
      November 23, 2010 at 11:03 am

      C’mon, Charli put in the eight words for the main post, don’t expect a response to the substantive criticisms of the article.

      Reply
    • Emma in Sydney says:
      November 23, 2010 at 11:48 pm

      Given the number of times Charli Carpenter has been blindsided by the response of LGM commenters to her posts, and astounded that we might disagree with her ‘serious’ pronouncements, I think ‘deliberately’ trolling is putting it too strongly.

      Reply
  15. charles says:
    November 23, 2010 at 9:27 am

    Well, as long as we’re going to go all “Freedom Ain’t Free” to fight the evildoings of evildoers, we should definitely spread the love to some upper-class white people. It’s only fair.

    Reply
  16. soullite says:
    November 23, 2010 at 9:49 am

    It’s easy for these elite, scumbag reporters to say. They know full well it won’t be their wives and daughters getting finger banged by some TSA pervert. As long as it’s only the little people, what do they care?

    Reply

Leave a Reply




If you want a picture to show with your comment, go get a Gravatar.

  • blogroll

  • Brad Delong
  • Crooked Timber
  • Daily Kos
  • Danger Room
  • Eschaton
  • Ezra Klein
  • Feministe
  • Talking Points Memo
  • Feministing
  • Glenn Greenwald
  • Juan Cole
  • Monkey Cage

    • Switch to our mobile site