We’re told Gate Rape saves lives – pure conjecture, since it’s all hypothetical. After all, not one “terrorist” has been caught (much less stopped) as a result of the terroristic tactics of the Blue Shirted Goons. Which is a pretty piss poor record, given they treat everyone as a presumptive terrorist.
You’d think by now they’d have caught at least one actual terrorist.
Ah well. Good enough for government work – right?
But lives have been lost as a result of the terroristic tactics of the Blue Shirted Goons. Not conjecture, either. Real people – thousands of them – dead because of the TSA.
Dead – because they chose to drive rather than fly. Anything – rather than Submission Training and Gate Rape. Even if it means an 18 hour trip vs. a three hour flight.
According to data compiled by Cornell University researchers, the ugsomeness of dealing with the TSA has pushed a goodly number of former air travelers into their cars – and back onto the roads. This, in turn has led to a measurable increase in monthly traffic fatalities – about 242 per month that would otherwise not have occurred. Some quick addition is in order. Let’s be easy on our calculators – and generous to the Blue Goons – and assume the figure is off by more than half. Let’s say it’s only 100 additional deaths per month attributable to TSA Avoidance Syndrome. That’s 1,200 deaths annually. Times four equals 4,800. In less than four years, then, TSA has managed to get more Americans killed than Osama bin Laden.
Only he’s finished – and the TSA is just getting started.
What will happen when the Blue Goons decide that cavity searches are now necessary for “security” reasons? Or perhaps stun bracelets – you know, like you use to deal with an unruly dog. How about that?
Farcical? Hyperbolic? Do a mental exercise and imagine it’s 1995. Ask any ten people at random whether they would believe that within a decade or so, they’d gave to spread their legs, hold out their arms and submit to a government goon literally handling their privates – including the privates of little children and old people in wheelchairs. Something not even the Nazis did to the Jews. Right here in the good ol’ USA – land of the (formerly) free and home of the (erstwhile) brave. And bear in mind that the stun bracelets idea was actually floated. So we know they are thinking along such lines. “Freeze training” has already been tried, too.
Well?
It’s far from over, that’s the point. Or rather, the point of the TSA is not to catch terrorists, but to get Americans used to being terrorized. Invasion of our personal space is just for openers. Bet your bippie more’s coming.
Worse, too.
As a result of these degradations, more and more people can be expected to opt out – of flying, altogether. They’ll do the only thing they reasonable can – take to their cars – because cold-cocking these blue-shirted bastards isn’t (unfortunately) a realistic option.
And because driving is riskier than flying, more people will be dying. A fact – unlike the hypothetical claims about “catching terrorists” – remember, not one so far – touted by the Blue Shirted Goons.
Project the 1,200 dead annually out over another ten years: That’s 12,000 people in the ground, courtesy of TSA.
Courtesy of the government.
Osama would have needed a dirty nuke, probably, to match this body count.
The one – the only thing – government is actually good at is destroying things. First our rights, then our lives. Here again we have tangible proof of this. Yet all too many people will nonetheless be duped by government’s claims – never substantiated but always asserted with insolent certainty – that its actions “save lives.”
Even as the bodies pile up all around us.
Is there anything government touches that doesn’t result in carnage? The answer to that question is obvious. Yet government is never held accountable for the mayhem it causes. If “terrorists” killed 242 – or 100 or even 10 – people every month, it would be the reason (and a good reason) to do something about it. But when government policies result in deaths, they become – in the immortal callous words of JV Stalin – statistics.
We are often admonished by government – and those truckling in favor of expanded government – that “if it saves even one life” then it’s worth whatever it is that’s being advocated. Why is it that this logic never applies to government? What is this blind spot that so many people have? This inability to see the danger posed by the entity that claims it seeks to “protect” us?
So what is likely to happen? The Blue Goons won’t be retired – and expected to find honest work. Instead, their ranks will be expanded – as will their “duties.” Note carefully that the acronym does not stand for Airport Security Administration. The Blue Goons are coming to a road near you, too. Probably soon.
That way, they can claim they’re thwarting even more in an endless conga line of hypothetical terrorists – without, of course, ever having to show they’ve caught an actual, real-live one – and have plausible deniability about the upticked body count on the highways and byways. Because no one will be able to claim people are driving to avoid the perils that come with flying.
Throw it in the Woods?
I should have added that Australia held a “Gun Amnesty” back in 1996. They even paid people using their “gun buy-back scheme”. If one were to assess the (incorrectly projected) impact of these “gun controls”, there are many references showing nothing had changed much; in fact, gun assault rates climbed significantly, and continue to climb. See http://www.gunsandcrime.org/auresult.html for just one analysis.
These new laws only created a higher demand for weapons – and certainly weapons possessing considerably more power. The black market is now thriving. We are not very far from Indonesia/China/Asia; this also goes to show that TSA has a near zero impact on importation of fire-power.
So, where are they coming from, and how do they get past this “strict(est) security”? Some have pointed the finger at baggage handlers/flight crew, but the government will refute that suggestion with “no way because they all have to possess ASIC (per my previous post) badges where the most stringent background checks apply”. Of course, we know better, and the common (naive) individual will feel more secure under these controls.
Could it be that our very own protectors are in on a very lucrative racket?
Anyone not an imbecile knows that “gun control” only affects the non-criminal elements of any society. That is, the people who possess weapons for defensive or sporting purposes. By definition, criminals ignore laws – including laws forbidding the possession of weapons. How any person not an imbecile can believe that someone who ignores laws that forbid, say, theft (or rape or murder) will somehow be swayed to obey laws forbidding the possession of weapons is something that beggars belief.
They’ll say, of course, that “getting guns off the street” will also disarm the criminal elements. Except of course this never happens. Ever.
In this country, the most dangerous places are so-called “gun free” zones (viz, Chicago, Washington DC). All the mass shootings have occurred – wait for it, now – in places where having a gun in one’s possession was illegal. Which meant: Lots of disarmed victims facing armed criminals.
On the other hand, the safest areas are those where it is legally permissible for citizens to posses (and, critically, to carry) firearms. Again, one has to be either an imbecile – or willfully ignorant of the facts – to believe that “gun control” serves any purpose other than to disarm people who are not the problem – and put them, thereby, at the mercy of the people who are.
Which category also includes the agents of the government, I hasten to add.
When I immigrated to the land down under nearly 30 years ago, it didn’t take me long to recognise that this country was a good 10 years behind in terms of control and authority over its people. Heck, there weren’t even speed limits (the ubiquitous sign for unlimited speed was a circle with a 45 degree slash through it that meant “go for it”)and the cops didn’t even wear firearms, There were no hand held lazers or mobile/fixed/red light speed detection. All the aforementioned are now in place big time and it really seems to me that after every US President comes to visit and spend some time with our Prime Minister at “The Lodge”, laws seem to change overnight.
More in line with this thresad; a cop wasn’t allowed to stop and search anyone without just cause until a year ago when Parlaiment in most states (only 5 here) passed the new “Stop and Search” bill in what’s called a “Hansard Entry” (it’s funny that absolutely no traffic laws – and many other “laws” – have these required entries, which consequently makes them totally unlawful, but people still pay up out of fear or ignorance). I was watching “Cops” (the USA brand) the other night and I started yelling at the fat cop to stop over-stepping his authority on a little female pedestrian. She was stopped for seemingly no justifiable reason and promptly wrestled to the ground by this highly overweight male goon (who previously was talking in his goon car of his “love of protecting and serving the people”). The female was continually asking the thug “why are you doing this to me?”, but got no answer. All she had to do was walk or jog away (the obese cop wouldn’t have lasted a chase on foot). He charged her with “resisting”, but he gets away with knocking her to the ground, then kneeing her in the middle of her spine. The show then goes on to other, similar shows of power and authority over anyone they pick. It reminded me of “Schindler’s List” where at a concentration camp, its commandant and sadist, Amon Goeth – played by Ralph Fiennes, is taking lethal pot shots at whomever he pleases. Then, of course, there’s the scene where the women and children are herded into the “showers” after being told they’d get their personal hygiene attended to. We all know what really happens to them in those showers. To qoute Eric: “The next step is not far ahead. Do you have any doubt at all in your mind that the creeps “serving” as TSA goons will – for example – obey the directive (when it comes, not if) to help herd people into trains/trucks (and so on) headed for camps? For their safety, of course?” . This kind of “desensitization” of the people is happening here and now in Australia. Cops have had guns since the 90’s (try getting a permit here folks – no farm and livestock = forget it), tazers (illegal for joe blow but I built my own for personal defense and give the goons the bird because a Hansard Entry was never made), pepper spray (illegal for by joe blow – again, no Hansard Entry), CCTV cameras everywhere, etc., ad infinitum…Yes sir, it is coming here. I used to refer to this place as “Paradise” to all the friends/family I left behind, but not any more; Everything gets “fast tracked” (this term is used on commercial TV a lot now) from the USSA.
Something new was just recommended here by our federal government (Attorney General Nicola Roxon) only a couple of months ago. Have a look at this: http://blog.iinet.net.au/data-retention-proposals-cybercrime-suspects/ Everything (including this) we say or do on the internet will very likely be forced to be saved by our ISP’s for up to 2 years AND we will have to foot the bill as it gets rolled down from our ISP.
Of course, it doesn’t stop there; I could go on forever. I could write a book – perhaps I should because at three years until sixty, my concern is more for my children and (especially) my grandchildren. If I don’t take action to stop this insanity, my adorable gradchildren might impart some of the blame to me and those of my generation.
Hi Bill,
At one time, I thought “down under” might be a viable get away, too. No more – for all the reasons you’ve just laid out.In some ways, it’s actually worse there – firearms bans (might as well be) as a case in point. Here – for now – it’s possible for most people in most parts of the country to obtain and possess a handgun or long gun. But I have little doubt this is about to change. The Dear Leader and his Vizhinsky (AG Eric Holder) are known to favor disarming everyone… except their praetorians guards/enforcers. It could be the thing that sets everything ablaze. Or it could be the moment the lights go out for good.
If the people submit to such a thing – if they hand over their firearms – it’s over.
PS: The Congress of whores is about to pass a new law that will eliminate yet another of “our freedoms” the “troops” won’t need to fight for anymore: Power to open/read/keep any e-mail without a warrant or even probable cause. No doubt they have been doing this already for years, but this will make it all “legal.”
Outside of a few small circles, no one seems to care or even notice. What time does the game come on?
firearms bans (might as well be) as a case in point. Here – for now – it’s possible for most people in most parts of the country to obtain and possess a handgun or long gun. But I have little doubt this is about to change. The Dear Leader and his Vizhinsky (AG Eric Holder) are known to favor disarming everyone
Eric, I find myself less and less worried that this will ever happen nationwide. In some states (my own, for one), ANY attempt at mass disarmament of the population WILL result in a very quick and very bloody civil war. GUARANTEED. I would not want to be a cop or soldier ordered to impose martial law. Following such an order in certain states (again, my own being one of them) will amount to an almost certain death sentence for anyone who chooses to obey such an order.
We had this conversation at length on another thread; I can’t remember which one now.
It came down to two sides; those who opined, as you do, and as I (mostly) think…and those who said, like Jim Karger of Casey’s clan, that Amerikans will hand in their guns like good little boys when a frightening SWAT team–or their beloved military–show up at their door.
Karger went further; he said indeed, there’d be a few who’d fulfill the “from my cold dead hands” promise, but the neighbors would hand theirs in right-quick after the first few examples were made.
There are some other nuances; for example, hiding them, or hiding them and turning in one or two “throw-aways”. My counterpoint to that strategy is, if it’s not time to use them when they come for them, what WILL the ‘right time’ be? The historical precedent is Poland…or Germany, where the standing joke was “why do Poles/Germans oil their gardens? So the guns don’t rust.”
Katrina is another data-point. I don’t know how many resisted; but the videos I saw were people reluctantly but promptly giving up their weapons.
Katrina may not be a good sample though, because the atmosphere is MUCH more charged now–and people are wiser to what’s happening.
My instinct would be–don’t be home when they come, or be positioned in such a way you’re not in a siege situation. Hunt them where they live, eat, and play. Follow the example of the IRA; make it very, very expensive.
But I hope, I truly pray in my own agnostic/atheist way, that you’re right, liberranter.
I’ve spoken to a dozen cops in random situations about this, and with one exception they said they’d refuse to confiscate weapons. The one exception said “well, if it’s justified, like domestic violence…”
Let’s hope the Elites haven’t gamed it so they have a plausible excuse like that.
OTOH, imagine what the mentality would be after another major false-flag, something to make 9/11 pale in comparison?
Is the TSA worse than the unconstitutional Drug Prohibition that’s been growing stronger for almost a century now?
If so, how so?
tgsam
Shit is shit, Tinsley. It all smells – and you don’t want any on your carpet.
Drug prohibition was merely the first step. It helped set precedents – and condition the masses to accept things that previously would have been regarded as outrageous usurpations. Just as the “war” on drunk driving got people to accept being randomly stopped. It’s all part of the same evil mosaic.
Just my mean streak in action.
Yes, the WOD is a dreadfully incomparable rights-destroying precedent. That’s why I consider it the jugular that most needs severing. Do that and unlawful legal powers will fall like dominoes.
I wonder how many persons who dislike TSA groping support the Drug War? How many as jurors would nullify a drug law?
tgsam
Eric’s right Tinsley; drug prohibition was one of the pieces first laid out on the table. Now that more of the puzzle is together, we’re really starting to see just how ugly the picture truly is. Drug prohibition, like alcohol prohibition before it, was an easy sell to the “Christian Right.” Now we all can plainly see by this administration suing the states that have legalized pot, “liberals” favor prohibition just as much as “conservatives” do. Can’t have other drugs (or moonshine) cutting into the alcohol revenue stream (unless the CIA doing the selling), now can we?
What makes TSA worse, is that the population at large, not just a bunch of nosey Baptist prudes, were sold on TSA molestation as soon as MSNBCBSABCFOX Yahooed and Googled them into believing a band of unwashed “rag-heads” with box cutters hijacked some airplanes and miraculously turned them into steel melting thermal hyper-bombs. Then all the owners of Plantation USA had to do was convince the flying public “It could happen again if you don’t bend over for a rectal check now.” So Boobus Americanus submits, obeys and spreads ’em.
Pretty soon roadside rectal checks will be administered (more than they are now) and the general public will most probably go along with that too…for a while. The ones that don’t will get wood shampoos, tazer therapy or a copper jacketed cranial implant. We’ll see where it goes from there, but as you pointed out before (see I do read your stuff), it won’t be bloodless. It never is, even when the proles submit. When they don’t submit…well ask those 8 million dead Kulaks…
It goes further back than the failed War on (some) Drugs:
L: Doug, after conversations like the one we had last week, we often get letters from angry readers who accuse you of hating America, disloyalty, and perhaps even treason. These people don’t know or understand what I do about you – that you love the idea that was America. It’s the United State it has become for which you have nothing but contempt. Perhaps we should try to explain this to them?
Doug: I doubt it would work; it’s a tough row to hoe, trying to explain things to people who are so set in their thinking that they truly and literally don’t want to hear anything that might threaten their notions. A person who feels threatened by ideas and who responds with emotion is acting irrationally. How can we have a discussion with someone whose emotion trumps their reason? How do we even begin to untangle the thinking of people who will gather this week to give thanks for the bounty produced by freedom and hard work – the famous puritan work ethic – by eating a turkey bought with food stamps?
But we can outline the ideas, for the record…
Doug Casey on the America That Was – Now the United (Police) State of America – http://www.caseyresearch.com/cdd/doug-casey-america-was-now-united-police-state-america
“the population at large, not just a bunch of nosey Baptist prudes, were sold on TSA molestation as soon as MSNBCBSABCFOX……..etc. ”
There it is, Boothe. Until most Americans turn off their TV sets permanently, this mass hypnosis will continue. I stopped watching TV in the 1990s and have noticed that it’s impossible to have an adult conversation with most of my fellow men.
If the topic isn’t ball-play, or the election du jour, today’s mass man is lost and can’t participate in a discussion that ranges outside the area of what’s on TV.
Foxnews addicts are impossible to reach. They have the attention span of a fruit fly and must fit any new idea into a frame of reference that would be comfortable to a maze-trained mouse.
Brilliant, Eric! Thanks!!!
“Something not even the Nazis did to the Jews.”
*sigh* You know, I really do love this blog. And I’m usually in agreement with what’s posted here. But every once in a while, you do say something that’s just outright insane…. And that frustrates me, because I’d like to quote that entire paragraph to people, but that one insane sentence will cause most people to reject the rest of it.
O well, guess I’ll just have to steal it, paraphrase it, and claim it as my own!
Harrison, when I was about eleven my parents took us across the East German border to visit our relatives in the socialist workers paradise and attend my uncles wedding. I saw Russian army convoys, trains laden with tanks and APC’s, barbed wire fences, guards and towers on the border and YET coming and going we were nowhere treated as rudely and dismissively as I’ve been flying in, out, and about Die Amerikanish Heimat. The only thing missing HERE are the gun toting sturmtruppen everywhere and I have no doubt that they’re coming. What infuriates the shit out of me is that not only do people support this crap but there are men and women more than willing to join and enforce these evil diktats. They are the lowest whale turds in existence as far as I’m concerned.
MoT,
Speaking of the lowest whale turds, I think The Running Man may have been ahead of its time.
Yeah, LOL, looking at that now I have to first overlook the cheesiness of the film to get to the underlying dystopian message. And, on top of that, there is Jesse Ventura in it!
We also have the gun toting stormtroopers – at least, in DC. Before we moved (2004) they were a common sight downtown. I bet they still are.
I first saw sub-machine gun toting federal cops in Frankfurt in the early 70’s. Now they’re here… how depressing. We now have a coast to coast open air prison. People just don’t see the barbed wire and fences yet.
I don’t find much of an issue with the language used by many liberty minded writers, Eric included. It’s far more accurate than that used in the mainstream. The reason some language comes off as insane is because often a reader doesn’t have the background and still retains certain perceptions, illusions, and perspectives.
In the case of the TSA the perception is they keep us safe or some such nonsense, they can never be like Nazis or worse than Nazis. But the objective reality is that those Nazis of 1930s and 1940s Germany were keeping good Germans safe too.
It is often a struggle to be accurate yet not appear insane to those who can’t step outside and look at a situation.
Harrison according to the 212th amendment the Nazis are just as equal as the Jews and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with comparing their behavior or the behavior of anyone else.
We live in a world where deadweight xenophobic chimpanzees spend a half billion in one day on first person shooter game like “Call of Doody” But that is sane, they say.
Put down your banana and have a look around. Men of mind worry more about mistakes in principle, than mistakes of fact. The opinions of millions of mainstream monkeys isn’t worth worrying over.
Hi Harrison,
Growing up during the era of the late Cold War, we had the specter of the Soviet Union and East Bloc countries. Remember the way these regimes treated their proles? The ubiquitous “security” – the internal passports and checkpoints? The men with guns lording it over? How we were told that this was the difference between Us and Them? And, by god, it was. As imperfectly free as the United States was in those days, it was still accurate to describe it as a free country.
Well, Harrrison, what is the difference now?
And bear in mind – the Soviets didn’t “pat down” the private areas of little children and old people. But here in the USSA, it’s common practice … now.
My point is this – something very much like Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany – is obviously where we are headed if the people tolerate such things. Because if people tolerate this, they will tolerate much worse. You don’t go from a fairly civilized system (whether it’s Weimar Germany or latter-day America) to gulags and gas chambers overnight. It is a progression – people must be slowly shorn of their rights and dignity. Acclimated to the exercise of arbitrary authority. Taught to Submit and Obey.
Is that not what is happening, Harrison?
Now salt in the oddly German talk of the “Homeland” … the ubiquitous wearing of Partei pins (metal flags) by the PTB… the rabid militarism and nationalism… what does it remind you of, Harrison?
Am I “outright insane” for noticing the parallels? For drawing the inevitable conclusions?
Perhaps it is “outright insane” not to notice them…
I don’t have a problem comparing our current situation to that of Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany. But that one line in particular? Not only did Nazis routinely force Jews coming into concentration camps to strip naked, as well as subjecting them to various other forms of sexual humiliation, they did, in fact, torture them, work them more brutally than American slave owners did their slaves, use them for horrific medical experiments, and oh yeah, there was that little matter of that whole mass extermination thing where millions of Jews were systematically murdered.
Comparing the plight of average Germans to what’s going on here now? Fine by me. Trying to make it look like the TSA treats flyers worse than Nazis did Jews? Sorry, that’s just not based in reality.
Note, also, I don’t think YOU are insane, just that one particular line. Sticks out like a sore thumb in an otherwise spot-on essay.
You XKCD types saunter in for a sucker-slap, and then shuffle away thinking you’re Brock Lesnar on a four-brothel fuggernaut.
You’re the type who would ridicule Goebbels for dangling his participle while screaming at a pile of Joy Divisioners who failed to faithfully serve the fatherland one too many times.
How ’bout it, HB, you got any trix for us old dogs? If we don’t assume a voluntary wolfpack formation of necessity, the DINGO gonna eat all our babies!
Not yet – not quite – but it’s coming.
The same desensitization to routine degradation- the same submission training. They are already forcing crippled old ladies to show their colostomy bags; already sticking their hands on the private parts of little kids – right in front of their helpless parents. Ordering people to “freeze” on command. requiring them to assume the “I surrender” position – specifically done to make them feel helpless and vulnerable.
The next step is not far ahead.
Do you have any doubt at all in your mind that the creeps “serving” as TSA goons will – for example – obey the directive (when it comes, not if) to help herd people into trains/trucks (and so on) headed for camps?
For their safety, of course?
We live in insane times. It is not insane to say so.
Eric, that post really explained it better than I ever could have. Yet some still won’t get it.
They add up, like a fighter who’s still on his feet, those body shots. Four years ago, I was thinking, I could still be a contender.
I didn’t follow current events, but I knew history.
Obama was going to be like FDR. He ended prohibition first day in office. Socialism doesn’t hurt if you keep a good buzz.
Now we’re in terminal colony collapse mode. Can you freelance and collect honey for cash. Start a bee condo with a princess of your own, the buzzing is unintellible almost.
It’s dementia season, maybe this is just what getting old feels like. Why am I so randomly degratiating, Is it because the LoT light is staying lit now.
It’s so degrading when you lived for the future, and it turns out everything is a lie. The groundhog saw Bin Laden’s shadow, and now we have 6 more years of prohibition on our hands.
Maybe there is a Galts Gulch in Colorado, a new Switzerland of culture and tolerance, high in the Rocky New Alps.
I’ve got to build something in my mind to beleive in. 80s rock is never coming back and neither is my hair. I wish somehow I didn’t know now, the things I didn’t know then, yeahy yeah. This is where I find something to believe in. Feliz Turkeydad everyone.
As Eric so correctly points out, the hands down the pants, assume the position, you have to be nice to TSA goos even when they act like assholes, we the PTB don’t care if there are more traffic fatalities reality of it all seems almost surreal. It’s a softer, buffered, kinder, gentler police state. The insane part is that you can’t see that they’re doing things now that the Nazis didn’t do so they can get away with a whole lot more for a much longer time frame.
So “we” lock more people per capita in our prison hell-holes than any other nation on earth, many for smoking ditch weed and use them to recycle paper, make office furniture and sew uniforms. But that’s not slave laborbecause they’re paid $0.50 / hour and they’re being punished for their crimes. But “we” let violent offenders out to steal, rape and murder due to “prison overcrowding.” And “we” routinley let the police engage in violent criminal behavior with impunity. But because they are bullies and thugs with badges and dime store costumes, somehow it’s okay. Afterall, those are “bad guys” they have to deal with. The dregs of society. You know, like blind elderly ladies, homeless wood carvers, the retarded, heart attack victims, people who dare to dance at the Jefferson memorial; real live enemies of the state. It’s a tough job trying to emulate the RUC and the Stasi without the public realizing what’s actually going on.
We put our children through the livestock sale-barn known as publik skule, lock them in, drug them with Ritalin and track them with cameras and RFID chips; all for their own protection against acquiring a taste for real Liberty. But let’s not call that child prison because this is “the land of the free.” Never mind that less than one of them in one hundred could tell you anything about the Constitution they will swear an oath to before the become the next wided and naive crop of Gestapo and storm troopers for the empire.
The same medical establishment that brought us blood letting, electro-shock therapy, Thalidomide and between 50 & 70 million abortions since 1972 is now to be trusted to administer national healthcare hand in glove with a bunch of statist bureaucrats? Maybe we ought to take a long hard look at the free healthcare system suppository Otto von Bismark gave the Volk in the 1880’s. Then see what it turned into by 1939 under the gentle hand of Herr Hitler. But this is Amurrika! It cain’t happen here, cuz’ are kids is off killin’ ragheads so we can be free to pay taxes and watch fuuuhtball.
And about those abortions…that took care of bunch of the future Medicare / Medicaid / Socialist Security recipients before they ever even hit the ground crawling. But that’s not a “holocaust”, it just cutting cost. Who’s next? Well the elderly, the mentally defective and the infirm of course. Anyone that dares speak ill of Big Sis will be branded mentally defective too. Give ’em a shot and you don’t have to worry about them stirring up the neighbors or asking for a disability check; it’s win-win for the PTB. I have to wonder how many rank and file Germans could actually see the writing on the wall in the ’30’s. I’m willing to bet it was a very small percentage and most cheered the beast on as it devoured everything in sight, as long as they got their cut of the meat.
As most of you in this particular community already know, I’m a firm believer in the principle that you reap what you sow. I’m confident that applies to nations as well individuals. When a nation becomes a kleptocracy and sanctions the violation of basic human rights both at home and abroad, nothing good ever comes from it. When torture, murder, pillage and plunder are routinely ignored by a desensitized public that are content with the modern equivalent of bread and circuses the day of reckoning is close at hand. America has been thowing a bender down at the local bar since 1898. The barmaid is yelling last call, the lights are about to come on and this country will be handed the tab. It’s a big one. I fear that the American public is about to find out what it really costs in much the same way, the folks in the Hamburg firestorm did. Only on a much grander scale.
In terms of daily life before the camps, the TSA is probably a little worse. It’s at what stage you want to pick. The current state of affairs in the USA is the ‘papers please’ have a star sewn on your clothing stage give or take a little.
As to horrific medical experiments, the US federal government has done that to people since the second world war at least.
I think noticing patterns and forming analogies is part of what make people human.
In mathematics, one looks for patterns in data and tries to get information from the available data.
Will every analogy be 100% accurate? No, but it does help in understanding the world we live in today.
I am going to spend 24 hours in a 8×6 room on a train with a 5 year old instead of flying in a couple weeks. I am terribly afraid that I will be thrown in jail if one more of those jackasses from TSA touch my kid or even want to ask him “innocent” questions.
I refuse to bring him up expecting that the state minions will ask, touch and rummage through our belongings in the name of security.
And to the Clover above:
You don’t seriously believe that the TSA provides security, do you? And how is air travel more safe now than even 10 years ago?
I feel less safe for many reasons the least of which is that once the passengers get on the plane, if they have any self respect, are so agitated and agressive from being treated like a piece of shit that they are waiting to lash out at the first person not in a blue suit that looks at them sideways.
I’ve got one about as young and I can’t even imagine flying with her right now. The thought that some asshole would fondle my kid because the Feds treat even kids as some sort of mini-me terrorist just infuriates the hell out of yours truly. And, yes, people are ready to “pop”, but you’d wish they’d direct their rage at the machine.
My congratulations to you, Todd, for having the principle and strength to properly protect your child.
Alex Jones made an excellent point today; the TSA taking your child to “search” her is a crucial slave-training technique. The strongest instinct we have is to protect our children. If the State can train you to give up your child, even briefly, to one of its predators…it owns you.
I will not allow a TSA pedophile to touch my children–and until proven otherwise, I will assume that’s what they are. There are so many examples of TSA goons arrested for child porn, rape, molestation it seems it’s the rule rather than the exception.
I’m reminded of the scene of Aslan’s sacrifice in “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe”. A crowd of the most misshapen, gibbering, hideous ghouls ties him down and kills him. They’re powerless, weak, pathetic creatures; but they’re temporarily empowered by the White Witch and her legalistic legerdemain.
But lest we forget the White Witch offers up all that tasty Turkish Delight. What better way to describe our government than the devil corrupting you through your base instincts.
There is a novel that was popular when the Clintons were on the throne. “Unintended Consequences” is the title. Disobedience is necessary at this point. Either I’m a free man or I am giving my consent to be ruled by inferior people. For me there’s nothing in the middle.
“Unintended Consequences” by John Ross is a very worthwhile read and is highly recommended for anyone who aspires to take back their freedom.
This book is a combination of history and law lessons, self-defense and protection against (evil) forces both “foreign and domestic” and should be on every freedom-lover’s bookshelf.
This book is so volatile, the “powers that be” (FBI, DEA and ATF) were harassing sellers of this book.
This book has been out-of-print for quite some time, and is a little pricey, but is still available through various sources on amazon and others.
I couldn’t put the thing down and read all 900 pages in an evening…
The last time I flew was three years ago, and at that time the TSA stole some of my property.
The next time I fly it will be one-way and involve a passport.
I think we will need to do a little civil disobedience campaign to stop this.
We will need a large group of patriots who will:
Buy a ticket from Detroit to Chicago on a busy holiday. Be willing to be arrested.
Arrive at the last minute enmass.
Not have documents out and ready. Take time to find in luggage.
Not know that belts, shoes need to be removed.
Refuse porno scanners, requiring manual checks.
Have contraband but beneign items (water bottles, large shampoo)
Have trouble putting on tie shoes, needing TSA help.
Complain about disease from removing shoes. Take time to use sanitizer on feet.
Move slowly, feign deafness, require repeated instructions.
Forget coins in pocket. Often. Forget coin in underwear.
Be slow in wheel chairs.
Demand that gloves be changed between searches.
Fake an orgasm when touched and ask for more loudly.
Have a loud arguement with spouse right in the middle of search.
Wear studded metal biker pants and go commando.
Have unsharpen metal blank in the shape of a knife in luggage.
Have perfume/anti-perspirant on with trace elements of explosives.
Have lots of valuable jewelry. “Miss” a piece and blame TSA. Discover it after lengthy search. Apologize forever.
Travel with children who will scream loudly and cry whenever they see the “bad TSA men”.
Ipacac? Incontinence? Incredibly foul body odor, or deer hunter skunk.
For those with the ability, break wind at the appropriate time.
Violate personal space of TSA agents.
The sooner we eliminate this ineffective unconstitutional “service” the better.
Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue. (Worlds record most laughs per minute movie of all time – Airplane)
Reston VA. DALLAS tx. Baltimore Police HAM/online link http://www.dxzone.com/catalog/Internet_and_Radio/Online_Receivers/
(Meant to post it here oringinally)
I think there was some good info on HAM radio posted above. It’s a good hobby to get into. I got into it, studied, and got my General license. I have my radio’s; two, one is VHF/UHF and the other a HAM (high frequency), (Kenwood and Yaesu)and 1 antenna for each.
It is a lot of fun, and it would be useful if comms go down. I can talk and receive from all over the world on the HAM radio, and the UHF/VHF is probably good for about a 50-60 mile reach. It would be very useful to have these radios if it hits the fan. No one around here has one, so it’s just me.
Firstly, thank you Eric for your welcome. I stumbled upon these pages when this site was highly recommended by “Aussie Speeding Fines” in Australia. Boy, did I find so much more; every other issue you are covering has also been very close to home for me and I was rapt to see it all. Your views, and your ability to convey them keep me coming back for more. Keep up the great work. Like Julian Assange, the world needs people like yourself.
This may be a lttle off topic, but when I first heard about Lockheed Martin being in charge of Census taking throughout the “free” (yea right!) world. I started becoming suspicious of everything our governments do.
http://hotterthanapileofcurry.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/why-are-lockheed-martin-running-the-2011-census/
Our world is spiraling out of control and we are losing more and more freedom and privacy by the minute. Everything we do and say is closely scrutinized. CCTV watches our every move, and to what end? To make us “safer”? That couldn’t be further from the tuth. I too, challenge those in Clover’s category. Perhaps his naive outlook and blind trust can be turned around through education and meaningful debate; perhaps not. All the same, this place has become a haven (heaven really) for me. To be amongst so many like-minded individuals tells me I’m really not nuts; that I’m not suffering from paranoia-driven obsession and that I’m certainly not alone.
With my best regards,
Bill
AUSSIE BILL
from
[email protected]
Provide a mailing address that you are comfortable with and I will mail you a free copy of AMERICA’S FORSAKEN PROMISE. You may then make and share as many copies as you wish.
Were there any profit in “Speaking truth to power.” I would be a millionaire many times over. Hell, the Establishment Du Jour might even decide that I am worth killing.
Tinsley Grey Sammons
13519 Chase St.
Gonzales, LA 70737
Sent you an email Tinsley. Would love a copy. BTW – of course people are interested in what you have to say.
🙂
OBNOXIOUS AND WASTEFUL SHOW
Much of what Congress does seems to be little more than Obnoxious and Wasteful Show. With one exception, they are scum. They are Domestic Enemy NO. 1.
Tinsley Grey Sammons (1936 –)
TSA Opt-Out Movement:
From 11/19 through 11/26
http://www.infowars.com/tsa-opt-out-movement-starts-monday/
I see the TSA through the same lens I see all state sponsored, and therefore theft fed, and enriched goons who simply “follow orders”. Like the KGB, Nazi camp guards, and “homeland security”
While working for the hideous Uniformed Welfare Service, that some refer to as the Army, I had to search the vehicles of Democrats who felt privileged to pay thousands of dollars to eat rubber chicken and listen to Al Gore speak in San Fransisco, during the 2000 election theater.
Upon checking their cars in the hotel parking garage I noticed a large amount of them were drinking openly in their vehicles. Wine, beers, glasses filled obviously with alcohol. As bizarre as that was, I still felt stupid and dirty going through the vehicles of these elite snobbish sycophants. What amazed me was the double standard. The SF police just shrugged when I pointed out these people were drinking and driving. It seems they had a different standard as it were.
And of course we know full well THEY DO.
That really opened my eyes as to how things were done, and I must say helped me leave the military in disgust. Now back then I flew with a 4″ folding knife. I could have killed any mythical terrorist armed with a box cutter. Now some mouth breathing thug feels me up and disarms me if I CHOOSE to take commercial aviation: I AM NOW A SUSPECTED TERRORIST, and remember this is AFTER the State told us it was 19 Saudi men who just “happened” to also work for us…….
The whole thing is BULLSHIT. And as a former bomb disposal tech who worked with all these idiots, I can tell you for a fact it’s complete BULLSHIT. Any reasonably intelligent person could do whatever they wanted on a plane and get anything through the “checkpoint”.
Our country is done. And to those NSA pervs who track these sort of comments, you know where I am, and I know Janetalia your creepy thug boss has already declared me the big domestic “enemy”.
So FUCK YOU.
Ray Steven’s wife seemed to almost enjoy it. 🙂
I can’t view this. But the lyrics seem to suggest the TSA doen’t like to do this. Nothing like PC, by the book, inside the box parody songs to confirm how deeply we are done for. Where is Occupy Airport or Tea Party No Fly Zone squads
Eric, you crack me up! I condemn the TSA as much as anyone.
You however, are the guy who vehemently defends the right of motorists to “choose” not to use seat belts. You condemn the fact that motorists can’t “choose” to buy cars without airbags, seat belts, and other safety equipment.
From reading your previous columns I thought you were a big advocate of people being free to choose their own course (as long as they harm nobody else,) and then living with the consequences of their choices.
Now, because some travelers have freely chosen to avoid the TSA by driving, you want to blame the TSA for 4,800 traffic deaths? Might as well blame the airlines too for raising their rates so some people can no longer afford to fly. But gosh, that’s just “free enterprise.” And libertarians like us can’t blame airlines for raising prices, no matter how many traffic deaths it indirectly causes. 😉
I think you’re going down a slippery slope when you blame the TSA’s obnoxious actions for causing traffic fatalities. They didn’t “force” those people to choose to drive….they only “influenced” their decision.
Let’s just call the TSA’s behavior obscene, pre conditioning for tyranny, and the epitome of un American. But each traveler remains individually responsible for the consequences of his choice to fly, to drive, or just stay home.
There is no free market alternative to fly unmolested. Saying people are free to drive or walk to their destination is a non-sequitir.
You’re right that its hard to quantify the deaths, and assign a strict cause and effect, but pushing people into a more dangerous substitute is absolutely a type of second hand murder. Consider the tens of thousands of Mexicans killed on our border due to drug prohibition. Its the most deadly border in the world because of the American Government.
Maybe a clearer example is malaria in Africa. Millions have died because DDT is banned through various Government and International body prohibitions.
DDT has never banned tardo. Broadspraying was stoped because mozzies were building up resistance to DDT. Hence had the change not occurred DDT would be useless.
Gosh Gil, didn’t the DDT ban lead to the development of Kepone? Now there was a nice substitute induced by gun-vernment intervention. BTW, the DDT ban here in the states (at least in part) was due to a supposed link to egg shell thinning decimating the bird of prey population (most notably the Bald Eagle). But one thing’s for sure, once the spraying stopped in third world countries, the incidence of Malaria went right back up. Nothing like a little natural mosquito born Eugenics to get rid of a few million useless eaters, huh Gil? Dr. Kissinger must be proud…
“The lawyer says that’s the breaks kid. Gonna gnarl and rot the rest of your life. If you don’t sue we’ll give u a TransAm. Course its hard to drive when you’re shaking all the time” – Kepone Kids: Dead Kennedys- not as good as Holiday In Cambodia though.
James.River got fooked up. Instead of just cleaning it, they sent all the chem plants to India or whatnot. Revenge and capitalism can’t coexist, and somehow the Statists geteveryone riled up and thirsty for blood.
A rich man ruined my river? I don’t want compensation, I want him in a cage, his factory confiscated, and his future capitalistic learning process prohibitted.
Are we going to be Gaza or Zion? (Zion being what Israel could be if it wasn’t a fascist Socialistic hellhole only marginally better than the USA)
Northern Nevada and surrounding states are not in a watershed. It seems toxic crap like DDT should be made there domestically, just not next to 8.1 million Virginians. We need medicinal opium somewhere too. We’re the most economically retarded nation I can think of.
Of course the TSA is responsible. Their intrusion into the market place of transportation has skewed decision making.
Eric is highlighting an application of Bastiat’s seen and unseen. The seen and unseen is about how a government action skews the market, skews people’s decision making. It’s not a question of people making the choice or not, it is that the government weighted the scales.
Well put. Thanks.
Mike I don’t think there’s anything wrong with pointing out the correlation. I haven’t followed the reference he implies here:
“According to data compiled by Cornell University researchers, the ugsomeness of dealing with the TSA has pushed a goodly number of former air travelers into their cars ”
since I don’t know who they are, however the sentence implies a causal relation. If that were real then I think the remainder of Eric’s argument would stand.
Hi Mike,
It’s hardly funny.
In the first place, stating that TSA “didn’t “force” those people to choose to drive” is a non sequitur. It is akin to saying I have a choice at election time. Or that I am “free” to choose not to have air bags.
Not really. Not a free choice, that is. A free choice would be: Fly – or drive. But the actual “choice” is:
Fly – and submit to obnoxious, outrageous violations of my rights… or avoid the obnoxious, outrageous violations by driving instead.
Note carefully: People would prefer to fly – because it’s faster and easier – but are compelled (if they wish to travel) to do so by car, if they want to avoid being molested and degraded. That is not a free choice, Mike.
It is a forced choice.
As far as deaths: It’s a fact that driving is riskier, statistically, than flying. It is a fact that lots of people are not flying – for the reasons stated. It is therefore a fact that more people are being exposed to more risk – and being killed – because of the government’s policies.
Eh, not so much Boothe… Having been a ham for many decades now, gotten the top license, and understanding all this radio stuff on a deep level, I don’t have much respect for “free bankers.” Most of them don’t really understand much of what they’re dealing with, have developed poor habits, and couldn’t build an antenna that works on other frequencies if their life depended on it.
I don’t understand why you’re putting out a message of fear of being licensed. If the balloon goes up, HF comms will be a fairly low priority for our occupying .gov. And, if you know what you’re doing, you can keep moving and defeat most attempts to triangulate. The point is, you need knowledge to be able to deploy this tech, and getting into the hobby is a great way to do it. You’ll find lots of support and reinforcement from like-minded nerds (hams) to get you going.
We’re going to need alternate comms of all kinds – there’s a place for CB, but you need all the bands to make it work.
free banders, should be – lol
Must have been a freudian slip
I don’t have much familiarity of ham radio but if I’ve learned one thing in my career in a technical field it is that licenses and degrees do not mean knowledge.
I’ve known way too many people who were good at school, passing tests, and jumping through bureaucratic hoops but couldn’t actually do anything to ever consider a license or degree to be proof of knowledge, skill, or ability.
If you want to learn something, you have to put the time and effort into it.
Licensing is an imperfect way of gauging your progress. Better than nothing. Or not doing the necessary legwork and being a “pretender.”
Trust me, it’s worth it to get your ham general class – an easier than ever.
I worked with an engineer who proudly displayed his PE license. He couldn’t design his way out of a wet paper bag. Myself and others spent the entire project making a product work despite his screw ups. Fundamental design screw ups he made in the early stages before we were in the group.
He is just the most blatant example of many.
I’ve also seen the opposite. People who have no licenses, no degrees, who know their stuff and have the ability. I also have known people fully competent and even brilliant who couldn’t sit through the drudgery of school.
Licenses and degrees simply have nothing to do with knowledge and ability as far as I am concerned. They only mean someone put up with the crap to get them and/or they are just good at school, exams, etc.
Hi Brent. You remind me of a MASH episode where this amazingly good surgeon comes to the unit. It is discovered that he is really not even a certified doctor, and he explains to Hawkeye that he just never had the patience to jump through all the hoops.
Take home lesson: certifications by supposedly learned groups mean nothing.
Agreed, Brent.
Apprenticeships are a sound way of acquiring practical knowledge – and even theoretical knowledge.
Also: It’s worth remembering that countless men of genius were autodidacts. Where did Henry Ford get is engineering degree? Did Woz and Jobs have the sheepskins on the wall of their garage?
Up to a point, Lord Copper.
Anything self taught is learned better, and anything learned from experience sinks in more solidly, but… anything self taught is likely to leave gaps that are blind spots you don’t even know are there, and learning from experience costs you in terms of time and possible downside risks from getting it wrong out in the field while you are learning. I once had to help give a training course relating to computers, and I found I couldn’t easily teach the part about reading the dumps you get from program crashes on IBM mainframes. I had just never got much experience with program crashes and reading dumps on IBM mainframes; my early days in programming were on other hardware, and after that I simply didn’t crash any more in ways that reading dumps could help.
I’m inclined to agree with you Downrange. But not so much on getting the license itself as in passing the privately administered ARRL tests. But based on your background info, I know where you’re coming from. I had my Novice license at 12 years old (1973) and worked Morocco on 40M with an old 75W Globe Chief CW transmitter, a Lafayette HE-10 super het receiver and a coax switch hooked to my homemade dipole strung out the bedroom window. I let my license go when I discovered girls (imagine that). But back then I still belieeeeved in “the system.” But I’ve had the red pill now.
After a stint as a mercenary in Uncle Sam’s airplane club doing ECM, I might know a tad bit about RF and especially how to defeat it. And I’ve kicked getting my General license around. I have all the necessary books (and I’ve studied them), I’ve taken the online pretests and it wouldn’t be a problem for me…except asking Big Sis’s permission to play radio. And any group of people that are so regimented and regulated that they spend time searching databases of deceased ham’s call signs to make sure one of the unannointed isn’t sneaking into “their” frequency bands, in the same way Chicago politicians get elected, probably aren’t folks I’d play too well with these days anyway.
Sorry Downrange, it’s more a matter of principle at this point for me. I really don’t want to register myself with a gun-vernmnet that has rounded up shortwave radios from otherwise law abiding citizens in the past…along with our gold, at times our guns, ignored the Constitution, imprisoned and tortured people without so much as a hint of a trial, tazed seizure victims, ad nauseam. Since we’re living under an essentially lawless gun-vernment, why would I ask the federal mob for permission to do anything? I’d be giving the regime approval and consent to control me a little more. At this point I don’t care to do that. Maybe in 20 years or so, if there’s still an ARRL and an FCC around, I’ll have mellowed out enough to consider it. But right now as far as I’m concerned “the system” can FOAD.
I think there was some good info on HAM radio posted above. It’s a good hobby to get into. I got into it, studied, and got my General license. I have my radio’s; two, one is VHF/UHF and the other a HAM (high frequency), (Kenwood and Yaesu)and 1 antenna for each.
It is a lot of fun, and it would be useful if comms go down. I can talk and receive from all over the world on the HAM radio, and the UHF/VHF is probably good for about a 50-60 mile reach. It would be very useful to have these radios if it hits the fan. No one around here has one, so it’s just me.
Boothe, I can understand and relate completely. You no doubt have the requisite technical knowledge from your background to develop an alternative communications network and deploy it. Many do not. And they really don’t get much of this knowledge from the CB ranks, unfortunately.
Hell, if they want to round us all up for imagined offenses against the state, they won’t have any trouble isolating and identifying the “trouble makers.” It’s just not really possible to hide much anymore. Better to get the cow, the ham ticket, etc., in my view. I really don’t think shortwave radios are going to be perceived as the same level of threat they were in 1940.
At any rate, the more centralized control exists, such as of the internet, the more control can be exercised, including total censorship or even hitting the “off” switch. I just like having multiple channels for comms and potential backups. HF radio provides that, and it’s not expensive, really. You can get a functioning transceiver (all band) that’s completely “unlockable” for the price of a decent laptop and craft dipoles out of hardware store wire and be up and running anywhere in the HF spectrum in a day or so, if need be. Add mobile capability and you’ve got the ability to move around. Put it all together…
So, keep in mind not everything will be banned or even be “bannable.” Keep capabilities in reserve and be prepared for contingencies. Just my .02.
Right on Downrange! Let us not forget that encrypted data transmission can be done all over the spectrum from HF to UHF and beyond. I would recommend to anyone that is interested in alternative forms of electronic communication to buy the appropriate ARRL books and have them on hand. At a minimum have an ARRL (American Radio Relay League) Handbook for Radio Communications and an Antenna Handbook. These won’t “go dark” if the net is compromised or the power goes out. If you can find some of the older ARRL pubs, there are a lot of good and often simple DIY projects in them. Of course these books won’t do you a bit of good without some equipment…
Now I understand your distaste for the free bands. There is a lot of “hash & trash” to be found there (and on CB) to use their own vernacular. Or QRM (i.e. interference) to use ham-speak. But I’ve also had some really interesting and highly intelligent conversations on the free bands back during the last solar cycle; even working Mt. Gambier, Australia one evening. But propagation there is indeed sporadic and hence that’s why no one really cares about those bands (and why it was allocated for “CB”). But if one were to run 300 – 450W FM there, hypothetically of course, one could usually find a clear frequency and have fairly reliable local comm., base to mobile and back out to about 20 – 30 miles. Just sayin’…
And let me tell you, I’ve listened to more than enough belligerence and profanity on the amateur bands to convince me that there are plenty of round-brown-fuzzies with Extra class tickets too. I’ve heard booming stations that were clearly running in excess of 1.5KW input. One ham I knew not only had his radios MARS/CAP modified (and he didn’t hesitate to talk anywhere on the spectrum he felt like), but had a really nasty amp composed of 1 Eimac 3-500Z driving four! The freaking transformer for the power supply weighed 135 lbs.! Downrange, what would you estimate that beast put out? Three or four kilowatts peak with 100W drive? I’m betting he wasn’t a lone gunman either; since I saw a 10KW Henry commercial amp for sale by a ham one time. I’m suuuure he never used it. My point is there are a lot of hams that talk a mean line of compliance, etiquette and protocol. But when it comes right down to it, how many licensees are actually as pure as the driven snow? You have the right not to incriminate yourself, but I’m guessing not too many.
As an aside, what if you built your own QRP (very low power) rig and worked strictly CW (i.e. Morse code) with a key? I’ll bet most of the few remaining hams that can actually send and receive CW without a laptop would find you to be more of a curiousity than a threat. One might just be able to carry on a civilized QSO with licensed hams if he were that type of “pirate.” Whaddya think Downrange?
Re: BrentP & Downrange – if you want to see why I consider the ham radio community to be little more than a petty Clover patch, you need to see it is from the ham community community itself. Read the comments from the Cloverian licensee’s that follow this very reasonable article by a ham and you’ll see that they’ve don Clover proud. http://www.eham.net/articles/6674
I skimmed. Looks like all the symptoms of an aging and dying hobby. Too many incantations and hoops to be part of the club so people don’t bother. They get their exclusivity at a cost to replacement rate. Eventually nobody is left.
BrentP you are quite right, the hobby is dying and as you could tell from the blustering Cloverian buffoons chanting “It’s illegal!” there are many “senior” members actively killing it themselves. Hence my crack of not being able to play well with them. Many of the “old guard” would rather kill and bury ham radio themselves than to admit there are good operators in the free bands to draw from to increase their numbers (and preserve their frequency allocations). It kind of reminds me of the way a labor union functions. Once they manage to bankrupt their own employer, they bitch that it was fault of management, free labor in the right to work states, foreign competition, etc. This brand of Clover has the remarkable capacity to point fingers and completely ignore the root cause of a problem if it can be found in the nearest mirror.
In re Olde Farts killing of hobbies:
I think it was you (or Brent) who mentioned a similar issue as regards the old car hobby – and specifically, the fairly common practice of restricting car shows to pre-1975 models (or whatever). Which of course is completely arbitrary – and worse, has the effect of weeding out almost everyone under 30 because most people who are under 30 today don’t own cars older than they are. (This would be like telling someone of my generation that only pre-1965 cars are permissible to bring to a show.)
Why have any such restrictions? Isn’t it – or shouldn’t it – be about appreciating cars, wrenching on cars – irrespective of their vintage?
Yes Eric, I think it was BrentP that brought that up about car shows. And I completely agree. It seems to me that the people who put those restrictions on car shows are the same middle aged / elderly retired men with enough money to own a T-bucket, a chopped and channeled 35 Ford or to completely restore a 62 Vette. The “We’ve got ours, screw the rest of you” attitude leaves no progeny.
When the NSRA holds their Mid-America Street Rod Nationals in Springfield the hotels are filled with guys & gals my age (50+) on up. Now to their credit the NSRA is smart enough to only limit it to cars 30 y.o. or older. But the really nice rods are all driven (or trailered) by Olde Farts. Most 25 – 30 year olds nowadays can’t afford a hobby like that, especially if they’re supporting a family.
The same with ham radio. You can get into Amateur Radio fairly cheap if you’re tech savvy and shop around for used older gear (but no too old, because those are collectibles just like old cars now). But the really nice radios with all the digital bells & whistles go for over five grand new and the Yaesu FTDX9000D sells for a whopping $10,750! Unless your daddy’s rich and generous, and you have plenty of time on your hands, it’s an Olde Fart’s sport for sure.
Yes, I mentioned the arbitrary car show rules. What’s really funny are what I consider the ‘exceptions’. The Cobra replicas, the street-rods that are built from the ground up with new parts, and so on. Or the Buick Grand National that I see practically every time.
It’s much like how clovers see the law. Not to be used on ‘good people’, only those ‘bad people’ over there. It’s all socially applied rules so there is an in-crowd and an out-crowd. He’s ok, but not him.
If they want to have a private club show fine, make it that way. But they want attendance and cars so they make it open, but with bendable rules to keep out people they don’t like and let in people they do. Make a hoop for people to jump through.
What’s particularly bad is that it splinters the car hobby which really needs to be united these days on key issues. But like clovers in general many people just can’t see that something which only bothers some other guy today is the ground work for bothering them tomorrow.
We still have private security in Canada, nothing like what you have do endure at the airport. I will not fly into the States and crossing the border by vehicle can be an issue. It’s so sad, all this security theatre.
Hi Ray,
Indeed – but it has purpose: Acclimating the masses to obeying arbitrary authority. And more: To degrade them. To violate their personal space. To show them who’s boss.
I have pretty much sworn off flying but it hasn’t been an easy decision. A vestibular disorder stuck about 4 years ago and has since made driving more 30 minutes at a time very taxing and not all that safe to boot so here I am, stuck at home, waiting in vain for some modicum of reasonableness to return to America. Not holding my breath however.
Btw, here’s some data showing the increased mortality on highways for the year after 9/11. At least as many “excess” deaths on the roads as there were killed in the attacks so fuck you, clover.
http://www.mpib-berlin.mpg.de/volltexte/institut/dok/full/gg/GG_Dread_2004.pdf
@mikehell,
Please search for Dr. Joel Wallach, and his cure for vertigo. In many cases it’s actually a form of osteoporosis of the skull, and affects the vestibular organs (three little hollow hoops of bone in the inner ear) by destabilizing the bony matrix in which they’re embedded.
He recommends a multi-mineral supplement high in calcium and magnesium with trace minerals.
I’ve seen a friend recover completely using it…hope it can help you too.
We all need to take command of our own health care–because otherwise we’re literally going to die under Obamacare. The medical system is so corrupt and inbred at this point that I don’t trust it for anything except perhaps trauma surgery…and then get the hell out of the hospital as soon as possible.
In the coming crisis, it’s going to be crucial to know how to stay well-nourished and healthy–and not dependent on the (health) sick-care system.
Great discussion here. I’ve been a pilot for 40+ years. I got my PPL at the age of 17, then flew jets in the Navy. I immigrated to Australia in 1983 where I had aspirations to fly for the airlines here. Having to convert licenses wasn’t a terrible hassle, so I finally got around to it a little too far down the track in order to procure viable airline pilot status. So, I just went through the process to fly for pleasure and as a part time instructor. Then 9-11 changed everything. Every pilot, from student up, must now get an “ASIC” (Aviation Security Identification Card) badge (it started a year or so after that fateful day). The cost was astronomical for one; the background checks go back to birth (no kidding), but what really put me off was the fact they stuck highly paid government “observers” at various vantage points. If a pilot is pre-flighting his plane and decides to empty the fuel sample container (or take a leak, etc., before start-up) and forgets that the key to the 4 or 6 seater he/she is going to fly is not on his/her person, they are on him/her like white on rice. The fine was something like $100,000.00 (as much as a used Cessna 4 seater is worth) about 5 years ago (who knows what it is now – maybe they now put us on death row). I voted with my feet; literally. I couldn’t get my head around the good chance that some wise-guy could come up to me at any time and without just cause to check me out, frisk me, detain me, and otherwise ruin the whole experience not only for myself, but my friends coming for a “joy flight” (what a contradiction in terms that now is) – or worse, our student pilots getting treated the same way. I gave it all up and so did a lot of my pilot friends. As if somebody is going to take a Cessna and knock down the US Embassy with it. Now I hear they’re going to install body scanners at all airports within the next 5 years. I can’t see any point elaborating the ramifications of these so called essential safety measures as I’m sure you get my point.
I was in NY when the twin towers went down. I saw them go up when I was a teenager and watched them fall as a middle-aged man. What really came true was a remark an American colleague made to me back then; he said “this event is going to change the entire world as we know it forever”. Boy, what an under-statement that was with (some) perverts looking forward to a day’s work squeezing balls or groping a lady’s breasts. Pretty soon they’ll also be able to see everyone’s assets (pun intended) even at a small regional airport. What has the cost of “freedom” (or is that word soon to become redundant) become in a supposedly democratic society?
Hi Bill,
Thanks for you thoughtful post (and welcome to our little corner of the ‘Net).
I used to enjoy flying, too. Did it often. I’ve been all over the country – and to several foreign countries. Now, I’d rather get a mouthful of old cavities replaced than fly anywhere.
I fear it’s going to become more than just a hassle – and an indignity. This “theater” is just preliminary. The opening act, if you like.
We have some time to get ready – and to try to wake up as many other people as possible.
I think that’s about the best we can hope for.
Bill it sounds to me like they did the same thing to pilots’ licenses that the *BATFE did to Federal Firearms Licensees back in the 90’s. They essentially weeded out most of the small and part time dealers by raising fees and making the licensee provide a lot of personal information. This allowed them to collect and database the records from those that didn’t renew, it cut competition for the bigger players (like Wal-Mart & Sports Authority) and made it a lot easier to monitor those few small dealers that remained. Now it appears that something similar is being done to limit private aircraft ownership. Its depressing to watch helplessly as the net encircles us.
*BATFE = Bureau of Arson, Treason, Falsehood & Extermination. Remember Waco?
This ASIC sounds similar to the TWIC card they’ve foisted onto every trucker who gets in contact with a “port”. They’ve gone berserk in pushing ever more stringent requirements while I fully expect them all to fail the next time a false-flag incident (one that is bound to happen) pushes us further over the dictatorial cliff.
If the cry against the TSA gets loud enough, expect them to foil a “major terrorist” plot(s), with the media blaring for weeks. If that doesn’t work, expect an airplane to blow up. In this way, government can actually expand when its “services” are no longer wanted.
Government failure = Government expansion.
In any socially arranged institution it seems that ‘big’ people are rewarded for failure while ‘little’ people are punished for failure. It could be said that ‘little’ people are even punished for success.
Quite right BrentP. Those who have “gotten theirs” aren’t real fond of sharing, aren’t interested in a level playing field nor any real competition. Their version of the golden rule is: He who has the gold makes the rules. “They” took the gold from the Amerikan people back in 1933. From what I understand most, if not all of “the people’s” gold that should be in Ft. Knox now resides in the vaults of the New York Fed (if it isn’t sitting the Rothschilds’ coffers in London and other undisclosed locations around the globe).
So yes, the visible evil people that play along with the mega-evil people behind the curtain are indeed rewarded whether or not they “fail”. I don’t see things like the MF Global debacle as a “failure” to these people. I think Jon Corzine did exactly what he set out to do; extract money from investors. With his connections he was able to do so fraudulently with impunity. Bernie Madoff didn’t have good enough connections, that’s the main difference. And in both cases the “little people” picked up the tab.
Since sociopaths and psychopaths seem to view life (and particularly physical wealth) as a zero sum game, our success equals a loss to them personally. With no conscience or moral compass, that makes it easy for them to cut the little guy’s throat, go home, have dinner and sleep soundly. Thanks anyway; I’ll keep my scruples and they can have their unrighteous mammon.
I also found Eric’s site through LRC – a good while back now. It’s really important that Lew’s site casts a wide net and picks up so much good material (as well as some dross).
TPTB understand the potential power of a free internet to link up people and, ultimately, to defend against their tyranny. That’s why they’ve installed a quiet “kill switch,” y’know. Don’t be surprised to find when the balloon finally goes up for real, that internet is suddenly “dark.”
Investigate getting a ham radio license folks – you’re gonna need comms when this all falls apart.
I would never pay for a ham radio license.
Among other reasons, they waste the money they get already.
Is there a reason to have one?
I have read that a Person does not need to have a license to listen to a ham radio.
I imagine those kinds of radios are expensive, ~$400 starting price?. And not too common to find, I’ve never seen one.
If one is none, and two is one, then a ham radio and a flock of homing pigeons is two? Ha. j/k
How about the libertarian / anarchist alternative: free-banding? Free-banding (or pirate radio if you prefer) operates typically slightly above and below the CB frequencies. Many folks run single side-band, often fairly powerful stations and basically ignore the FCC. If one is discreet, keeps their power levels below 1KW and runs clean equipment, there’s little chance the FCC will ever bother with them. Hence many free-banders run modified ham equipment.
But be warned, hams are very jealous of their frequency allocations. Some local radio clubs are known to go on “fox hunts” to locate and report unlicensed stations invading their turf. If you’re running a fixed (or “base”) station on a regular basis, there’s good chance they’ll find you if they want to. Most hams figure that if they’ve had to jump through all the hoops to get the license, you should too.
If you’re set up with a 100W mobile rig (say an Icom 760, a tuner and broadband stick antenna) and limit your air time, then odds are you’ll never get caught. A nice thing about a rig like the IC-760 is it runs off 12V. So if you have a car battery and a solar panel, it won’t matter if the grid’s down. This type of radio has a broad band receiver and some operate clear up to the 2M band (144 MHz), so you can monitor all kinds of interesting traffic (police, aircraft, etc.) with the right antenna.
Icom, Yaesu, Kenwood, et al produce similar “ham” transceivers and you don’t need a license to purchase them (although some individual hams won’t sell to you if you’re not licensed. And these radios do tend to be expensive. So if all you want to do is monitor short wave or gun-vernment frequencies, then you may be better off with a Grundig SWL receiver or a scanner. But if you need to get a message out…
When the excrement really extrudes into the rotary air moving appliance and the internet / cell towers are shut down for “national security” all bets will be off. I’ll go so far as to say that most anyone who can provide their neighbors a means of communicating across the country and around the world will have a pretty good skill to barter with post collapse. And I also suspect that finding free-banders at that point will still be an extremely low priority for the Reich, at least until the initial smoke clears. My guess is they’ll target the licensed ham operators first, much the same way that they’ll use the CCW rolls and gun shop records to single out gun owners. Then after that they’ll start clean up operations. YMMV, but that’s my two cents worth.
It’s like old 1980s sci-fi…
Mr. Spock You have the con….
http://youtu.be/HGKS3laSlXo?t=8m9s
“Running Man”, 8:09 in this youtube if the link doesn’t work right.
Are CB radios still of any use? I often see those at the goodwill stores…some of them are cheapo under-the-dash junk from the 70’s, but every now and then I’ll see some fancy looking bearcat with digital panel and a desktop mic with push button switch.
Turd, CB radios operate in the 11M band (27.965 – 27.405 Mhz) at relatively low power (4W AM / 12W SSB). CB is still used by truckers and other over-the-road travelers for highway information and general chit-chat. I don’t think it’s as popular as it once was due to cell phones and the internet (the same with ham radio). But it still has a pretty good cult following. CB’s are limited to 4W, the 11M band is affected by solar activity and subject to a lot of interference from skip depending on where we are in the solar cycle. In other words, at certain times you’ll here a lot of traffic from Buenos Aires and Mexico city covering you up when you’re trying to talk to one of your neighbor’s down the street in Akron. Push enough (illegal) power to overcome it and you’ll (a) probably be talking to the folks down in SA as well as (b) “bleeding through” your next door neighbor’s stereo system. He may get pissed and call the FCC on you. They might actually investigate, but that’s highly unlikely.
Typically the CB rigs you’ll see at thrift stores, flea markets and yard sales will be older and beat up. If they’ve been sitting, then the electrolytic capacitors inside will have dried out. When this happens, the capacitors are shot and the device will not work until they are desoldered and replaced (not something the typical homeowner will be able to do nowadays). In other cases, I’ve seen nice radios that the owner attempted to “mod” himself and butchered. Here again, unless you’re a tech with component level repair experience, it could cost you more to fix one than to just buy a new radio.
Some conventional CB’s can be modified to “slide” (tune slightly off frequency), to put out a small amount of additional power and in some cases (like the old Cobra 142, 148, etc.) add extra channels (operate in the “free-bands”) between 12M & 10M (basically from 26 – 28 MHz). Of course doing these “mods” is in violation of federal law. There is another alternative: export radios. These are gray market transceivers that are not FFC type accepted here in the United Socialist States of Amerika. They typically operate over a broader frequency range than “CB”, may be more powerful and have features (like FM, VFO or skip channels) conventional CB’s don’t. You can often find these Galaxy, Ranger, etc. radios at various questionable websites, under the counter at some truck stops and used through local free-bander clubs (as they move up to ham gear).
If you’re primarily interested in short range two-way comm., you’d probably be better off looking in FRS / GMRS rigs that operate in the VHF / UHF range on FM. Read my post on ham gear above.
I know someone who actually modded CB’s back in the day for a pretty penny. There may come a time that they’ll be put into use again. Who cares what the feds think at a moment like that.
You can get useful information from other highway traffic (usually truck drivers) when traveling on the highway.
OK, too much info to put out in a post here, but, first, just get your ham license. It’s easy, and your mind will thank you for the effort you put in to get it. You will learn enough about the craft of radio communications to help you understand what’s possible and not. Hint, communicating reliably more than a few dozen miles with “free band” equipment is NOT, due to lack of reliable propagation at that frequency. Just get the on-line courses (should be free, or very low charge) and start studying and working your way up the ranks.
You only need one or two hams per group – they can handle the comm duties for the rest. They will thank you for the effort.
Let’s qualify that Downrange; a *Technician class* license is “easy”. And that’s if you have an interest in radio, electronics and propagation theory. A General or Advanced class license not so much. It’s easier now that they’ve lifted the CW (morse code) requirement I’ll grant you. But if it’s not something you’re passionate about, the license material will be dry and boring. And you will be registered with our paranoid gun-vernment as a potential security threat…albeit at low cost.
How about just picking up the ARRL books if you’re interested, studying up, setting up a station and monitoring traffic without asking Big Sis for permission. I agree that the “free-bands” (actually gun-vernment and business bands that are unused because they’re unreliable) aren’t of much use for anything other than friendly QSO’s with whomever is listening, but it does give the unwashed and unlicensed some bi-directional operating experience.
Plus freebanding is kind of like running 100 on a deserted stretch of I-95 in the middle of the night or lane splitting past a city cop in downtown traffic on a bike. There’s a certain amount of anarchistic / libertarian satisfaction to be had in flipping “the man” the bird when there’s nothing he can do about it, dontcha think?
Good points. You don’t need to beg permission to teach yourself and others what to do. It’s absurd.
You guys are the greatest glad i found this site thankyou lewrockwell and you eric its gettin closer everyday
Eric bats about 900* while Rockwell hits about 200. Nine-hundred is worth a careful read while two-hundred is worth a daily quickscan in search of a nugget or a Keeper.
tgsam (1936 –)
*Quite good for a youngster.
Methinks you misunderestimate the strategic value of Lew Rockwell.
Have to part company with Tinsley on LewRockwell.
However, perhaps Tinsley will enlighten us?
Few Individuals display an interest in what I have to say.
tgsam
Have to pretty much agree with TGS, but I’ll put Lew at 700 as it is libertarian, Austrian econ, as well as fun and general interest topics. For pure news it’s Drudge and Alex Jones. Mainstream media has devolved to great stories on which actress forgot to wear panties, got a DUI, how the FED is fighting inflation, how the innocent Israelis are getting attacked by the Arabs, or the latest on why we need to kill people in Iran or Pakistan. Pravda would be green with envy over what passes for American media.
One of my favorite lines about the MSM:
As predictable as Pravda in the Brezhnev years.
Which actress was it again?
Pravda was never as slick as the American entertainment-as-news criminal syndicate.
How is Lew Rockwell’s lifetime batting average? He did found the Mises Institute!
That is like him hitting back to back grand slams in the bottom of the ninth, game seven of the world series when your team is down by 7.
The ballot alone will never inflict enough pain upon the parasites for them to respect the Individual’s natural rights.
tgsam (1936 –)
Absolutely correct. They’re going to whine about the situation while dining away on your dime!
I like your thinking Paul. That’s a true American reaction! Use the free market to give injustice a big F U while making a buck! Also, please invite me to your party. lol
Let’s see here. Downtown Phoenix to Los Angeles CA is 370 miles. That’s 37 gallons of gas in a Crown Vicky for the round trip. Times an average of $4 per gallon is….$148. If I charged the same as Southwest Airlines for a ticket (about $220 based on a one way fare) I can fit 3 customers in the cab, get them door to door service, be done in 10 hrs of driving, and pocket $500. Hmmmmm…. Do that twice or three times a week…..
Actually, a six pack E250 Econoline Van with captain seats and TV/DVD player could nearly double that.
We could get the people door to door in about the same time as it takes to get door to door from home in Phoenix to destination in La La Land…..
When life hands you lemons, make lemonade! (then find someone whose life has given them vodka & throw a party)
You know what, Paul. You’ve given me a brainstorm. Thanks!
I am one of those who has taken to the roads. My wife and I turned what would have been a flight/visit to Milwaukee into a road trip from Seattle to Maine and back, over the summer. A month ago I could have flown to San Diego easily, but I refuse to fly, so I drove to San Diego and back. Due to constraints, I did the downward trip in a straight shot.
If people quit flying in large numbers, TSA goons would be standing around molesting each other, and we can estimate how long that would last…
Longer than we might think…but not as long as many other gubmint programs.
I’ve mentioned before that I stopped flying as Gate Rape became unavoidable. I used to fly somewhere almost every month to attend a “ride and drive” – car industry-speak for press events hosted by the automakers to give journalists an opportunity to drive their latest cars before they become production cars. Not attending these events puts me at a disadvantage in terms of my ability to write about the latest stuff before it’s no longer the latest stuff – but I’m adamant about not participating in Submission Training. I won’t have it. And more, I’d probably say something – or do something – if I put myself in that position. So, I don’t. I am practicing avoidance – even though I know that eventually, it won’t be possible to avoid confrontations with these creeps even if you never leave your house. They just won’t leave us alone.
“Submission Training”, that, Mr. Peters is exactly what the TSA and Big Bitch is all about. And anyone who thinks it is about “security” is an idiot beyond redemption.
I refuse to ever again sing the national anthem. “Land of the free, home of the brave” my ass.
Hi Skunk,
Yup.
Last 4th of July, my wife ran a 5k race. Big crowd. Just before the start of the race, there was the usual patriotic flapdoodle, including the obligatory talk about “our freedoms.” When they played the Star Spangled Banner, I was the only one who declined to play along. I wish I had had the presence of mind to turn my back on “the flag.”
Next time, I will.
land of the sheep home of the slave
Yep Skunkbear and Eric, I’m with you. I not only refuse to fly, but I wrote to the major airlines and informed them they would not get one more dime from me until the TSA becomes an historical fact. The big ones sent back canned responses whining about how it wasn’t their fault, blah, blah, blah. Sure, my approach limits my mobility somewhat, but I’ve done my share of traveling, seen most of the rest of the country and I’m perfectly happy to stay home now.
In so far as saluting the rag and swearing allegiance to the Reich (and by extension the banksters that own and operate it) goes, no more! They hold an annual veteran’s day memorial where I work. I quit attending 3 years ago out of repentance for my days as a mercenary as well as a moral conviction against celebrating the unnecessary deaths of deluded cannon fodder of the empire. This year the organizer of this event approached me to deliver a speech for this event. I politely declined and explained why. She said not only that she understood (and implicitly agreed with me), but that there would be no speech given at all. Sometimes, in a tiny way, we can make a difference.
“…repentance for my days as a mercenary…”
I love the expression and it is good to know there are others out there who have a clearer vision of their past.
I also did time as a merc for the banksters (aka a veteran) for which I am completely ashamed.
I hope other vets will also come around too.
Mercenary? A true mercenary is what he is and admits as much. The tragedy is that your common military doofus, as I once was, has his head pumped full of lies about who he is and what it’s all about. One is at least honest and it sure as hell isn’t the one wearing Uncle Sams uniform.
Why do “they” never stop short of killing and being killed? Bloodless revolutions are quite rare.
I really don’t care if “they” all die but unfortunately some good people also die.
Yesterday, the costumed revenue collectors were at Gonzales Louisiana’s main intersection checking for expired “safety” inspection stickers. The fine for an expired sticker is up to at least $160 in at least one parish.
tgsam (1936 –)
Tinsley-
The costumed revenue collectors are every bit as evil as the judges and the prosecutors. To argue otherwise, is to give a partial get out of jail free pass to the goons.
Sad to say but Bailouts and Ballots aren’t very effective in bringing about change. It’s all about the Bullets.
In spite of the consistently effective method championed by Gandhi and King, Americans still overlook the power of the Boycott and the right to Peaceful Assembly.
tgsam (1936 –)
So long as one protests in am authorized “free speech zone”! Otherwise one will be arrested!
That method relies on the government being made up of decent people. You’ll notice that, in China and Russia, they simply rolled in the army and liquidated the dissenters. And they weren’t hesitant about wiping out entire ethnic groups either.
Mao was right. Evil, but right. “All political power flows from the barrel of a gun.” Whichever side has the ability to kill the other is the side that is in control. If your only method of resistance is to ask them nicely, then you’re not really free, you’re just a slave with a kind master.
That which is not seen comes to mind. I think your article, while not a scientific study, does indicate a quantifiable negative of the BSG (Blue Shirted Goons).
What politician would state they are in favor of killing 100 (or even 50) people month with a policy that violates everyone’s rights as a human? The BSG violate peoples privacy and dignity without probable cause on a daily basis.
So, let’s see:
Your entirely hypothetical (and utterly hysterical, like an old woman screeching) “tens of thousands who would die” vs. the absolute certainty of millions of people treated like incoming prisoners, forced to Submit & Obey arbitrary authority exercised over them by blue shirted goons. Millions of people being groped; having to allow their children to be groped. Having to watch the elderly abused and humiliated…
That’s your America, Clover – not mine.
For you, any “risk” – as defined by you, based on your own fears and limitations – justifies any abridgement of other people’s liberty, any assault on their dignity.
Man up, Clover.
Men don’t let fear dominate their lives. They accept risk as the price of liberty. And they despise creatures who quickly surrender not only their liberty – but the liberty of others – in order to feel “safe.”
PS: Why not put your assertion to the test? Why not let people’s free choices determine whether “we” need/want the “security” you say “we” do? How about letting an airline offer “No TSA” service? No groping, no scanning. Unless someone specifically gives them a reason for suspicion, let ’em board and fly unmolested. You know, like Americans used to be able to do as recently as 10 years ago.
As you like to say, I’d bet you a million dollars such an airline would quickly become the most successful air carrier in the country.
The government knows this, too – which is why it won’t allow it.
It’s actually a mute point Clover is making; we already know exactly what would happen to the air transportation system in the absence of the TSA. The answer is “nothing”.
A lot of folks forget the TSA is a uniquely American/”First World” phenomenon, and it isn’t even uniform in those locales. Most regional airports don’t have naked body scanners so there’s no reason to “opt-out” of them and have your balls fondled by some grinning fat kid in a blue shirt looking for revenge. The only increase in airline security at most airports is they make you take of your shoes *and* your belt before you go through the metal detector. Not a big shift in procedure.
It’s only in major airports that they microwave you before they let you in. “No more radiation than you get from your cell phone!” said one BSG to me last year when I requested a pat down rather than being treated like last week’s leftover pot roast. I was tempted to explain I didn’t completely trust cell phones either but figured it was a waste of breath, the woman was on a mission; she was selling very high priced junk to the public and wasn’t interested in discussing the ins and outs of radiation exposure.
Anyway, back to my point. Clover, we already know what happens when you go back to 1970’s era security; nothing. Over half the airports in the developed world still do that. San Francisco, Dallas, Denver, SLC, pretty much all the big hubs, are places to avoid. Otherwise nothing has changed much. In other words, the body scanner/pat down routine is provably worthless as a deterrent.
You OK with that?
Moot not ‘mute’.
Not so. I meant “mute” as in “refraining from speech or temporarily speechless”.
“The argument is mute.”
You’ll find this construction in uncommon use.
Hi Scott,
My local airport – Roanoke Regional – has the scanners. And the gropers. This is a small airport. Regional jets only.
Sorry to hear that Eric. Idaho Falls doesn’t. Monterey doesn’t. Oakland has them but doesn’t use ’em. Maybe they’re just broke.
Roanoke is, as I recall, just down the road from a major military establishment. That might play a part in their having Hub level security.
Fly out of Cancun? They didn’t even have them last year and they weren’t doing pat downs either. Puerto Rico on the other hand is a high security prison. My point is there are so many gaping holes in the TSA apparatus that asking “what would happen if we didn’t have them” is pointless, we already know.
I should probably mention I’m not against airline security. I am against paying large amounts of money to abusive goons for the *appearance* of airline security.
If I try taking my nail clippers through a TSA checkpoint I lose them. Then, after going through the checkpoint, I sit down at the Chili’s restaurant, where they hand me a knife and fork.
The level of stupidity here is epic.
”
Not so. I meant “mute” as in “refraining from speech or temporarily speechless”.
“The argument is mute.”
You’ll find this construction in uncommon use.”
Yes, I see that construction among the functionally illiterate often. The correction from Me2 was accurate, Scott.
In the early 1970’s, the United States experienced a marked increase in hijackings and bombs aboard aircraft. This development prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to enact an emergency rule in December of 1972 that airlines must inspect baggage and scan passengers for possible threats. Airlines operating in the U.S. had one month to comply. One of the first measures to implement this directive was the utilization of metal detectors.
Then when 911 came around they found that metal detectors and simple measures like that were not enough. You have to change with the times and your enemy or you die. Pretty simple. If you lack the security needed then the airlines shut down because no one flies when planes start going down.
And yet, they give people metal knives at the restaurants inside the “security” zone… .
And why is it that other countries don’t subject their citizens to fondling and scanning? Planes are not falling out of the sky in other parts of the world. Amazing, isn’t it? Oh. That’s right. Those countries don’t have to worry about terrorists. It’s only the USSA that does. Because of all our freedoms. Just drives the ragheads to conniptions.
Well, why don’t the angry ragheads just spray the crowds coming into the airport with AK-47 fire? Easy enough to do. Or just drop an airliner from the ground using a shoulder-fired rocket?
The enemy, Clover, is stupidity and fear. Not “the evildoers.” Well, not the ones you’ve been taught to think of as evildoers, anyhow.
The real evildoers are the ones who’ve turned you into a cringing, fearful wreck of a person – willing to accept any abuse if it’s done in the name of “safety”.
Did you bother to find out why there was a marked increase in hijackings and bombs aboard aircraft in the early 1970’s, bootlicker?
Eric,
More likely than the FedGov not allowing it, they would likely actively sabotage the effort. They have “thwarted” numerous false terrorist attacks that they just happened to have planned and facilitated, only to bust the poor patsy at the last minute with the fake explosives. No, they would not sit idly by as the free market exposed them for the losers they are. There would be at least one free market flight taken down by a mental midget recruited by the FBI to carry out a suicide mission. They don’t give a damn about “Americans” dying, so long as they retain their position and power, and so long as clover will roll over for them.
In Upstate NY, I know people who drive to Canada to fly. They don’t do the TSA nonsense. Personally, I have stopped flying commercially. I can drive anywhere I want to go here, and will fly out of Canada for international travel. Like Eric, I remember travel in the 70s, and even into the mid-late 60s. Its a different world and a different country now.
The only drawback I can see in driving to Canada to fly out of the country is having to deal with another set of TSA thug-goons at the U.S.-Canadian border. Also, while I have never made the crossing from the U.S. into Canada over land myself, I have it on good authority from those who have done so recently and fairly frequently that the Canadian customs and border agents are as big a bunch of pricks, or even bigger than the U.S.’s TSA.
Without the TSA earth as we know it would cease to exist! LOL
Dom,
Imagine all the freedom in perfect harmony. 🙂
Makes me wish for pre-2002 flying.
I can dimly recall what flying was like in the ’70s, when I was a little kid. Walk through a metal detector – that’s it. Walk right up to the gate to see relatives off – with no hassles. Get to the airport 15 minutes before the scheduled departure – and make the flight. Ashtrays in the armrests. Good looking stewardesses. Not angry old sow (and snooty gay dude) “flight attendants.” Kids like me could get invited to the cockpit, talk with the pilots – maybe even get a toy airplane. Real food. Good food. Well-behaved people – and not too many of them, either. I remember stretching out to sleep across three seats. There were always empty seats.
And how about this (true story):
Circa 1978 I went to visit my uncle and his family in Mexico City. I caught a lizard at his house and was determined to bring him home with me. And I did. Made it all the way home – through JFK airport – with that lizard tucked in a cardboard box under my arm. No asshole Blue Shirt Goons back then.
It used to be a fairly free country – and not all that long ago, either.
Remind me again: What are the “freedoms” we’re fightin’ for again?
Eric,
I remember being permitted by the pilot to enter the cockpit in the early 80’s. It was a thrill for me.
I think there are still some good looking stewardesses, but my sample size is too small for anything meaningful statisitically speaking.
Metal detectors were a relatively quick way for the airlines/airport to check for possible metal weapons, without treating everyone as a defacto criminal.
Going into the cockpit as a kid, Eric? Have you ever seen a grown man naked?
Sorry, couldn’t help myself…
And: Joey, do you like movies about gladiators…?
Mark and Eric, if you two are serious, I’ll stop calling you Shirley.
I can top Eric’s lizard story.
In the late ’60s I was a teenager and my parents were expatriates working in Nigeria, and I regularly flew there on school holidays. Just before one such flight, I found a mysterious piece of metal tubing and bits and pieces in the road, so I thought I would bring it with me and ask my father what it was. I showed it to the Nigerian customs inspectors when I arrived, and they just laughed and waved me through. When I showed it to my father he identified it as part of a shock absorber that must have fallen off a vehicle, and then he told me what a risk I had taken going through Ikeja airport with it, if it had been noticed as suspicious; it was in the fraught period right after the first military coup, while Ironsi was ruling before he, too, was overthrown.
By the way, the correct test for whether an organisation like the TSA is succeeding isn’t how many terrorists it catches, any more than the Battle of the Atlantic was won by sinking more submarines. The first OR people figured out that the test then was the amount of shipping that got through, so they switched their tactics and more got through though fewer submarines were sunk. In the same way, the true test for the TSA (which it also fails) isn’t how many terrorists it catches but how many terrorist casualties it prevents; an attack that never gets made is as good as one that gets caught, as far as that goes. Of course, judging from TSA justifications, they themselves don’t know what they should be trying to do.
I too remember the trip to the cockpit: I was 7, and it was September 1972 as our family made its way to Australia.
Later in the 70s I flew (by myself) back to my home country to spend a year with my Mum’s parents. Again, a visit to the cockpit was de rigeur.
My memory of the day we boarded the flight to Straya is very clear – our hand luggage wasn’t inspected at either departure or arrival, the staff were courteous, and the trip was enjoyable.
My proposed solution to the obese-retard-sheltered-workshop security-theatre nonsense is the same as my proposed solution to drug laws and so forth: DISOBEY *EN MASSE* AND MAKE THEM JAIL YOU.
I deliberately disobeyed the French immigration authorities several times – and made them put me in one of their concentration camps (some woman kept throwing apples through the fence and telling me some wolves would save us… no, wait). TWICE.
This had the successful concomitant that everybody that I knew in France was outraged – about 200 people who had never given the matter a moment’s thought, suddenly understood the ridiculousness of eartags for transporting humans. And I tell the story at every opportunity (much to the chagrin of The Lovely).
Being incarcerated (the full bottle: razor wire, high walls, bars on the windows, lockdown at night, meals to a set timetable, armed guards) is something more people should experience – it’s not frightening in the least (I’m lucky maybe: I’m a little over 6 feet tall and about 220 lbs).
What’s more relevant is that the Machine does not want the removal of the stigma of ‘ex convict’ – the reputational damage is does is a primary vector of control (once you’re a ‘convicted felon’ in the US, your life is pretty well rooted).
The more people who violate stupid laws, the more pressure will be put on the parasitic megalomaniacal vermin who seek to be our overlords. Eventually JURIES will start to balk at jailing their fellows – and then we win.
As an aside: I asked one of The Lovely’s mentors – a senior criminal barrister – whether he had ever heard any defence barrister say in closing argument that even in the absence of reasonable doubt, the jury could refuse to convict simply because they felt like it (it’s absolutely true: nobody is permitted to ask the jury WHY they voted the way they did).
The response: “I reckon you would be held in contempt the moment the words left your lips, and would be in the cells five minutes later.”
And that, my friends, is part of the many and various reasons why I have no respect whatsoever for the ‘justice’ system. If barristers are not permitted to make statements of fact in their closing arguments for fear of incarceration (however short) then the system is putrid at its heart.
GT… Geoffrey Transom? Love to read your stuff. Your “French” story clued me right in. I never forgot it. But having said that you’re absolutely right. I so despise the machine and it’s little functionary “cogs” that seem so willing to bust peoples chops just so long as they can get greased by the overlords a little more.
Your response assumes that TSA equates security.
If your logic were correct, being molested all the time (in addition to traveling) would make us a safer society.
Molestation only equals security if you’re a pervert..
Who said anything about removing security, bootlicker? Some just realize what happens when such a service is monopolized and handed over to a violent gang of thugs calling itself government.
You’re so funny Clover. Such an easily manipulated scared person.
Successful hijackings are impossible now. The government allows the guy with the exploding underpants on the plane, a guy who doesn’t even have a passport, whom was known that he was going to do something, and he was thwarted by the passengers. The change in mentality, where people on an airplane won’t put up with it, won’t act like sheep, has ended hijacking.
If I had the capital to risk against the government and your kind, I would start an airline called “No-Checkpoint-Airlines” or perhaps “Archie Bunker Airways”. Minimalist security and/or perhaps requiring every passenger to be armed, providing rental weapons if need be. Ooooh better yet, guns or knives in every seat back… in case of hijacking break glass. The motto would be something like ‘in our passengers we trust’. Advertising would be how other airlines treat you like prisoners, we respect your business. Something like that. Yes, I am being comedic, however the theme of having an airline that doesn’t hassle passengers as prisoners, doesn’t treat them as children, and so forth would work quite well.
I think it could be very successful except for one thing. The government. They don’t take kindly to things like cow-shares to drink raw milk and they probably wouldn’t like plane-shares or something to technically avoid travel hassles.
“Ooooh better yet, guns or knives in every seat back… in case of hijacking break glass.” I like it. It would work.
Actually the 60s air travel was like that. I often carried my shotgun on board. The only time anyone even said anything was a Brit stu who asked me if it was loaded. I told her that carrying a loaded shotgun on board was dangerous. I keep the loose shells in my jacket and the full boxes in the overhead. I also carried a 1911 auto in my luggage with the magazine out and the chamber empty. After the DB Cooper hijacking, guns were outlawed in the cabin. Different world then indeed.
You could do it if the airline isn’t open to the public, Make it a private charter club with a membership fee. Only members allowed on the plane. If I had enough capital I’d do it. Might be an idea for a kickstarter project…
I must have missed the carnage before the TSA. More people in the US die on the roadways than in the air.
Sources:
Federal Highway Administration
US Census
You don’t understand the point. No one is saying there’s no need for security. They’re saying that it should be left to the airlines not the gov’t. Then different airlines can offer different levels of security and people can freely choose to pay higher prices for more security or not.
The market is a much better and much harsher regulator than gov’t.
Except–TSA has never caught even ONE terrorist–so who would have killed “tens of thousands”, Clover?
If there are terrorists just waiting to kill “tens of thousands”, why hasn’t TSA caught even one?
And don’t say it’s because TSA deters the terrorists. They don’t.
Have you heard of the “mile-high picket security” problem? Imagine a picket fence around your house for security. Only, it’s just one picket; and that picket is a mile high. Pretty easy to walk around it to get to your house, isn’t it? That’s what TSA is–except they’re hardly a mile high.
Do they secure the maintenance areas of the airport? The food delivery areas? The mechanical areas? Hardly, or not at all, in many cases.
How about the airport itself? All those hundreds of people milling around inside, waiting their chance to be ‘saved’ by the Brave, Brave TSA “Workers”.
Why haven’t any terrorists attacked there, Clover?
You sound like an hysterical eunuch who’s lost his hair-brush. Screechy, illogical, emotional. I recommend a testosterone patch…to replace the missing testicles.
I’ve probably stated this here before but proving the TSA absurd is really easy.
According to the government story the hijackers of 2001-9-11 accomplished their deeds by being armed with box cutters. How the government knows what they were armed with is amazing given the evidence that was left behind… none. I digress.. A box cutter is a simple weapon. Just a razor blade with a handle. About as effective as a prison shank.
Now prison shanks aren’t even prevented in maximum security prisons. How is one going to be prevented at an airport? With all the vendors behind the checkpoint? All the material resources at people’s disposal?
It’s absurd. It’s theater. A naked man could go through the TSA checkpoint and a body caviety search carrying a couple-four $20 bills which of course are placed in the bin to scanned by xray and the attentive TSA employee.
How the clovers can go through security, sit down to eat a steak and drink a beer and not see the obvious absurdity of the TSA is what astounds me most.
ack… delete the part about the naked man… it was just redunant and didn’t get fully edited out. Just to point out how rich the resources are behind security.
Yea that’s one of my favorites. After you pass “security” you can sit down at Chili’s or whatever restaurant is in the airport and eat a steak with a steak knife and yet I’ve never seen a waiter or waitress count how many steak knives there are. lmao.
I’ve hesitated to put this thought anywhere on line before, even though it occurred to me years ago, because I didn’t want to give any ideas to a would-be terrorist (if there actually are any besides those created by the FBI). But I saw a reference to a similar idea on another site today, so here goes.
We all know that TSA creates a huge bottleneck at the security checkpoint. Many, many travelers bunched up. If some terror organization wanted to really nail the US at the airports, they would have suicide bombers in a dozen or so major airports at the same time, and they would all detonate the explosives in their carry on bags. Hundreds or thousands of dead people who were relying on TSA for saaaaaaafety.
It really wouldn’t be difficult. The fact that it hasn’t been done yet tells me that the security threat is being vastly overstated.
Hi Mike,
Absolutely. Here’s another:
I used to live 5 minutes from Dulles Airport. There was (and probably still is) a partially wooded/partially open area adjacent nearby where I used to ride dirt bikes. The incoming planes flew right over your head – at tree-top level or slightly higher than that. I remember thinking to myself how easy it would be for an actual terrorist – you know, someone with access to say a throw-away shoulder-fired rocket – to just blast a 747 out of the sky from there. Hell, how hard would it be to do this at almost any airport? Most are located in urban/suburban areas. Rent a delivery truck, drive it to a place that gives you a clear shot of the runway – and have at it.
Just another example of the farcical nature of “security” theatre. Of course, that doesn’t mean “security” doesn’t have a purpose. It’s just not the purpose stated.
Methyl, I’d go into my personal security analysis in detail but I honestly don’t think it would be safe for me or others. I sort of feel bad about that last post I made criticizing airports I’ve been to.
The TSA is a horrible joke, they don’t protect us. Could they? Perhaps. Could they do it *without* being buttheads? I think so. Will they do it under gubermint supervision? Not a F$*king chance.
Clover is a delusional happy freak.
Here’s a clue.
A guy walks up to you at an airline checkpoint. You say to him “Hey! Carrying any weapons today?”
You watch his eyes.
You’re done.
I am one of those people Eric, who now travels long distance rather than disgrace my dignity and honor by flying. I am sure that there are more out there, and your article has proved the point. I can take a lot of hassles in life. Life also means dealing with hassles and common struggles. But disgracing my dignity and honor is forever. Once you lose it in public, you lose it. You know this well because you are from the Southland.
The problem with traveling long distances is the price of gas. I have a Dodge Ram 4×4 and man it takes around 70$ now to fill the thing. After doing a r/t 100 mile trip of going 75-85 m.p.h., I am at half a tank! I remember back in the 80s when I could fill my vehicle with some extra dollars leftover from a Saturday night blowout. With 4$ to the gallon, those days are over.
I am sure that the facho scum who run DH, TSA, SS, or whatever they call those criminal state organizations nowadays, understand this fully. So, they laugh their heads off about us resistant car and truck drivers on the highways. The state of Tennessee once allowed a few TSA goons to do a checkpoint on one of the Interstates. This happened a few years ago. Those bums are now moving into Amtrak stations, especially the main ones in Chicago, NYC, D.C. and in L.A. I took Amtrak about a year ago, and it was packed! The food sucks and the trains are real slow, but Americans take the train more these days because it is such less of a hassle. The Greyhound bus service is terrible, a good amount of the drivers are thugs and the police and US govt. security agents regularly harass and humiliate those customers – and even worse than in airports. I have had personal experience in this area and I will never use their service again.
Going into airport security is the same exact system as checking yourself into a minimum security jail. Think about it. You have to first show a pass and an identification badge. You then have to hand over all of your personal belongings into a machine and empty all of your pockets. Those US govt. creeps can search your personal bags without probable cause or arrest – unlike donut cops. You have to go through an x-ray exam, take off your shoes and belts, and then if they still suspect you of something, they do an intrusive pat down. Minimum security jails do the exact same thing when processing correctional inmates.
I wanted to do a historical tour of the Missions in the southwest, from the Nacogodches, Texas to Sonoma County, California. I have given up that plan. First, the gas would have cost close to 700$, so I would have probably spent thousands of dollars for a few months of traveling, just to pay gas costs, lodging in motels and eating at local cafes and diners. I need that extra capital as a reserve – just in case the system goes kaput. And we both know that this unjust imperial system is on its way there.
The final issue that us drivers have to worry about are the numerous police-security checkpoints everywhere. They are all over the place. In the Southwest, there are these Border Control checkpoints near the Mexican border that harass drivers and try to bust drivers for drugs, so they can steal people’s vehicles. I’ve heard from other Americans near the Canadian border the the DHS Buffoons regularly harass drivers and try to illegally search vehicles along that border area too. Our highways and byways now have DUI checkpoints, drug checkpoints with dogs, seatbelt checkpoints, license, registration and insurance checkpoints, emission checkpoints, etc. Only very few states out west don’t have these intrusive and abusive police state tactics. Driving is just not fun anymore. But we drivers are the last ones with the freedom to move around.
Once our enemies that abuse their power physically come for our guns, autos and personal belongings – then we will have to make our final stand. There is a lot talk out in the Internet blogosphere about fighting back against the US govt. thugs and nazis, but it is really talk – and they, meaning the state in D.C., know this. I don’t even want to think about this future just yet.
Right on, Refco –
If only more people thought as we do – and were willing to act on it. Not only would such a thing as TSA be over tomorrow – it would have never been.
Unfortunately, most people don’t think as we do – and are all to ready to Submit and Obey. As a result, our lives – everyone’s life – has been cheapened. And we’ve been cheated. Out of seeing things and going places. Our “circle” grows smaller each year.
My only hope is that they – the thug scrum in charge – pushing too hard, too fast.
People are waking up. Perhaps enough will do so in time….
Refco
Same problem with my F150 and the cost of fill ups. Found a 1999 Suzuki Esteem w/150k miles on Craigslist that needed a battery and a rear wheel bearing – minor work. Lady was asking $1200 and I got it for $1,000.
I use it on longer trips when I don’t need the truck. It gets 33 MPG, has A/C and a nice stereo. No problems now for over 1 year. It’s a great little car for the money (shame Suzuki went tits up).