While the initial backlash against the use of full-body scanners in airports has faded, the decision by a Washington, D.C. federal judge in January to allow the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to refrain from releasing more than 2,000 scanned body images to a civil liberties group has brought the issue back into focus.
Complaints about Transportation Security Administration screening shot higher in November, the first month airport security screeners started doing “enhanced pat-downs’’ on passengers, but the increase might not have been as big as you might have expected.
That the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has saved a single life is unproven and doubtful. But it did something good for the country last fall by provoking a long overdue reaction against bureaucratic bullying.
So far, the revolt against the Transportation and Security Administration has resulted in very little fundamental change, other than exemptions for special interests. By fundamental change, I mean the restoration of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.”
We need to scuttle the TSA’s equal-risk policy in favor of one that concentrates on genuine potential risks.
The humiliations of the patdown policy, which Janet Napolitano wants to expand, are an Orwellian assault on American freedom
it comes as no big surprise that officials in Washington, DC, instead of dedicating law enforcement resources to something worthwhile are instructing officers, in conjunction with the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), to conduct random bag checks at the city’s Metro stations, ostensibly to guard against the threat of terrorism.
Airport Body Scanner Truth