2006-08-11

The Sheep Accept Their Fate

Today, one day after the foiled terrorist attack, people are accepting the fact that they aren't supposed to carry any liquids onto planes, while Britons (a group not known to make a fuss) are complying with their countries banning of all carry-on luggage, including books.  For a people who stood up gallantly to the Nazis, allowing their own government to ban books on an airplane is beyond pathetic. 
 
Meanwhile, here's an interesting article from Ronald Bailey, in which he outlines that a risk of being killed by a terrorist is much less than getting into a car crash, murdered, drowned, and many other ways that people die even if terrorists carried out attacks regularly.  Simply put: all this extra security is nothing but political bullshit, designed to enslave the populace.
 
The security measures being used are completely ineffective.  In my previous post, I asked the question, "How far will it go?"  I think we could safely eliminate all of our current security checking.  All that is needed is an adaptive approach to singling out certain people.  Young arab males travelling alone seem to be a good place to start.  If we find out that terrorists are starting to come in other colors we can move our search there, but it's stupid to tell the 75 year old World War II veteran that he can't take his bottle of water on the plane because radical muslims are potentially using this method to bring bombs on board. 

2006-08-10

How Far Would You Let It Go?

As an afterthought to my previous post,

"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it."

--Thomas Jefferson

The inconviences of too much liberty is that shit can happen. Perhaps an airplane or two would go down every year through the acts of pissed off people.

How far would you be willing to go to prevent that?

0. Freedom

1. No weapons (federal laws that violates the 2nd amendment prohibit carrying on airplanes. Those who are licensed to carry weapons are among the most law abiding citizens. Just think if one of them had been on each of those 4 flights on 9/11. The muslims with the box cutters couldn't have gotten one of those. Would we be in the middle of this "war on terror" if we weren't disarmed on plans on that fateful day?).

2. Metal detectors.

3. X-rays of your luggage.

4. Prohibitions on all fluids (this just occured today; I read that they are expecting it to last 12 to 72 hours. We are now in the middle of that time frame). This means no water, contact lens solution, handcream, etc. Does the American woman with 2 young children carrying a purse full of handcream really worth this extra effort?

---Now that we've gone this far, how many steps below are you willing to let us fall?---

5. Prohibitions on ALL electronic devices. No cell phones to alert people if your flight is late, no iPods to listen to music on the 5 hour flight, subjecting your $3,000 laptop to baggage "throwers".

6. No more carry on luggage. No books, no magazines, no change of clothes, no nothing.

7. Strip searches. What if someone wrapped an explosive around their penis or tits? Suddenly you would have to go fully nude in front of the TSA.

8. Body cavity searches. Next a terrorist could put a condom full of explosives into their assholes, vaginas, whatever. So boarding an airplane would require everyone to take off all their clothes and have someone of the same sex stick their latex-gloved hand up their ass.

I'd personally like to see us go back to level 0.

Attack On All Liquids!

It seems that a plot was foiled to bomb planes in midair bound from the UK to the US.  It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out who was probably behind it (here's a hint: they aren't Mormon). 
 
The British flipped out and banned all carry-on luggage from their flights, with only a few exceptions (wallets, glasses, tampons, etc.)  You aren't allowed to bring iPods or books!  Can you believe this?  These fucking British Nazis banned books!!!
 
Not to mention that it's just a little bit harder to join the mile high club now, since the TSA has banned all liquids and gels (no K-Y allowed anymore). 
 
Penn Jillette said that we should make every passenger consume a slice of bacon before boarding the flight; if we did that we wouldn't even need the x-ray machine or metal detector. 

2006-08-09

An Early Obituary to Vinegar Joe's Career

"Vinegar" Joe Lieberman has just conceded the Connecticut Senate Democratic Primary to Ned Lamont. This defeat is the first indication of the ramifications of the Iraq situation. Lieberman voted to authorize the president to send troops to Iraq, violating the Constitution in that only Congress can declare war, something it hasn't done since 1941. CT is a very liberal state (as is the entire Northeast except New Hampshire), so this action comes as no surprise.

Joe Lieberman is an oddball of a senator. While he is a hawk on foreign interventions, he is sometimes socially liberal. He does not seem to be against gay marriage, flag desecration, and stem cell research. Also he feels that affirmative action goes against our country's history on equality, is a proponent of school vouchers, and seems to favor States' Rights. These are all good things.

However he is definitely far from perfect. He has voted against tax cuts, which is an overall bad sign. He is very pro gun-control, something that also does not jibe with the Constitution. Lastly, he (along with Hilary Clinton) have a vendetta against the entertainment industry. If it were up to people like him, everything from R-rated movies to pornography to violent video games would be under strict government control, if not outright banned. This stance has made me very hesitant to support him in any of his endeavors, since I find it hard to trust politicians who blatantly should their distrust of the public to make their own decisions, especially when it comes down to things that do no harm to others. My bad taste could be someone else's fetish, and I have no right to tell them what to like. Neither does he, or any politician.

Many other politicians are going to see fallout for their actions, and not just for the war. I think it's time for a clean slate, I think every senator and representative (except for Ron Paul) should be voted out of office. I would prefer to see this happen more often, but now is as good of a time as any.