(Updated) Why the TSA lawsuit against whole body imagers concerns everyone
image credit: garciamedialife
TSA declares sorority book could be a BOMB...
The Rutherford Institute has filed a lawsuit against the TSA over its unregulated use of whole body imagers, which have been likened to virtual strip searches, in the nation’s airports. Security experts have described whole body scanners as the equivalent of "a physically invasive strip-search."
Update 8/5/2015: For the last few years, federal agencies have defended body scanning by insisting that all images will be discarded as soon as they're viewed. The Transportation Security Administration claimed last summer, for instance, that "scanned images cannot be stored or recorded."
It's all LIES, the U.S. Marshals Service admits they store whole body images:
The U.S. Marshals Service admitted this week that it had surreptitiously saved over 35 thousand images.
These "devices are designed and deployed in a way that allows the images to be routinely stored and recorded, which is exactly what the Marshals Service is doing," EPIC executive director Marc Rotenberg said.
"TSA is not being straightforward with the public about the capabilities of these devices," Rotenberg said. "This is the Department of Homeland Security subjecting every U.S. traveler to an intrusive search that can be recorded without any suspicion--I think it's outrageous."
As far back as 2010 The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) said that the program is "unlawful, invasive, and ineffective." and violated our Fourth Amendment. But our injustice system found in the governments favor. How many lawsuits will it take to force our government to abide by the Constitution?
“We are the unwitting victims of a system so corrupt that those who stand up for the rule of law and aspire to transparency in government are in the minority." said John Whitehead.
"This corruption is so vast it spans all branches of government, from the power-hungry agencies under the executive branch and the corporate puppets within the legislative branch to a judiciary that is, more often that not, elitist and biased towards government entities and corporations. The whole body imaging scanners are a perfect example of this collusion between corporate lobbyists and government officials,” Whitehead said.
"We the people have not done the best job of holding our representatives accountable or standing up for our rights. But something as invasive as these scanners certainly shouldn’t be forced on the American public without the absolute assurance that it will not harm our health or undermine our liberties...” Whitehead said.
As evidenced by my recent story "police state America invades movie theaters," metal detectors and TSA patdowns could soon be the norm in movie theaters and malls across the country. DHS wants TSA like security in EVERY movie theater in America!
What are you going to do? Put security guards with guns everywhere,” Steve Cooper threw out the idea but was not for it. He added, “I don’t want that.”
This is the same TSA that just declared a book might be a BOMB!
"We had a large group with a large number of bags to be checked and because of a certain item in those bags there was additional screening necessary," said Bill Begley with Hobby Airport.
That "certain item" was a sorority convention souvenir booklet!
A spokesman for the airport says the sorority members were apparently given thick booklets at the convention that could be mistaken for explosives when packed into checked bags. The booklets forced TSA officials to hand check most of the luggage.
"Our souvenir booklet, apparently it's too thick and because of all the colored photos in it, it appears to look like some sort of plastic explosive," Tomes said.
This is the ASININE Police State we live in, where a thick book is considered an EXPLOSIVE!
The TSA has expanded its Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) program to perform warrantless searches at various locations, including festivals, sporting events, bus stations and America's highways.
VIPR teams on America's highways:
This is our future unless we take back our country. Do you want you and your family to be subjected to invasive whole body imagers and warrantless searches on highways and in movie theaters etc.? Heaven forbid you have book in your handbag, you terrorist!