Stupid Commenter Beatdown - Reporter and George Orwell Share Laugh at Aggressive Patdown Trauma

"What?  You think I look like a terrorist?"

And we're back with another exciting episode of Stupid Commenter Beatdown for our 23 (soon to be 25?) followers!!  We can feel our influence growing by the minute. Feel the Power of The Persnickety Project!! Or not, really, whatever you feel like doing. 

Anyway, the TSA and their full body scanners have been in the news a lot lately, have you seen this (that’s our Jay Leno impression, you should hear the high pitched nasally voice we’re doing in our head right now). Let’s take a look at an article from NJ.com about "aggresive patdowns" written by someone who is apparently both a Orwellian scholar and a man who laughs at inappropriate times.  It's not about the absolute horror of a barely intelligble image of someone's wang and/or tay-tah's (we’re mature enough to use the proper words instead of “private parts”), but its fun nonetheless.  Read on.

We George Orwell fans are having a wonderful time watching the Transportation Security Administration handle the botched rollout of that plan to install full-body scanners in airports.

Ahh yes, we George Orwell fans are quite amused.  Just imagine the jolly times we’re having as we sip champagne cocktails and argue over which dustjacket for “Animal Farm” we prefer.  In a related note, we Goerge Orwell fans are boring douches.

Central to the program is the argument from the TSA that those scans are "completely optional." I suspect Orwell would not agree.

And on what grounds might you suspect that? Strained analogy that has nothing to do with Orwell, per chance?

If I’m sitting on the beach and can decide whether to go for a swim, that swim is completely optional. If some guy from the government comes along and says if I don’t go swimming, he’ll throw me in, then swimming’s not optional.

Bingo!!

Similarly, if you opt out of the scan you get a "pat-down" of your private parts — whether you like it or not. And that pat-down is not optional as we saw in the case of the now-famous John "Don’t Touch My Junk" Tyner. On Monday, the TSA chief in San Diego held a news conference to say that Tyner faces a possible $11,000 fine for leaving a screening area and going home rather than face a pat-down.

First of all, if being pushed into water is the same as having your dinkus fondled then we need some serious therapy as a result of our childhood pool. Second, “Don’t Touch My Junk” is a spectacular nickname.
So Tyner’s options were few. But he had more options than Deborah Post of Chester Township had when she flew home from South Carolina last week. Post is 60 years old and 5 feet tall. She does not look like a suicide bomber.

And what exactly does a suicide bomber look like? A middle-aged Englishmen? A young Saudi? An American woman from Michigan?

Yet when she was leaving Myrtle Beach last week, Post was picked out of line for one of those aggressive pat-downs that are inspiring horror stories all over America. "They said they were going to search me, and in the beginning, they were polite," Post told me. "They were saying, ‘I’m going to do this. Is that okay?” Post said she refused to either consent or object.

No might not mean yes but silence apparently translates roughly to “Yes, Please.”

"They proceeded to do the pat-down without my consent," Post said. "The first woman patted me down and was going toward my breasts. She said, ‘I’m going to feel your breasts."

It’s $9.95 a word if you want to read the rest of that sentence. And we’ll need your credit card number up front.

Post was wearing a sports bra of the type women commonly wear on the streets of Myrtle Beach.

It’s Geriatric Mardi Gras!!

"I basically lifted my shirt and that set off bells and whistles," she said.

And with that, Ms. Post was declared the winner of both showcases.

"They searched my crotch, and they did it three times," she said.

Sorry, that just sounds funny.

The woman also "demanded that I lift my shirt," Post said.

But didn’t that already win you the showcase showdown? Greedy bitch.

If Orwell happened to be looking down from heaven, he had to have a laugh at that one.

Ohh Ohh, that’s one of our favorites. Like heaven is one big glass-bottomed boat. And even if it was, your telling me Goerge Orwell wouldn’t have better shit to do that peep in on airport security screenings? Also, he’d probably be pretty annoyed at the hack move of dragging out the 1984 every single friggin time the government does anything intrusive.  Usually by people like us who have never even read the damn thing.  After all, the book was written in 1949 and shit, the year 1984 itself was 26 years ago. Can we please get a new representation of government oversight.

First, the government spends a billion dollars to set up a system to look under citizens’ clothes. But when a citizen offers a peek, she’s threatened with arrest. Then, they ask to look under the shirt. That’s funny. But Post wasn’t laughing.

Probably because it wasn’t funny at all to her. Not even remotely. Just a guess though.

"It was awful," she said.

after having endure the reporter doubled-over as she recounted her experience.

But was it optional? If you’ve read other [hilariously funny] horror stories like this, you probably assume Post had opted out of going through the scanner. Nope. Myrtle Beach airport doesn’t have a scanner. So what were her options? "If passengers refuse to complete the screening process once they’ve started it, they could be subject to a monetary fine," TSA spokeswoman Ann Davis told me in an e-mail in which we had discussed the Tyner case.

Ok, that’s a fair point.

When I later asked Davis about the Post case, she contradicted Post’s assertion that she had not consented, stating, "Ms. Post stated repeatedly that she did not object to the screening."

Davis also stated that Post was ”asking for it” dressed in that sports bra.

I asked Davis repeatedly whether Post would have faced a fine if she had tried to opt out of the screening once it had reached that point. Davis declined to answer. So perhaps Post could have left at that point without facing a fine. But why did we get to that point? Who came up with a plan that involved having government agents grope citizens’ breasts and genitals under threat of massive fines?

Ummmmmm…….Obama!?! The Tea Party!?! Who else can we blame? Maybe it was the gays! Haven’t blamed them in awhile. First they want equal rights, now they want us groping each other. It’s just unnatural.

At some point, answering that question will no longer be optional for the TSA. In the meantime, we can ponder this Orwell quote: "Power is not a means; it is an end. The object of power is power."

Quotes are so deep.  Did we mention that in addition to being boring douches, we George Orwell fans are also utterly pretentious?

Croctch searches, breasts, aggressive patdowns, with topics like this what wonder can the commenters have in store for us?

nevel175
I read the correction that all hand searches are preformed by members of the same sex. I think it would be more fun if that were optional. Trust me I would much rather have my genitals grouped by a woman. Let's see how comfortable she feels.

Yes opting out of a full body scan so you can force a poor female TSA agent to “group” your genitals (does that mean she'll put them in order, like dong, ball, balls, or maybe ball, dong, ball?  Imagine the possibilities, they're utterly limited), is the absolute height of fun. And we’re guessing that checking 400 pound men with undercarriages that smell like stale parmesean cheese and who pant during the pat down isn't enjoyable for a woman.  But as long as it’s fun for you, man.

Let’s just hope this guy is alone in his idiocy.

njtaxpayr688
nevel175: That's a good point! I wouldn't refuse if a nice looking FEMALE TSA worker was fondling my crotch!


Should have known better. This is like a bad bit from the “Man Show” or something. Can we get this straight, they’re looking for bombs and shit, not giving out free hand jobs. If you're that desperate, we’re pretty sure you can get a “massage” for less than the cost of a plane ticket.

ken101
We would all be a lot safer if the police could just go house to house looking for contraband and weapons without having to deal with the silliness of probable cause and search warrants. Imagine all the crime that could be prevented! And why do the police need reasonable suspicion before they ask for your consent to perform a consent search of your car during a motor vehicle stop? With all the contraband transported on our highways, the police should be able to set up check points where they will search every car. It would all be for the public safety. Oh wait, nevermind. I forgot about the Constitution: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

We’re as confused about thiscomment as Ken is about the principles or sarcasm.

FairfieldFox
Judge Andrew Napolitano calls the whole procedure a form of slavery. He's right. The money interests of former TSA Chief Michael Chertoff in the scan machines also needs scrutiny. Who owns th company he works for and why are taxpayers paying for a quarter of a TRILLION dollars to buy machinery that enslaves us? Janet napolitano has to go and so do the Chertoff Scanners.

I saw someone on TV say something so it must be true. The microphone in front of them proves that they’re an expert. Bob Barker says that having your pet spayed or neutered helps control the pet population.  He is also right. Works ever time.

fluffyvv
It's a good thing Tyler Celementi didn't have to go through a screening like this. Hw would have jimped off the GWB for sure. At least this intrusion upon people's privacy and their privates, proves that Tyler's jump had nothing to do with an invasion of privacy. Here we have millions get video and groped, much worse that what allegedlly happened to him and there is no rush to the GWB. Imagine the traffic if there was.

We'll just leave this one alone, Fluffy has done an excellent job of being an ass all by himself.  

james82
After 9-11, the sheeple demand the government do something. Now, the sheeple don't like this something, until the next "martyr" takes down a plane of innocent people. The wannabe martyrs are learning to put c-4 in their rectums, so, there really is no alternative than to profile Muslim men between the ages of 16-46, or Muslim wannabes who have visited that tourist hotspot, Pakistan. I laugh when I read in news, that there are Germans training for terrorist operations in Pakistan. You mean Muslims who immigrated to Germany, and resent the West.

Sheeple – nice, we see what you are doing there. It’s like people are sheep, right? We both grow wool, “bah” all the time and you can count us to help you fall asleep. Very clever. We do think that “wannabee muslims” should totally be profiled.  Stupid  rich kids living in Brooklyn pretending to be muslim, wearing really tight robes with supposed-to-be-ironic Yinka Dare jerseys.