"Next step for body scanners could be trains, boats, metro"---

[WinkyDink]

The next step in tightened security could be on U.S. public transportation, trains and boats.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says terrorists will continue to look for U.S. vulnerabilities, making tighter security standards necessary.

“ are going to continue to probe the system and try to find a way through,” Napolitano said in an interview that aired Monday night on "Charlie Rose."

“I think the tighter we get on aviation, we have to also be thinking now about going on to mass transit or to trains or maritime. So, what do we need to be doing to strengthen our protections there?”
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/130549-next-step-for-body-scanners-could-be-trains-boats-and-the-metro-
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

All-righty, then.

[ananda]

1. The Age of Reason is now offically well and truly dead.

nt

[Xipe Totec]

3. Thus will the hysteria of the United States be written nt

[Matariki]

2. And everyone will need a pass to leave their homes...

[Xipe Totec]

4. Bethselamin

Bethselamin is a fabulously beautiful planet which attracts billions of tourists each year. Unsurprisingly, erosion is a primary concern of the local authorities. Their solution is to remove any net imbalance between the amount of matter eaten and the amount subsequently excreted through amputative surgery. Thus it is vitally important to get a receipt after every trip to the lavatory while on the planet.

- The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy

[Swamp Rat]

5. The Final Step: Giant scanners in space.

[TheKentuckian]

6. Haha...just got called out as basically absurd for this exact slippery slope.

I can't believe I helped make this bullshit happened.

I couldn't be more sick.

[WestSeattle2]

7. So basically a jobs program that will annoy the masses and do

little to enhance anyone's security. Well, if they intend on screening passengers boarding every public train, plane or boat, the number of TSA agents that would require would reduce the unemployment rate by at least one percentage point. The law of unintended consequences would inevitably kick in though, and there would be a mass migration back to individual cars to meet our transportation needs.

[TBF]

28. The military industrial complex marches on ... nt

[rug]

8. I can't wait until they try this on the NYC subway.

Hilarity ensues.

[Matariki]

10. A few years ago I wouldn't have believed they'd be poking around in people's underwear.

I would have laughed at the idea. I think the thing is that these measures are introduced in small steps and people just suck it up and take it.

[nadinbrzezinski]

14. And they are actually self defeating

[woo me with science]

35. This is the correct answer,

and the apologists here make my blood burn.

[Chan790]

20. Me either.

They'd better be prepared to pay those TSA agents hazard pay, especially on the (7) after a Mets 2-loss doubleheader...drunk and pissed-off may be no way to go through life but they'll be hell on TSA screeners first.

[KamaAina]

40. Every single station in Manhattan would have a line outside as long as a Broadway theatre

:scared:

[sarcasmo]

9. The #1 reason we must fight them now, if we don't fight now they will be every where.

[IDemo]

11. Skateboards, pogo-sticks, Big wheels, flights of imagination....n/t

[WinkyDink]

17. Walking! Shoes! Remember the "Shoe Bomber"?!

[LisaL]

12. Why would anyone think TSA is going to stop at the airports?

After all, it's transportation security, not just an airport security.

[katnapped]

29. Hey come on now!

According to other posters, you don't have a RIGHT to step outside your house. If you need your anus searched to get out your front door, so be it. :sarcasm:

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. Alas there are ways to do this

that do not need this crap

hell it worked like a charm today Madam Secretary right here in San Diego, as annoying at it was personally. You see somebody did tell a trolley cop about a strange bag...

[Chan790]

30. Yup.

It's true. I live in DC and lived in NYC.

Thousands of reports of suspicious activity in NYC on MTA transit (Subway; Buses; Met-No, PATH and LIRR trains) in 2008. (They put it on posters everywhere.) Every last one investigated. Led to 677 arrests for illegal activity (most being drug-related to my understanding), 0 terrorist attacks, 3 suspected plots disrupted in infancy before they ever even got close to being viable.

In DC, I've been standing on a platform (@ Farragut North) when a suspicious package was discovered. It's amazing beyond belief. Someone hits a station-intercom button and says "There is an abandoned package on the inbound-side platform." Within 2 minutes, the platform is cleared. Within 5 minutes, an army of transit police, bomb-sniffing dogs, bomb techs, investigators, Hazmat is on-scene. Someone pulled a gun and fired on security guards at the Pentagon Metro station last summer during evening rush, despite 2 officer deaths, the entire incident lasted less than 10 seconds with 0 civilian casualties and 8 responding guards. (I've been in that corridor, it's not a checkpoint.) There is no visible security presence...yet in the moment of need, overwhelming firepower deploys instantly.

Vigilance and public engagement combined with well-trained incidence-response personnel work 10x better than any technology TSA has or will ever have. To paraphrase an old Smokey the Bear anti-forest-fire slogan: "Only you can prevent terrorist attacks!"

[Initech]

15. Get fucking rid of the department of Homeland Security!

The word "Homeland" itself has such a nazi-esque vibe to it, doesnt it?

[grasswire]

16. is she emotionally okay? Mentally okay?

Maybe we need someone in charge who is slightly less fearful.

I vote for a mental health check for her.

[WinkyDink]

18. No. She is a paranoid Fascist.

[sally cat]

41. +1

[yodermon]

19. if enough nutjobs get disgruntled enough by these tactics,

they'll just plant a bomb as close to the entry point of these checkpoints as possible
or, just show up & start shooting
This is 100% counterproductive

[high density]

21. Ah, there is the jobs machine: Fascism.

Gotta have teams of blue shirts manning all of those nude-o-scopes.

[TBF]

22. More like the profit machine - $$$$$$$$$ nt

[high density]

27. That too. Rapeiscan and L3 must be joyous. NM

[seabeyond]

23. i dont know why just transit. if i were a terrorist, i could get lots in a multi theater

have 8 bombers go into 8 movies.

strip all movie goers down and grope. not a right to see a movie.

oh, that would be the young kids on a date watching some agent groping your girl

[Vinca]

24. Canada better start building its fence.

[AsahinaKimi]

25. This is some scary stuff..

No one will be safe.

[woo me with science]

26. These people are dangerous.

This is like Pistole's explaining that the reason they are not doing body cavity searches now is that the bombs being used have external triggering devices and can be detected without body cavity searches.

So obviously when they start using a different type of bomb, the cavity searches may become necessary.

They are not going to stop on their own.

[Odin2005]

31. Welcome to the police state. We tried to warn you but you didn't listen.

[sally cat]

34. I don't think we believed it would come from a Democratic administration.

[fatbuckel]

32. Next time VOTE.

[sally cat]

37. But we did. We voted for the people who are doing this.

[lib2DaBone]

33. As long as there is a quick buck to be made....

[eleny]

36. Every train station - every bus stop? Sounds like a Jobs Bill in the making!

[guardian]

38. Next comes

Supermarkets, shopping malls, sporting events, places of work, etc. It never ends. We are on the road to a totalitarian police state ...

all in the name of 'safety' and 'security'.

[glitch]

39. "Cha-ching" - Chertoff nt