C'mon Mr Bog, this is a pretty effective way to stop them sending explosive toner cartridges in baggage, erm, it isn't.

It'd be really nice to get a couple of professionals in the WH - especially if Mr Obama wants to get re-elected.

how long do you have to stay in the scanner (or backscatter, I guess it's called)?

Did John really get his ticket refunded? Seems like a win win option for a cancelled vacation. Shouldn't be too difficult to be selected by the TSA if making a snide remark about shoe removal from the start. Did the San Diego TSA do MORE enhanced screening during this tirade, or did the employees focus on the decoy?

I can't imagine much shows up on this particlar scan.

These searches are an invasion of privacy and should never be permitted, unless of course those being searched plan to get on a plane with me.

Hmm... blasted with ionizing radiation, or felt up by the TSA monkey. What a great choice.

If this isn't Security Theatre, I don't know what is. Anyone who actually does any form of security work (physical security, IT security, whatever) knows that the next big threat doesn't come from places you're already looking at, but from places that you haven't thought about yet.

We're getting a bunch of reactive hysteria here, rather than real security. Instead of making things better, they're just treating the average traveller like criminals and invading privacy.

We should hire El Al's Security team and start doing rational profiling...

Choice #3: Don't fly.

Some radiology group said you would have to go through it at least 1000 times in a year to get the radiation of a single chest xray. And since I really never fly (only flown 2 times in my 42 years), I guess its no big deal.

Besides, none of this stuff is going to keep someone who really wants to blow up a plan from doing it.

I guess the TSA monkeys need to justify their existence.... I would file a sexual assualt charge if they did that to me or the Mrs....

Why bother with security - take Amtrak!

There are no additional fees to pay, can carry all the baggage you want, AND you only pay 50% of the actual cost to transport you - the taxpayers pay the rest! Plus there is still hot meal service aboard the train.

(Of course, Amtrak doesn't go a lot of places; you might take days getting somewhere that a plane can get you to in hours, and you'll pay through the roof for mediocre food, unless you get a sleeping car in which you'll pay through the roof for a cramped bedroom.)

Scientists Warn Naked Body Scanners May Cause Cancer
November 14, 2010 |

WASHINGTON — US scientists warned Friday that the full-body, graphic-image X-ray scanners that are being used to screen passengers and airline crews at airports around the country may be unsafe.
http://www.alternet.org/rights/148849/scientists_warn_naked_body_scanners_may_cause_cancer

On Kink this morning, Shiela Hamilton spoke about her experience - because the scanner picked up what was nothing more than buttons, she not only got the full body scan, but the full body grope as well.

I agree with others - let's get some rational profiling - heck, let's get a computer system that can actually track young men from middle eastern countries that don't return home when their visas expire. Seems like lotso money, little security.

BTW - my 83 year old mother gets the wand scan each time she flies, since she has had her knee replaced. I also saw them practically tear the wheel chair apart - which was provided by PDX airport!

You know everyone is looking at the TSA grope fest the wrong way. Just think of all the lonely thirty somethings whom haven't had anyone grope them in years. :)

If you are unhappy with TSA's new security methods just imagine what the Moslems are thinking.

I would pay to see the look on Abdullah's face when some butch-cut TSA worker puts the grab on one of his wives.

Rational profiling will intensify PC screams of racial profiling, which will intensify the need for machines that scan everyone, which will cause little old ladies and pretty girls to get searched too, which will result in us wanting security to do only rational profiling.

The new "naked scanners" at the airport can't spot stuff inside body cavities, meaning that any terrorist with an explosive buttplug can wander right through, his unusual gait notwidthstanding.

Suggested response:
1. Opt out of the scanner machine.
2. Make passionate sounds while being patted down.
Don't complain or resist. The official response of the TSA to that kind of thing is summary punishment. But it does give the TSA employees (other than the one doing the naked pictures) some relief from mind-numbing boredom.

I'm not that desperate Lc Scott.

Last time I got frisked/searched at PDX was a few years ago when I had a one way ticket.

Just one more reason NOT TO FLY unless you have to. I'm already at the point where if I can drive somewhere in about 4 to 5 hours I will do it rather than put up with the TSA nonsense at the airport.
And for whatever it's worth, if you have access to a private airplane; you don't have to deal with TSA at all. You simply drive to the airport, enter the security gate, park your car in the hangar, push the airplane out, make your pre-flight inspection and announce your flight plans, and take off as soon as you're cleared. From entry gate to being in the air - 15-20 minutes...

From link above provided by Mojo:
The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) began rolling out full-body scanners at US airports in 2007, but stepped up deployment of the devices this year when stimulus funding made it possible to buy another 450 of the advanced imaging technology scanners.

So stimulus funding made this possible!

Radiation/body scans - where is the science on this, safety and proof? Seems like once again a decision made based on politics and money to made. Corporations win again and in this case we do not really know at what expense to public health. Who has investment in the machines?

Freedom and Liberty - gone! Seems like another way to get people used to strange compliances. What will they manufacture next? Special thought booths to have to sit in before boarding? This is getting too Orwellian for my tastes. If this country is so concerned about safety, why several years ago was the idea brought up to have our ports under Dubai? Under whose watch are the ports today?

Choice – limited. Elite and some others will be able to travel on private planes, while most would be traveling on planes that require more than many are willing to be subjected to. Thankfully, am not alone in resistance.

Finally - a flashing warning light to the rest of the world announcing they are indeed witnessing a darkening of a country that was once called a beacon of light. Who will enter this country willingly?
Tourism is one industry we did have left. There are places for others in the world to enjoy and people will not want to be subjected to this in order to visit our country. This will further separate us from the rest of the world in many ways.

"We're getting a bunch of reactive hysteria here."

Yeah, and here's the Big Joke on U -- psst!, Nine-Eleven Op was an inside job. There were no Arab hijackers. There's never been ONE shred of evidence there were ... such as, like, maybe showing up as passengers named in the airlines reservation system? nope, none were. (Oh, yeah, supposedly some guy or gal showed up at FBI or somewhere with a picture-perfect passport supposedly found on the sidewalk, or something. But the other '18 identities'? Nothing. Nothing shown us. Zip. Zero. Nada ... EVER. ... think about it)

Oh, by the way, all '19 hijacker names' are former CIA/USmilitary recruits (for Afghan to fight out the Soviets), paid to 'volunteer' to go to Kosovo and fight the Serbians -- that's simply a fact; and, btw, 'al Q eida' is shorthand for the Arabic word ('Q eidat ilmu'ti'aat') that means 'the database' like in the computer -- that's simply a fact.

Even FOX News has started broadcasting that a new more-open second investigation is a reasonable demand and worth doing. (That's the first time I ever used 'FOX' and 'reasonable' in the same sentence.) Geraldo 'At-Large' Rivera this weekend (11/13) said, 'I used to believe exactly what the Bush Gov't told us. Now, I'm more open-minded about 9/11 news, things I've heard don't add up right, and I'd like to hear more details and explanation.' YouTube video here: www.YouTube.COM/watch?v=pFPobKeSzKQ&feature=player_embedded

But wouldn't it be just the biggest joke ever pulled on you ... and about a hundred million gullible 'serious adults'? Think about it: Imagine the whole entire N.E.O. was all a big hoax by the Bushgoons ... and all we got was 'I Hate Israel's Enemies' T-shirts, JTTF in PDX watching City politicos, extraordinary renditions, false arrests, torture murders and our troops overseas sport-killing and then butchering off souvenir body parts, oh, and 'airport security' on all of us ... guarding against a non-existent BOOghost. Ha, that's a knee-slapper! woo-weeee, gotta be sure and tell everyone at the office about this one.

And EVERY SINGLE time you have heard some political/military 'authority' (or cop) shake the Nine-Eleven Op THREAT at you -- in your face, for nine long years now, it was all fake, like the Tooth Fairy Easter Bunny, and everyone was in on the gag except you.

- -

About air passenger/baggage screening, what's wrong with this idea: Two-tier service.

For a Tier 1 price, you get to fly just the way it is now -- screened, scanned, patted, interrogated, cramped in the seat twisting around constantly suspicious of everyone, a nervous wreck and worrying yourself to death. ... but no bombs on board, all luggage peeked at and fondled, plainclothes armed Air Marshals on board, safe as can be.

For a slightly lower Tier 2 price, (because of higher demand?), you get to fly 'the old way' -- carry-on goes on the conveyor belt x-ray, you're not scanned, not patted, not inspected, zip right thru to the boarding gate, no 'security' lines, still cramped in the seat yet all the while knowing nobody else on the plane was 'inspected' either, but it's worth the miniscule risk to be rid of the hassle and harassment and identity surveillance 'every step you take, every move you make, every smile you fake, every claim you stake' Big Brother's watching you.

Oh, and don't forget ...
The anthrax mail murders but that turned out to be some Bush Gov't inside job or something by some 'lone nutjob' super-intelligent bio-germ warfare science expert.

WMDs, anyone? ... anyone? ... anyone? ...

Did you hear that 'mystery missile' a week ago off the coast west of L.A. turned out to be a Chinese submarine-launched ICBM, which landed back inside China, 'to send a message' in retaliation for the USNavy fleet doing maneuvers and 'exercises' close off of China's coast lately. 'Showing off' China has new electric-motor submarines so quiet that our underwater microphones don't hear them. Oh, yeah, the Pentagon said "no, don't believe your eyes, it was an optical illusion of an ordinary commercial jet taking off" (although LAX tower said none did).
Oh, that good ol' Gov't -- what a fun bunch of jokers! They must think American voters are stupid gullible idiots who'll believe anything. Hey, wait a second ....

Those Chinese subs, if what you say is correct, are probably driven by screws milled by Toshiba machines, designed in the US for US Navy subs.

First, the US had them, then the Russians now the Chinese, probably an improved version.

I didn't see that version of the missile story. Links, please?

Tenskwatawa, calm down.

Lawrence, the fun-to-imagine story that China sent a sub to the coast of California and launched an ICBM back to China as a display of strength before the G20 came from CNN iReport. As you may know, iReport is reader-reported/created news.

Thanks, PJB. That's why I asked for a link. Funny how the "truth" waters down when you do!

This makes me wonder if TSA is going to be in charge of the New Mexico spaceport set up by Richard Branson. I somehow picture TSA agents at the spaceport wearing Dalek shells, screaming "You will squeal like a pig! Squeal! SQUEAL!"

From link above provided by Mojo:
. .Some 315 "naked" scanners are currently in use at 65 US airports, according to the TSA.

Question: Are the scanners now in the Portland airport?

I for one am not flying any more.

Once, at the tender age of 24, and four months pregnant, I was in Karachi, not a nice city then, not a nice city now, at the airport.

The plane was held on the tarmac, and the passengers and all luggage taken off, because the dogs had smelled drugs.

Everyone got patted down. The women got special treatment. Tarped-up ladies in hijabs came to pat the women down in private curtained individual stalls. During the patdown, my nice lady thought it appropriate to molest me while smiling at me lewdly.

Even today, more than twenty years later, the memory makes me feel like choking.

This is how the Islamists will win, by slowly sealing off our sanity. If we keep having people like Obama and Napolitano running things. Obama, who will not even name the problem, but will take to the airwaves of the world, and wish Muslims a happy Eid, as the blood of DIY ritual slaughtering runs in the streets. Something about the patriarch Abraham.
Obama, the American president who says he will fight to preserve the right of "women and girls" to wear the hijab.
Does that count the six-year-old Somali girl I saw at the train station in Seattle recently, all draped up?

Happy Eid, everyone!

Let's not forget the so-called underpants bomber, who created the justification for all of these porno scanners, did not have a passport.

You try boarding an international flight without a passport. How did he get on the plane? Well a well-dressed man talked to security and got him on by bypassing all security. This was witnessed by two passengers (lawyers at that) while they were waiting to board the plane in Amsterdam.

And guess what else, Michael Chertoff stands to gain big bucks off these machines because he just happens to be on the board of directors of the company that sells them.

Who do we really need protection from?

Links? you ask; links you shall have. However, approximately no one goes and reads links for fear of finding new info contradicting one's preset and hardened preconceptions. And besides, there is some amount of difficulty in getting to these particular links -- namely, an amount of thirty bucks a year (cheap!) subscription fee for this guy's news reports; (a whole year for half the cost of a month of cable TV 'news reports' ... containing NO news and LIARs propaganda).

Since approximately no one here has that amount of money (for a cable TV subscription) to get news and info analysis and veracity, let me bring such content here, moderately edited for shorter length - it's just so arduous to have to read and concentrate at the same time for longer than 25 words.

My primary source explaining the 'mystery missile' is Wayne Madsen Report .COM (a.k.a. 'WMR'). The front page there is free to see and find eye-opening info astonishments; in particular see Madsen's biography / resume (a.k.a. 'curriculum vitae). He was in the Navy stationed on the Oregon coast, at Coos Head (lighthouse?), circa 1981, where and when he discovered his 'base commander' involved in trafficking child porn and doing pedophile crimes. The astonished Madsen reported the officer to authorities, but it all got covered up and suppressed within the Navy, (Madsen wrote to Oregon newspapers, too, and all of that got squashed and buried, not published ... sound familiar? have you heard of 'other' pedophile criminality in Oregon around 1981? maybe you also heard of it back then in Washington D.C., and 12- and 14-yr-old 'pretty boys' getting midnight 'tours' in the reagan/BUSH White House ... no? it was in the Washington D.C. newspapers -- links supplied on request); and Madsen got transferred away from his Coos Head station and stamped 'troublemaker' on his Navy file. His honesty and integrity might have counted for something, though, to somebody, because after that he was hired by the National Security Agency (NSA) for several years as a communications (radio signals) intercepts intelligence analyst, (please recognize that 'Joe the plumber' jokers do NOT walk in off the street and get hired at the NSA ! ! !).

WMR has three reports during the eight days since the 'mystery missile' was video-recorded by a CBS news helicopter doing traffic reports -- not 'accidentally' recorded along the margin of the screen focussed on some other event, but expertly recorded center-frame as the helicopter flew at it with the pilot and cameraman exclaiming 'holy cow jeebers look at THAT, WTF is it? going on there?', which is quite unusual for a frequent-flyer helicopter pilot to say about a commercial jet taking off from LAX.

WMR's first report states it was a missile, (What), ICBM-performance characteristics and signature identifying the source, (Who's), and current geo-political power intrigues it is indicative of, (Why) -- means, opportunity, motive.

WMR's second report offered an eye-witness account of the time a similar event happened before -- a Russian sub popped up among fishing boats and surprised everyone, (mostly the Navy unaware it was there), 30 miles off the Oregon coast in 1981. Remember that? It was reported in all the Oregon newspapers: 'Russian 'war'sub off the coast.'

WMR's third report compiles analysis of other former and current professionals (Madsen contacted during the week) whose expertise is military intelligence of submarine-launched ICBMs. (It happens that whistleblowers and 'leakers' in NSA and CIA and [|||||||||||||] Department of the intelligence community do their 'leaking' only to Madsen.)

Bottom line: It was a sub-launched missile, 100% confidence. 99% confidence it was Chinese. 24 hours of USGovt failure to identify and confirm the event to massmedia reporters signals it was some of that there WMD-like 'bad intelligence' (in this case, clueless 'intelligence') going on, and Pentagoners be LIARS saying "it's a commercial jet undergoing an optical illusion by you TV viewers and experienced helicopter pilots in the LA area." As for Why? the Pentagoners might issue LIARS reports, there are dossiers to consider on deep background, international subtexts and backstory, but for whatever reason(s) they make false statements, yet bald-faced lying is an established pattern in Pentagoner behavior ... and so they get the Big Bucks.

" ... admitting that the Department of Defense is “bloated” and that the defense budget needs to be “looked at honestly,” ... proud progressives like Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Jeff Merkely (D-OR)." ~ ThinkProgress.ORG, Nov. 15

Let me put excerpts from WMR's items in a separate Comment, downthread. Meanwhile, Copy 'n' Paste and check out the homepage: www.WayneMadsenReport.COM

WMR includes reference to the news analysis at Wired .COM in Noah Shachtman's blog Danger Room (here), where Noah also links to the "CNN iReport" cited by PJB in a Comment, upthread. Further conjectures and opinions are scattershot like wild guesses in Comments both at Danger Room and CNN iReport.
-

On topic about airport 'security' scanner revolting and defenestrations, since 90% of the knowledge of 90% of Americans is injected in minds while, and by, watching TV news of and opinions of airline passengers, (or of the 'mystery missile' or WMDs or nine-eleven or balancing the federal budget ... or Pam Anderson), let's take a peek. And see what's being broadcast in the rightwing hatetalk TV news and opinions, the 'booster shot serum' inoculation for TV-minders, to be immunized against catching any cold truth and hard facts.

Here are two items from the Media Matters .ORG blog dated today, Nov. 16; (not linked; go to MediaMatters.org your own way, and click to the blog, and you'll find these in the scrolldown or the archives). I just think these two coincidental items in one day work together supporting the point I'm making: Airport FEARmaking is 9-year continuation of Nine-Eleven Op FEARmaking.

1.)
"Naked" stupidity: Conservative media strain to blame Soros for full-body scans, November 16, 2010 11:20 am ET, by Todd Gregory

... the conservative media's all-out campaign to vilify George Soros:

Glenn Beck couldn't resist this. Today on his radio show, Beck warned his listeners that "there's something wrong with the scanner story." He went on: "First of all, George Soros has 11,000 shares in the scanner company. What a surprise. But there's something deeply wrong with the scanner story and what's happening at our airports. You're being set up."

2.)
Depends on what Doocy means by “great”, November 16, 2010 8:52 am ET, by Eric Boehlert

Returning to the glory days of 9/11 during a Fox & Friends interview with George Bush, here's Steve Doocy [emphasis added]:

And the great thing about your book, sir, is that it takes us back to that scary paranoid time when you don't know when the other shoe is going to drop.

-

SO what's new at the airport is Soros Robots 4 Nudity -- kinda like where the Hare Krishnas used to be, but without the tambourines. On your way to the boarding gate be sure to pick up the newly booked Bush, (he was?), to absorb during your flight and maintain the American GREATness: FLY with FEAR.

Three WMR items:

1.) November 10, 2010 -- Pentagon and its embedded media covering up Chinese show of force off LA

China flexed its military muscle Monday evening in the skies west of Los Angeles when a Chinese Navy Jin class ballistic missile nuclear submarine, deployed secretly from its underground home base on the south coast of Hainan island, launched an intercontinental ballistic missile from international waters off the southern California coast. WMR's intelligence sources in Asia, including Japan, say the belief by the military commands in Asia and the intelligence services is that the Chinese decided to demonstrate to the United States its capabilities on the eve of the G-20 Summit in Seoul and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Tokyo, where President Obama is scheduled to attend during his ten-day trip to Asia.

The reported Chinese missile test off Los Angeles came as a double blow to Obama. The day after the missile firing, China's leading credit rating agency, Dagong Global Credit Rating, downgraded sovereign debt rating of the United States to A-plus from AA. The missile demonstration coupled with the downgrading of the United States financial grade represents a military and financial show of force by Beijing to Washington.

The Pentagon spin machine, backed by the media reporters who regularly cover the Defense Department, as well as officials of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), and the U.S. Northern Command, is now spinning various conspiracy theories, including describing the missile plume videotaped by KCBS news helicopter cameraman Gil Leyvas at around 5:00 pm Pacific Standard Time, during the height of evening rush hour, as the condensation trail from a jet aircraft. Other Pentagon-inspired cover stories are that the missile was actually an amateur rocket or an optical illusion.
[...]
Missile experts, including those from Jane's in London, say the plume was definitely from a missile, possibly launched from a submarine. WMR has learned that the missile was likely a JL-2 ICBM, which has a range of 7,000 miles, and was fired in a northwesterly direction over the Pacific and away from U.S. territory from a Jin class submarine. The Jin class can carry up to twelve such missiles.

Navy sources have revealed that the missile may have impacted on Chinese territory and that the National Security Agency (NSA) likely posseses intercepts of Chinese telemtry signals during the missile firing and subsequent testing operations.
[...]
According to Japanese intelligence sources, Beijing has been angry over United States and allied naval exercises in the South China and Yellow Seas, in what China considers its sphere of influence, and the missile firing within the view of people in Southern California was a demonstration that China's navy can also play in waters off the American coast.

2.)
November 11, 2010 -- Sneaking subs into waters off the west coast -- it's happened before

The firing of a submarine-launched ballistic missile by a Chinese Jin-class submarine off the coast of southern California lat Monday at the height of evening rush hour in Los Angeles was not the first time the U.S. Navy's anti-submarine warfare sensors in the Pacific have failed.

In 1981, a Victor-III Soviet nuclear attack submarine, armed with torpedos and anti-ship missiles, popped up previously undetected some 30 miles off the Oregon coast. The submarine had undergone significant noise-reduction modifications, with its turbine and propeller cavitation being quieted to avoid detection by U.S. Navy acoustic sensors in the Pacific. The Navy, embarrassed, covered up the incident.

In 1981, a Soviet Victor-class nuclear submarine successfully evaded the Navy's Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS) network of underwater hydrophones, ...

While serving as the Operations Officer at the Navy's SOSUS station at Coos Head, Oregon, this editor received a phone call from the Coast Guard station in Brookings, Oregon reporting that some local fishermen sighted a Soviet submarine alongside a fishing trawler flying the Soviet flag some 30 miles off Brookings.

The incident resulted in the sending of a "Bravo" visual sighting on a Navy-Wide Formatted Message Reporting System (RAINFORM) message to the Commander Oceanographic System Pacific (COMOCEANSYSPAC) in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Since the clear majority of Soviet submarine contact reports were SOSUS RED messages, (meaning the submarine had been detected by the SOSUS acoustic arrays), the sending of a BRAVO visual sighting message to the Navy's top commands in Pearl Harbor created a political storm.

The Navy's higher-ups immediately began to question the veracity of the Oregon fishermen and the Coast Guard in an effort to limit the damage. The reaction by the Navy was similar to the cover story now being issued by the Pentagon that the missile plume witnessed some 35 miles off the California coast was actually from a US Airways flight from Honolulu to Phoenix, a model rocket, or an optical illusion.

The Navy, clearly embarrassed over the undetected presence of a Chinese Jin-class SSBN submarine off the coast of Los Angeles, is, some 40 years after the Victor-III incident, continuing its age-old tradition of covering up when it screws up. ... The Pentagon, shown to have wasted billions of dollars on a useless ballistic missile defense system, is working overtime with the media and on the Internet to cover up the latest debacle. However, even some reporters who cover the Pentagon full-time are beginning to question the Pentagon's version of events ....

3.)
November 15, 2010 -- Anti-submarine warfare veterans: shot off LA was a sub-launched missile

Retired veterans of the U.S. Navy's anti-submarine warfare and Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS) community have confirmed to WMR that what was seen launched some 35 miles off the coast of Los Angeles in the early evening of November 8 was, in fact, a submarine-launched intercontinental ballistic missile and that it was likely launched from a Chinese ballistic missile nuclear submarine.
[...]
WMR has also been informed that China, like the former Soviet Union, may soon have one cruise missile armed diesel-electric submarine, likely a Yuan-class, with an air-independent propulsion system, on permanent patrol in an area south of southern California. The Yuan-class is believed to be armed with the SS-NX-13 anti-ship cruise missile. A Yuan on permanent patrol off southern California would target the U.S. Navy's fleet operating out of San Diego.

Tenskwatawa, I do not appreciate your comments about my attention span nor anything about my willingness to suspend disbelief and read what the links contain, or what I will do with that information.

You do deserve a thank you for writing so extensively from that source. Therefore, than you.

Sorry. No disparagement intended. (Indeed, more a self-admission.)

As opposed to the following.

The importance(?) of this:

Leaked online: The body scanner images we were promised would never be saved or published, By Daniel Bates, (UK) Mail Online, 17th November 2010

is proofed bold by LIARS Larson remonstrating all hours of his radio programming today lying that it would not, could not, and gosh darn it should not ever ever EVER happen. LIAR LIARS. Hair on fire. Cooked.