Originally Posted by
BearX220
TSORon, TSA began life with enormous goodwill and support from the traveling public. Way back when, most of us thought it was a fine idea to upgrade the professionalism level we saw from random rent-a-cops at checkpoints -- especially post-9/11. You didn't start out hated; you made yourself hated -- by refusing to explain yourself; by tolerating an out-of-control workforce; by dodging all accountability; by perpetrating terrible abuses on innocent citizens; and by denying they occur.
You obviously missed a few things.
1 I didn’t write the anon post, I just happen to be willing to consider its validity. I know it counters the prevailing lack of wisdom here, which is why I posted it as “A different perspective” rather than an attempt to state it as fact as is oh so very common here.
2 You write quite a bit of rhetoric, but little that has any actual support to it. Just because you refuse to see the accountability does not mean that it is not there. What you believe are abuses are no more or less than what we as citizens have asked the government to provide for us. And of course the government rarely explains what it does in detail, and for well known and sometimes very good reasons. Someone out there in the government knows what is done and why and they consider it valid. You don’t, oh well.
Originally Posted by
BearX220
TSA basically made the bed it lies in today. It's virtually the only arm of government that doesn't set out to curry public support; even the IRS tries to explain itself, and relate to taxpayers. Instead TSA treats every criticism as an act of treason, and threatens or smears its critics.
Why do you feel that government must “curry public support”? Government is here to serve a purpose, not to make 100% of its citizens happy or lick their shoes. One of the main reasons government exists is to provide for the public defense, and TSA is nothing more than one way of doing that. Or are you of the opinion that the US Coast Guard is the only defensive force that the United States needs?
Originally Posted by
BearX220
Your post is a fine example of this -- you suggest that any TSA opponent is a traitor. TSA is a totalitarian agency operating in a democratic society. (It's depressing to see the substantial American appetite for totalitarianism revealed in peoples' slavish expressions of support for extreme TSA actions.)
I didn’t suggest anything, I asked a question about someone else’s words. If you are interested I can provide a link to where I found them, and no I don’t post as “Anonymous”, I don’t feel a need to hide my opinions as many of those who post at the TSA blog do. Please, try and get it right.
Originally Posted by
BearX220
The mismatch cannot persist. Either TSA eventually succumbs to the customary rules of American democracy, or the US slides toward totalitarianism. The comparisons some here make to East Germany's Stasi are a little hyperbolic, but in point of fact TSA demands just such an operating brief for itself: the power to set up shop anywhere, make citizens do anything, and arrest all critics. No enemy real or imagined justifies this.
Hyperbole is the mainstay of many of the posters here. Yourself included it seems. TSO’s have no arrest powers other than that of every citizen. We are not law enforcement officers, please stop indicating that we are.
Originally Posted by
BearX220
[It's incredibly difficult for TSA to claim it's "defending the homeland" when its very operating principles strike at the heart of American values.
“Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” The TSA does its very best to make those “American values” available to every person who feels the need to board a commercial aircraft. Your opinion about its “operating principals” is just that, opinion. And ignorance is really a poor excuse for it.
Originally Posted by
BearX220
Happy Thanksgiving, TSORon. Remember, the pilgrims were fleeing royalist tyranny. I think they'd be heartbroken at how much political tyranny now stains the new world they risked everything to reach.
And a happy Turkey Day to you as well. I sincerely hope that one day you will understand that freedom is not free, that there were many more reasons for the pilgrims to sail to the new world than you imagine, and that you eventually realize that the hyperbole serves no
useful purpose other than to highlight how few actual facts support your belief’s.