Yes, from a legal perspective, we all understand that. However many, including me, believe that there was a practical perspective as well, which is that the court wanted to write its decision so that it would make the Constitutional argument above while still not letting the child pornographer go free. The court is obviously not going to say any such thing, but I strongly believe that's what happened in this case. (What the court basically said is that enough was found during the admissible part of TSA's search to provide probable cause for the subsequent LEO search.)

the court really didn't have an option here. Public outrage in letting a child pornographer go free would have been monumental.

The man has now been stopped and the children (hopefully) protected from further harm.

Regardless of how you think this decision has affected your rights, the broader picture - the rights of the children involved in this case - had to be protected.

It was the right decision.

So any measure the court supported to "protect" children would be acceptable to you? If the court had decided that police have the right to stop any person at any time and search any digital media that person has to see if it has any child pornography, that would have been acceptable? I don't at all agree that the "rights of the children" were the "broader picture": I argue just the opposite, that it was the very narrow picture here.

The "broader picture" is the Constitution.

Only in the minds of those who don't understand the Constitution.

What do you mean by inappropriate?
- Unconstitutional
- Illegal
- Immoral
- In violation of procedure.
- Something else?

I cannot think of any inappropriate activity on the TSO's part would be acceptable if it's not too inappropriate. Anything I can think of seems self-contradictory: "not too illegal", "not violating procedure too much", "not too unconstitutional," they all cross the line. I assume you are not talking about lines (e.g. immoral) that are irrelevant to the discussion, so please help me out here.

(I have not read the entire thread, so I apologize if you explained this elsewhere.)

In fact quite the opposite. ;)

No, it was the wrong decision - and your way is thankfully not the way we do things here in America. We don't set aside the Constitution and the Bill of Rights in order to feed the 'broader picture'.

We follow the Constitution - and if someone goes free because of it, that is the way it is.

I love it when foreign folks tell us how our Constitution and laws should be applied. This is not a socialist society where people's individual rights are submissive to the 'common good' - here, individual rights trump the common good, and that's exactly how we like it.

The police have the ability to find this person and bring them to justice properly, legally, and correctly without needing an illegal search or creating an environment where illegal searches are fine.

Courts let all kinds of monsters and perverts loose to protect the Bill of Rights. I see nothing in this case that is any better or worse than all those cases. If this were indeed "the right decision", then there have been "wrong decisions" by the thousands.

Well, I use CASH for everything, including both my vehicles, one of which cost over 80 000 USD. Also, I don't appear to be alone in this habit, as the dealer's office had a a note counting machine for handling large sums of CASH, and it wasn't exactly sitting in a corner, covered in dust. Just I have a preference for that mode of payment doesn't mean it makes me a free target for the TSA or a LEO when transiting an airport., although they have several times tried to hassle me or ask about the amount when I was carrying 5 - 15K.

But that's not what happened here. The testimony of the clerk (page 7 of the ruling) says that she was no longer concerned about explosives (meaning the authorized administrative search was over) but went back to read the letters to "make sure" the photos were what she thought they were, e.g. representative of children who may be in a "bad situation" or similar.

That's not to say that she might not have called a LEO anyway, based on what she had already seen within the (now allowed) scope of the administrative search, but as I see it, the court set boundaries of what was allowed, and then permitted the search, even though it clearly exceeded those bounds. Ergo, a flawed ruling.

I have to admit I was reluctant to wade into this discussion. It's just too hot an issue for some people, and oftentimes it seems like if you're not a "suspected pedophiles must be shot on sight" type then you might as well be a pedophile yourself. There's not a lot of middle ground, even where critical Constitutional liberties are at stake.

Some people think it's ok that sufficiently "bad" people shouldn't have any rights. Free societies don't work that way - you have to take the good with the bad, and everyone deserves the same protections. Otherwise, what are we protecting? I sure as h*ll know my dearly departed grandfathers didn't fight in WWII to protect some people's interpretation of America.

I don't disagree with you generally. I think we are saying the same thing, albeit in different ways.

Everything the screener found while within the SOP is admissible. Everything thereafter is not, which is ok because what they defined as within the SOP is enough to get this guy.

So, you're in favor of protecting the children by any means, from a pedophile photographing and perhaps molesting them. But you don't see any problem with letting those same kids be felt, with front of hands and back of hands over their chests, over the their buttocks, down the length of the pubic bone, and up to and including the scrotum (boys) or labia (girls) by a strange man or woman at the airport? Is their some magic pixie dust wafting out from their blue shirts that prevents those kids from being traumatized or affected badly by being invaded like this by a stranger in a public setting?

If anything, it is far worse to have government clerks do this. At least in the case of pedophilia, both pedophiles and society in general know what the pedophiles are doing is wrong and harmful to the kids. But in the case of the clerks and those that support their activities, there is instead a wilful denying of the bad impact that the whole-body feel-overs has on the recipients. At least with pedophiles, it is an honest perversity.

I agree with all of that, except one line. You said, "here, individual rights trump the common good."

I disagree with that. Here, individual rights ARE the common good, and are the MOST IMPORTANT PART of the common good, without which the rest of the common good is gradually eroded to the point of nonexistence.

Yes.

Freedom isn't free. It's an oft-used platitude, but it's usually used to defend wars, or to illustrate the sacrifices made by those who serve in uniform, or to remind someone of the risks taken by soldiers and cops. The implication is, those people are paying the price for everyone's freedom, and since we're not footing the bill, we should shut the heck up and never criticize those who are.

But the real price of freedom cannot, and must not, be paid solely by soldiers or any other small group. Anyone who wishes to live free must be willing to pay the price for that freedom, and the price is not just military service or allegiance to the flag. The real price of freedom is risk - risk that somewhere, sometime, someone is going to abuse their freedom and use it to do harm to others.

If you're too afraid to pay the price, you won't long keep the merchandise.

America hasn't been paying it's bill lately, and there will be consequences for that.

I don't disagree with the flavor of this statement, but we must realize our definition of the common good differs significantly from a European's definition, or someone from communist China.

Sure they are. Just like my laptop that could have been bought with large sums of cash that could be the proceeds of criminal activity. Or my car that I drive to the airport that likewise could have been bought with large sums of cash that could be the proceeds of criminal activity. :rolleyes: