The amusing part of this debate is that that in most real-life conversations I have about this sort of thing (domestic surveillance, etc.) I'm considered quite the civil liberties extremist! And yet it seems that we're about as far apart on this matter as two civilized people can be. I suppose it's all about context.

That would be like saying that there should be no police on the roads, and instead each bus, truck or vehicle should chose whatever security measures they deem appropriate.

No, it's like saying that the government shouldn't search every passenger boarding a bus, truck or vehicle to determine if they're carrying something dangerous, but should let the bus company, the trucking company, and the drivers of private cars decide (a) who gets in their vehicle, and (b) what they can/can't bring.

Example: I don't let passengers smoke in my car. I consider it dangerous (to my health.) That's MY decision. If YOU want to let people smoke in YOUR car, that's YOUR business. We don't need the government to create a rule about smoking in cars, or enforce it.

The security of your private car and the security of public transportation are two entirely different things.

Try telling that to the guy who now has lung cancer because his parents smoked in the car with him every day for his entire childhood.

It's more like saying it's up to the government to set security standards and up to the airlines and airports to determine how to meet those standards.

~~ Irish

The airlines which I fly within the US are as private as the cars in which I am driven within the US. Yet when flying within the US, DHS tries to extort money and information from passengers merely to be a passenger treated no worse than any other passenger paying for the contracted transport service with a private sector provider of the service.

We don't have US government-owned airlines in the US that provide me with commercially-scheduled passenger flight service. When was the last time you flew within the US on a US government-owned, commercially-scheduled airline?

As quoted at the bottom of this Political Bulletin:

^ ROF LMAO!!

�The TSA just announced that passengers can pass through security without taking their shoes off, if they are willing to pay an extra $85."

But most decent shoes cost about $85 to purchase. I think there's an insidious
connection here... between Big Brother and Buster Brown.
I always suspected they were linked. Maybe it was the double B's.

No, it would be like saying that each bus and truck company and highway authority should choose whatever security measures they deem appropriate.

Hey, whaddayaknow, that's how it works now! And, tadaa, it works! @:-)

The $85 is the cost of the background check and administering the program, not a bribe to the TSA official performing the scan.

I get that we have a lot of Libertarians here, and that hyperbole is par for the course in online debates, but let's have some perspective.

Whatever the reason for the $85, the end result is a payment of $85 that may allow a citizen to be treated decently by government agents. I don't care why the cost, just that there is, and there shouldn't be.

TSA - "Give me $85 and I might treat you and not infringe on your rights!"

Imagine a program instituted by the government requiring you to have a particular id card to vote, and that id card costs $85. The $85 isn't to allow you to vote, it is just for the administration of creating the id card that the government mandated. But in effect, if you don't pay the $85, you don't get to vote.

Neither is right nor acceptable.

I personally am a big fan of user fees. The $85 is not a fee for different treatment - it is a fee paid to administer a program designed to determine IF you are low risk AND as such can be expedited through security.

Thats a completely different issue - If you believe Security Theatre at US airports is an infringement of rights, how does that change whether or not you have your shoes on or liquids in or out of your carryon?

The 24th Amendment took care of the poll tax.

There is no prohibition on you flying absent the fee. Documenting (proving) that you are low risk requires that the government incur an additional cost and you gain the additional benefit of expedited security screening (note, expedited, not eliminated). You make the call if its worth it to you. Don't expect ME to pay for your convenience with MY tax dollars. You (and I) both pay user fees with each ticket to access airports and airplanes - this is no different.

The better analogy is the driving license. No one requires that you have one but if you want to drive a car on public streets that's required. You have to prove to the government that you are capable of driving. You could always take the bus, ride your bike, or walk. Same applies here - you have to prove to the government that you pose a lower level risk and that costs money to do and you are being told that you need to pay for it.

Exactly 19 passengers of the roughly six billion who have passed through US airport checkpoints over the past decade or so have boarded with the intent to harm the plane and its passengers. Two additional such passengers have boarded from overseas, where their checkpoints are similar to the PreCheck checkpoints here.

Remind me again why I have to pay even one cent to prove to some faceless government bureaucrat that I am low-risk?