The TSA is 10 years old and still groping

I received the following from Campaign For Liberty:

Everyone’s “favorite” bureaucracy is growing up.

Today marks 10 years since the TSA’s creation.

And if I could make a birthday wish on their behalf...

... it would be that this is the last holiday season we have to put up with their poking, groping, and scanning.

In what should be “the most wonderful time of the year,” the path home for many Americans begins with a long wait at the airport – and dealing with people who think a government ID gives them the right to put their hands where they don’t belong.

Remember the joyous, exciting holiday travel of yesteryear?

“Over the river and through the woods…”

Well, no one will be writing Christmas carols about modern holiday travel – though we may hear some blues about how miserable the experience can be.

Since its inception, perhaps no other agency has been more flagrant in its violations of our civil liberties and as flippant toward Americans’ constitutionally protected rights as the TSA.

As you may remember, in March of 2009, a C4L staffer found himself temporarily detained and interrogated by the TSA after attempting to fly back after our first Regional Conference with the event’s proceeds in his carry-on.

It’s not illegal to fly with cash and checks on domestic flights, but these agents made it their business – something the TSA does far too often to too many people.

Since that time, the situation has only gotten worse.

For the past year, the TSA has been installing potentially dangerous backscatter imaging machines across the country to perform virtual strip searches on airline passengers.

This leaves passengers the “option” of either being scanned and possibly exposed to dangerous radiation or enduring the very public humiliation of receiving one of their infamous “pat-downs.”

When the policy was first implemented, Senator Claire McCaskill downplayed the invasive groping that makes up one of the TSA’s “enhanced pat-downs,” referring to them as “love pats.”

The senator apparently no longer feels that way (after selling her private jet), and she recently complained about their invasiveness to TSA Administrator John Pistole.

"I try to avoid a pat-down at all costs," McCaskill told Pistole. "There are many times women put their hands on me in a way that if it was your daughter or your sister or your wife, you would be upset."

And as people continue to make their mistreatment and abuse at the TSA’s hands public by sharing their stories online, more members of Congress are beginning to take notice.

Others, unfortunately, still don’t see the bigger picture.

Without immediately reining in the unaccountable TSA and eliminating their procedures of scanning and groping passengers at the airports, I’m afraid the situation will only continue to get worse.

In the past, we’ve warned about the TSA’s plans to expand its scanning beyond our nation’s airports – to our highways, train stations, and bus stops.

Unfortunately, this is already happening.

Last month in Tennessee, the TSA’s VIPR teams were deployed to conduct random searches of vehicles on the highways.

This has to stop.

And you and I are the ones who can fight back.

Members of Congress may think this issue has blown over, but it’s up to Campaign for Liberty to remind them that we’re more outraged than ever at what’s taking place every day in our airports.

Please, as soon as you can on Monday, call Congress at 202-224-3121 and demand they rein in their Frankenstein creation.

Don’t let them sell you a bill of goods, either.

They can force the TSA to abandon their policies of scanning passengers (in what amounts to a virtual strip search) or groping them (in a manner that would constitute sexual assault were it coming from a regular individual).

Ultimately, Congress should abolish the TSA altogether and return the responsibility for security to the private sector.

Just like other federal government overreaches, the TSA believes telling us this is necessary for “our safety” allows it to do whatever it wants, including shredding our Fourth Amendment rights.

We must expose this lie, and I hope we’ll have your help to do so.

The responsibility for airline security lies with the airline industry in the first place.

Since 9/11, only alert passengers and flight crews have thwarted additional terrorist attacks on airplanes, not the TSA!

Tell Congress to pass appropriate, common-sense legislation like H.R. 2438, the “American Traveler Dignity Act,” and to cut off funding for the maintenance of existing scanners and implementation of new ones.

Even the European Union has banned the use of these scanners because of the possible health risks!

So please, reach out to Congress as soon as you can on Monday at 202-224-3121 and urge them to rein in the TSA by outlawing their scanning and groping.

Or you can email them,just look them up here. Perhaps emailing the Senate will help too. No harm in trying to so let's do it.

Throw out the cake and presents because this is one birthday that SHOULDN'T be celebrated.

Ever since the Senator sold her private jet and has to fly commercial along with the rest of us peons she's had a change of heart and is now complaining. But Senator I thought those were just "love pats" (which would make them sexual harassment and sexual assault) and now they're "violations of our bodies". I guess things are different when the queen is forced to live under her own rules.

Step in right direction

Ohio legislature introduces bill preventing abortion without father's written
permission
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
By Anthrope1

HB 252, presently before the Ohio legislature, would prevent a woman from having
an abortion without written permission of the fetus' father. If the father is
unknown, possible fathers must be provided to the doctor and prenatal paternity
testing is required. If the father refuses testing, the abortion is denied.

As Introduced

128th General Assembly
Regular Session
2009-2010

H. B. No. 252

Representative Adams, J.

Cosponsors: Representatives Jordan, Huffman, Blessing, Morgan, Martin, Maag,
Wagner, Hall, Wachtmann, Combs, McClain, Derickson, Goodwin, Winburn, Uecker

A BILL

To enact section 2919.124 of the Revised Code relative to requiring paternal
consent before an abortion may be performed.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF OHIO:

Section 1. That section 2919.124 of the Revised Code be enacted to read as
follows:

Sec. 2919.124. (A) As used in this section, "viable" has the same meaning as in
section 2901.01 of the Revised Code.

(B)(1) When the fetus that is the subject of the procedure is viable, no person
shall perform or induce an abortion on a pregnant woman without the written
informed consent of the father of the fetus.

(2) When the fetus that is the subject of the procedure is not viable, no person
shall perform or induce an abortion on a pregnant woman without the written
informed consent of the father of the fetus.

(C)(1) A pregnant woman seeking to abort her pregnancy shall provide, in
writing, the identity of the father of the fetus to the person who is to perform
or induce the abortion.

(2) No pregnant woman seeking to abort her pregnancy shall fail to comply with
division (B)(1) of this section.

(3) No pregnant woman seeking to abort her pregnancy shall provide to the person
who is to perform or induce the abortion the identity of a man as the father of
the fetus if the man is not the father of the fetus.

(D) No man shall give a consent pursuant to division (B)(1) or (2) of this
section as the father of the fetus if the man knows that he is not the father of
the fetus.

(E) No person shall cause a man to believe that the man is the father of a fetus
for the purpose of obtaining the consent required by division (B)(1) or (2) of
this section, if the person knows that the man is not the father of the fetus.

(F) If, pursuant to division (C)(1) of this section, the pregnant woman
identifies two or more men as possible fathers of the fetus, the person who is
to perform or induce the abortion shall perform a paternity test, or cause a
paternity test to be performed, to determine the father of the fetus prior to
accepting any consent required under division (B)(1) or (2) of this section and
prior to performing or inducing an abortion of the pregnant woman's pregnancy.
No person shall perform or induce an abortion in violation of this division.

(G) It is not a defense to a violation of division (B)(1) or (2) or (C)(2) of
this section that the woman does not know the identity of the father of the
fetus.

(H)(1) Divisions (B)(1) and (2) of this section do not apply if the pregnant
woman provides to the person who is to perform or induce the abortion either of
the following:

(a) A copy of a police report or a complaint, indictment, information, or other
court document that gives the person who is to perform or induce the abortion
reasonable cause to believe that the woman became pregnant as the result of rape
or incest.

(b) A copy of a paternity test that gives the person who is to perform or induce
the abortion reasonable cause to believe that the woman became pregnant as the
result of incest.

(2) This section does not apply if the abortion is necessary, in appropriate
medical judgment, to preserve the life or the physical health of the pregnant
woman.

(3) Divisions (B)(1) and (2) of this section do not apply if the father of the
fetus is deceased at the time of the abortion.

(I) The written consent required under division (B)(1) or (2) of this section,
the written identification required in division (C)(1) of this section, and the
results of a paternity test performed pursuant to division (F) of this section
are confidential, are not public records under section 149.43 of the Revised
Code, and shall be viewed only by the pregnant woman, the man claiming to be or
the man identified as being the father of the fetus, the person who is to
perform or induce the abortion, any law enforcement officer investigating a
violation of this section, and a court and jury in a criminal case involving an
alleged violation of this section.

(J) Whoever violates this section is guilty of abortion fraud, a misdemeanor of
the first degree. If the person previously has pleaded guilty to or has been
convicted of a violation of this section, abortion fraud is a felony of the
fifth degree.

Source:here

This is truly a step forward. Let's hope this proceeds forward.

Way to go Missouri

Missouri Men Now Have the Right to Genetic Testing in Paternity Cases

By Robert Franklin, Esq. Jul 10, 2009

The latest development in a matter we've reported on before is here (Kansas City.com, 7/7/09). The governor of Missouri has signed into law a bill that allows men two years after they've been adjudicated to be a child's father to contest the matter in court via genetic testing.

If a test proves the man is not the biological father, he would be excused from previous child-support debt and would have criminal nonsupport convictions removed from his record, under the new Missouri law that takes effect Aug. 28.
The law is obviously a step in the right direction. It gives men some actual control over obligations that courts so often place on them without their knowledge or consent. According to the article, paternity in Missouri was often established by a man's failure to respond to a paternity suit filed by a woman. As we've seen before, his failure to respond, whether due to his own negligence or the fact that he didn't receive notice of the suit, resulted in a default judgment being taken against him. That meant 18 years of child support for a child that may or may not have been his, with no opportunity to establish the truth.

That in turn meant that, if the child were not his, another man shirked his responsibility toward the child. It also encouraged mothers to lie about who the father was and where he was. Since lying by women in paternity or divorce cases about either or both of those matters is rarely punished, the law tended to encourage misrepresentation.

That has now changed in Missouri. It's a small step, but it gives men and putative fathers more power in family courts.

Source:here