Really? Flying is now a privilege? Yup, this kinda sums up the situation – and states the problem: ABC News’ Huma Khan reports: Transportation Security Administration head John Pistole today defended controversial new security procedures and argued that if passengers want to get on a plane, they have to undergo new screening procedures.
“I see flying as a privilege. That is public safety issue so the government has a role in providing public safety and we need to do everything we can in partnership with the public to inform them about what their options are,” Pistole said at a breakfast with reporters organized by the Christian Science Monitor. “Passengers have a number of options as you go through screening. Bottom line is if someone decides they don’t want to have screening, they don’t have a right to get on the plane.”
Driving a car is a privilege. Riding in a car is not (unless my son is driving – then it is more akin to an "A" ticket at the Rock Horror / Freddy Kruger / NASCAR theme park. Most of us are not looking to drive the plane, just use it as the flying bus that it has come to be. Who gave Mr. Pistole, supposedly a public servant, the authority to declare a mode of transportation to be a ‘privilege‘? Isn’t this something that our legislators should be determining, rather than a bureaucrat in the Executive Branch? Is this not yet one more example of the "Administrative State" overreach in determining how Americans in the "land of the free and the home of the brave" will live their lives? Is this not something that we decide?
The effect, if one is not one of the hoi-polloi that can afford private aircraft (in whole or in part), to make it more unpalatable to freely travel large distances in short time frames. Does that mean that trains, cars, and bicycles are next? Taken to the absurd – "walking to work today? Yes, sir, it’s heart healthy! Yeah, gimme those shoes; I got this hand held scanner right here…..".
I have to grimly chuckle at the "…do everything we can in partnership with the public…" line as well. In my thinking, …
…a partnership is bi-directional; communications goes both ways and there is give and take from both sides. In what way is this a give and take:
- You go through the nudie scanner
- Or, you go through the legalized sexual molestation ("I’m with the Government and I’m here to touch you")
- Wanna back out of the line after chickening out over either option? Simply a $11,000 fine and / or intimate time with your lawyers.
The only partnership in this is your humiliation if you are of the Modesty Class) or not having the "cover charge" for court. Yeah, I’m with the Government and I’m here to hurt you (one way or the other).
Now, don’t get me wrong – I really have no desire to share parts of myself over a larger geographical location. However, why is everything coming from Feds now couched as "public safety"? Pretty much, every time I turn around, the general reason given for the action of government is to "protect the public" in one way, shape, or forrm?
Should that not be a red flag for the rest of us that believe that this is more a tactic of govt for more intrusion (albeit, "for our own good") into our lives or to lessen our choices because "those other choices are bad from you, and we have to enact this new law or regulation to protect you from yourself or that you are not smart enough to figure it out for yourselves…"
