If you give them enough time, they’ll put their foot in it…

Napolitano:  No “Logic” In Profiling Muslim Men Under the Age Of 35

You’re not using good logic there. You’ve got to use actual intelligence that you received. And, so, you might — all you’ve given me is a kind of status. You have not given me a technique for tactic or behavior. Something that would suggest somebody is not Muslim, but Islamic, that has actually moved into the category of violent extremists,” Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said at a forum on U.S. security and preventing terrorist attacks.

“We have ways to make some of those cuts. And they involve the intel that comes in, the analysis that goes on. For example, we often times, for travelers entering the United States, we won’t not do what is called a secondary inspection just because they are a 35-year- old male who appears to be Muslim, whatever that means. But we know from intelligence that if they have a certain travel pattern over a certain period of time, that should cause us to ask some more significant questions than if we don’t.”

The “ways of making those cuts” so far haven’t been all that productive, reference the Christmas Bomber.  Remember, the IED in Times Square was found by a street cleaner, not any of Naplolitano’s minons.

I will give her one credit, doing an enhanced screening of every darkskinned male with an Arabic name would not be cost effective… so why is screening every private aircraft and pilot prior to every flight?

SIMPLE, we’re not noisy enough.  Muslims have CAIR, we have the alphabet group who want to compromise and declare victory.  Sam Graves (R-MO) is right:  THIS IS A BAD IDEA, PERIOD — no compromise required.

Just like thousands and thousands of dark skinned Arabs/Muslims have no intention of doing harm to National Security, 99.9% of licensed pilots in this country have no intention of harming our National Security.  Yet we are going to be faced with extra cost, un-Constitutional scrutiny, and crippling paperwork all because we enjoy a certain hobby or use a specific tool in our business.

CALL, FAX you representative.  Another example of our “great protectors” not having a clue.  I promise you if Muslims were to be targeted, CAIR would be in the news in a heartbeat!

Pistole’s about “Operational Assessments”

From the Aviaton Week website:

Transportation Security Administration (TSA) chief John Pistole says the next decade of security screening will focus on operational assessments “to stay ahead of tomorrow’s threats.”

Pistole, in an address to the 83rd annual conference and exposition of the American Association of Airport Executives May 19 in Atlanta, outlined three principles to guide the TSA. Each new step will strengthen security, he says. Screening will be “smarter,” rooted in the knowledge that the vast majority of 628 million annual air travelers pose little to no risk. TSA will be guided by the philosophy that “we can mitigate risk” but never fully eliminate it, he says.

The risk-based security program will be enhanced as TSA reviews current procedures and technology, how procedures are carried out and how segments of the population are screened.

Pistole suggests that TSA will move to more identity-based screening. “Just six months into this process, we have made good progress toward developing a long-term security construct that we hope could eventually change the flying experience for most travelers.”

A small step will be taken in coming months, when TSA officers will use an identity-based system to verify the identity and employment status of pilots against airline employee databases. Testing is under way at some airports and should expand further this year. Flight attendants are under consideration for a future phase.

“Eventually, passengers who can be deemed ‘low-risk’ after volunteering information ahead of time could be eligible for expedited screening,” he added. “While there will never be a guarantee of expedited screening—we must retain a certain element of randomness to prevent terrorists from gaming the system.”

What a crock!  The test program for pilot screening at BWI has been going on for years!  How long will it take?  Now we’re going to see this at a couple more airports, yip-te-do.

Once again, the Kool-Aide is poured and people are lapping it up.  There is no threat in General Aviation, there is no threat in commerical aviation pilots.  Yet the sieve approach, ‘screen ‘em all, let God sort ‘em out” is the way it works.

LASP II will probably be out in about 10 months my sources tell me.  Maybe longer if the DHS/TSA keeps stepping on itself like they have been.  Keep your elected officials in the loop.  A call is best, fax second best.  Use the AOPA resource to offer them a ride, show them GA — show them we’re no threat.

And how did that disaster excersize work out where GA was going to fly the relief effort (you know, kinda like we already did with Haiti)?  But, I guess we’re still a threat, because all those pilots must have had a 5 year background check, been fingerprinted.  All the passengers were searched and wanded, checked against a No Fly List, even Senator Rockefeller.

“Sudden Jihad Syndrome” — it’s not terrorism, it’s mental illness

What happened on AA Flight 1561

Michelle Malkin – Syndicated Columnist – 5/13/2011 8:50:00 AM

If you listen to the passengers and crew who flew on American Airlines Flight 1561 last weekend, there’s no doubt about what happened on their harrowing trip: A Yemeni man shrieking “Allahu akbar!” at the top of his lungs more than 30 times rushed the cockpit door twice intending to take down the plane and kill everyone on board.

The clammy, sweaty lone male passenger exhibited classic symptoms of what Middle East scholar and author Daniel Pipes has dubbed “Sudden Jihad Syndrome” — a seemingly random outbreak of threatening behavior or violence by a hysterical Muslim adherent who had not previously exhibited signs of Islamic radicalization. It took at least four men to tackle and restrain Rageh Ahmed Mohammed al-Murisi. “There was no question in everybody’s mind that he was going to do something,” passenger Angelina Marty told the San Francisco Chronicle.
 
And no, that “something” did not mean enlisting his fellow flyers in a midair flash mob performance of the “Hallelujah Chorus.”
 
Not everyone was so grounded in reality. Bleeding-heart sympathizers seriously speculated that al-Murisi had simply mistaken clearly marked lavatory doors for the clearly marked cockpit door (because, you know, it’s normal to shout “God is great” repeatedly just before relieving yourself as your plane is about to land). Some federal authorities and media whitewashers proclaimed that al-Murisi’s motives were “unknown.”
 
If only al-Murisi had been screaming phrases from the Constitution. The Selective Motive Determination Machine — the same one that rushed to pin the Tucson massacre on the Tea Party, the GOP and Fox News without a shred of evidence — would have kicked in to full gear.
 
On Wednesday, a San Francisco judge denied al-Murisi bail. Unburdened by the paralyzing prissiness of political correctness, federal prosecutors noted that “Allahu akbar” was the same refrain invoked by the 9/11 hijackers over Shanksville, Pa., and by the would-be Christmas Day bomber over Detroit. Not to mention Fort Hood jihadist Nidal Hasan, the Frankfurt, Germany, jihadist who killed two U.S. airmen on a bus in March, the young Portland, Ore., Christmas tree lighting bomb plotter, every last suicide bomber across Europe, Africa, South Asia and the Middle East, and every last evil al-Qaida beheader broadcast on video over the past decade.
 
So how, despite a massive transportation and homeland security apparatus, did al-Murisi get into this country and get on a plane? He had no keys, no luggage, $47 cash, two curious posted checks totaling $13,000, and a trove of expired and current state IDs from New York and California — where relatives said he had not notified them that he was coming. He is young, male, brought no family with him, had no job or other discernible income, and hails from the terror-coddling nation of Yemen. Yes, the same Yemen that is Osama bin Laden’s ancestral home, harbors al-Qaida operatives who are burning the “torch of jihad,” and is deemed a “special interest country” whose citizens warrant increased scrutiny by DHS when they cross the border illegally.
 
As I reported last month, a federal watchdog revealed that TSA’s counterterrorism specialists failed to detect 16 separate jihad operatives who moved through target airports “on at least 23 different occasions.” Neutered by Islamophobia-phobia and an “overtime over security” mentality, our State Department consular offices’ and airline security bureaucracy’s stance toward the al-Murisis slipping through their snaking lines is:
 
Nothing to see here; move along.
 
At least the heroes of Flight 1561 who refused to sit silent learned the proper 9/11 lesson. “I swore to myself that I would never be a victim” after the 2001 attacks, passenger Larry Wright, one of the men who brought al-Murisi down, told reporters earlier this week. The only effective homeland security begins and ends with a culture of self-defense. Just as there are no atheists in foxholes, there are no “see no jihad, hear no jihad, speak no jihad” delusionists on airplanes with Allahu akbar-chanting flyers beating down doors.

 From Prespectives on www.onenewsnow.com.

Now, I guess, jihad is actually a mental illness.  So naturally it fits that General Aviation should feel some pain because there’s no telling when any of you, flying your 1500 pound Cessnas over the vast country will suddenly get “Sudden Jihad Syndrome”.

Oh, wait, you have to be Muslim I guess for this to happen.  And generally you’re an adult male, between the ages of 18 to 35.  And you have ties to a terrorist country (or your Dad has already told the State Department you’re a terrorist), little money and a somewhat strained relationship with your family.

I don’t see anything about flying private aircraft… but, thanks to Norm Minetta and PC, we can’t profile because that would be wrong.

Instead, all of us GA pilots will feel Senator Rockefeller’s pain over being wanded and patted down at Dulles.

There, that’s better.  Have some more Kool-Aide.

TSA’s GA Chief Resigns

This from this morning’s AvWeb: 

AOPA is reporting that Brian Delauter, the GA General Manager of the Transportation Security Administration is leaving after less than two years in the post to return to the private sector. AOPA CEO Craig Fuller said Delauter’s GA experience was an asset in his assumption of the role in 2009 and his leadership will be missed. “We are hopeful that Administrator [John] Pistole will build on the relationships Brian developed with general aviation industry and pilots by finding a successor with a similarly strong GA background.”     The appointment of Delauter was generally regarded as a positive thing for GA, because of Delauter’s varied experience in aviation. Prior to his hiring, the TSA was criticized for seemingly arbitrary and sometimes puzzling initiatives for bringing more security to GA operations. It seemed to acknowledge the gap in its hiring of Delauter, counting on him “use his extensive general aviation experience in government and private industry to lead TSA’s strategy to enhance security within the general aviation sector while reducing the risk of the misuse of GA assets by developing identification capabilities including positive pilot and aircraft identification.” It’s not clear who will be doing Delauter’s job while the search is on for his replacement.

Apparently he got an offer he couldn’t refuse, from the outside.  He wasn’t asked to leave.  Scuttlebutt is his immediate bosses like the idea of communication with “industry” and “stakeholders”.

How effective and what kind of communications seems to be a matter of opinion.

Anyway, the job is open.

LASP is at the DHS apparently for review and will probably be public for comment for another six months, unless the TSA or DHS steps on itself again.  What are the odds?

Get involved, get those elected guys informed, get people on our side.

Drunk Man At JFK Airport Tells Ticket Agent ‘I Am Bin Laden And I Have A Bomb’

Dates set for TSA union runoff vote

By Jim Barnett, CNN

Washington (CNN) — The runoff vote to determine which union will represent the 40,000-plus airport screeners will begin May 23, the Federal Labor Relations Authority said Thursday.

The election will be conducted over a four-week period ending on June 21. The votes will be tallied and announced on June 23, the agency said.

In the initial six-week voting process, neither union seeking to represent the transportation security officers received a majority.

The American Federation of Government Employees received 8,369 votes and the National Treasury Employees Union received 8,095, while workers cast 3,111 votes to reject a union, according to unofficial results released by the Labor Relations Authority on Wednesday.

The choice of no union representation will not appear on the ballot for the runoff, so a simple majority will decide the winner.

Senator Rockerfeller’s gonna be upset…  seems I remember Mr. Pistole telling him and his committee that he was against unionization of TSA employees.  So much for truth on the Hill.

Wonder what else he was saying just to get confirmed?

TSA Seeks Comment on ‘Identity-Based’ Screening

by Michele McPhee       Posted Mar 21st 2011 03:00 PM

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is soliciting comments about a planned program that would cut down on controversial pat-downs and full-body scanner searches at airports and instead rely on an “intelligence” system that focuses on people who have been identified as a threat.

The move would eventually allow some frequent fliers to obtain trusted status similar to what’s been granted pilots, who pushed for faster security checks and also expressed concern about being exposed to radiation at the body scanner machines. Now pilots traveling in uniform on airline business for a U.S. carrier have a streamlined process for security screening.

The TSA’s official Blogger Bob is asking for suggestions and comments about the proposed “identity-based” system as it would apply to the general public.

“Physical screening will likely never go away completely, but the idea of adding identity-based security makes good sense and it’s an idea we’re actively exploring. So, we’d like to hear your suggestions and ideas,” Bob says.

The blog comes weeks after TSA Administrator, and former FBI agent, John Pistole told a group of American Bar Association lawyers that the agency is attempting to move more into intelligence on passengers who pose a threat rather than making air travel unpleasant for all of the 628 million people who are screened in the U.S. each year.

“At the airport, numerous layers of security are in place. There are behavior detection officers, explosive-detection canines and closed-circuit video surveillance. And, of course, we do have the physical screening at the checkpoint,” Pistole told the assembled lawyers in his speech.

“We want to focus our limited resources on higher-risk passengers, while speeding and enhancing the passenger experience at the airport,” Pistole said in his remarks.

So, where do we go from here?  Actually using INTELLIGENCE to identify a threat is so unlike the TSA it boggles the mind.  Of course there are a few problems.

For example, this “streamlined process” of the working pilot in uniform.  Trust me, it ain’t so.  About the only thing we, usually, don’t have to do is take our shoes off any more.  Outside of that, even though we ALREADY HAVE CONTROL of the aircraft, we go through the same humiliations you do, much more than you do, just for the privilege of getting to our office.  So, I’m not holding my breathe.

But, it begs the bigger question; if, perhaps, most of the 628 million people screened at airports each year aren’t threats, why is General Aviation?  When there are three separate and independen studies that claim GA isn’t a threat, why are we living with LASP, SD-8G, Operation Playbook, etc. 

Why does Senator Rockefeller demand that Administrator Pistole do something about the fact we can walk to our airplane without feeling the pain he feels getting searched; apparently he won’t feel this much longer (of course, you people in WV could stop voting for him) and then will he back off?  Somehow I doubt it.

Keep writing those letters, sending those faxes, making those phone calls.  Take an electee flying, take a reporter flying.

I’ll withhold judgement for now, but this might be a good thing.  Cops catch bad guys, not straining the entire population through a sieve. 

Maybe Chertoff just made enough money by now…

What do we pay these people for, exactly?

TSA staff jet blew it

Boxcutters taken on JFK airliner

By PHILIP MESSING

March 2, 2011

A passenger managed to waltz past JFK’s ramped-up security gantlet with three boxcutters in his carry-on luggage — easily boarding an international flight while carrying the weapon of choice of the 9/11 hijackers, sources told The Post yesterday.

The stunning breach grounded the flight for three hours Saturday night and drew fury from Port Authority cops, who accused the Transportation Security Administration of being asleep on the job.

“In case anyone has forgotten, the TSA was created because of a couple boxcutter incidents,” said one PAPD source, referring to the weapons used by al Qaeda operatives to commandeer the jets they later slammed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9/11.

The two TSA agents and supervisor who completely missed the blades at a security checkpoint “will all be disciplined and undergo remedial training,” said spokeswoman Ann Davis.

The incident happened at around 10 p.m. Saturday as factory worker Eusebio D. Peraltalajara, 45, of Jersey City waltzed past the screeners on his way to a Dominican Republic-bound flight, the sources said.

Agent Ahmir Wilkerson, supervisor Anthony DeJesus and at least one other screener allowed his carry-on luggage — with the boxcutters with razor blades — to pass through the X-ray machine, police sources said.

Once aboard Santiago-bound Flight 837, flight attendant Fausto Penaloda, 40, asked him to stow his luggage in the overhead storage bin.

As Peraltalajara’s shoved it into the compartment, Penaloda saw the boxcutters fall out of the bag, according to a police report.

He grabbed the boxcutters and alerted the captain and first officer.

They called JetBlue security, which raised the alarm to PAPD Emergency Service Units, the Joint Terrorism Task Force and the FBI, sparking an evacuation of the plane’s 136 passengers and five crew members.

The PAPD’s Canine Unit swept the plane for bombs and all of the passengers had to be rescreened.

Peraltalajara told authorities that he used the boxcutters for work at a Secaucus manufacturing plant and simply forgot that they were in his luggage. He was not charged with any crime.

The TSA spokeswoman Davis insisted that the traveling public was not at risk.

“There have been a number of additional security layers that have been implemented on aircraft that would prevent someone from causing harm with boxcutters,” she insisted.

“They include the possible presence of armed federal air marshals, hardened cockpit doors, flight crews trained in self-defense and a more vigilant traveling public who have demonstrated a willingness to intervene.”

The traveling public wasn’t at risk because this guy made an honest mistake.  Had be meant to get the boxcutters onboard, they probably wouldn’t have been dropped in plain sight.

Meanwhile, Senator Rockefeller feels these people should be inspecting our General Aviation aircraft, passengers, pilots, hangars, etc. because he just can’t walk out on the the ramp like we can.

Once again, this has NOTHING to do with safety or security; it has to do with control and looks.  As a GA pilot, you have a level of freedom enjoyed by few, and apparently they want to take that away from you.

LASP II is coming soon, KEEP IN TOUCH with your Congressman and Senator.

From Forbes Magazine… I like this guy!

Art Carden

The Economic Imagination

Do We Need a Department of Homeland Security or a TSA?

Jan. 21 2011 – 1:30 pm

By ART CARDEN

The new Republican House of Representatives took office amidst much fanfare about the US Constitution and respecting Constitutional limits on government.  I have suggested that if they are really serious about it, they will start by abolishing the Transportation Security Administration.  Not much has changed in the last few weeks.  Indeed, we can do without the whole “Homeland Security” charade.

Defenders of the Department of Homeland Security and TSA ask whether we are willing to sacrifice safety and security to avoid being inconvenienced. There is no evidence that this works.  I have said it before and I will say it again: the data suggest that if anything, the TSA actually costs lives.

No doubt, there are plenty of people who heartily endorse increasingly-invasive measures employed by the Department of Homeland Security and the Transportation Security Administration because it makes them feel safe.  That feeling of safety is an illusion.  As Bruce Schneier and others have pointed out, the entire operation is “security theater” that costs us time and money while leaving us no safer. As Wikileaks is showing us, an opaque government saying “just trust us” is not to be trusted.

In spite of the evidence, the national security state gets larger and more invasive.  In a truly creepy turn of events, the DHS is trying to deputize all of us into a nationwide spy network and enlisting the power of Walmart to do it.  As someone whose research interests include the effects of Walmart and the political economy of institutions, I can’t help but wonder which combination of carrots and sticks motivated such “patriotism.”

Future generations will look back on the early twenty-first century security state as an interesting exercise in the triumph of politics over everything, including peace, prosperity, and safety. In a recent Foreign Policy essay, Anne Applebaum adds to the cloud of witnesses testifying that Homeland Security is an expensive sham. Most specifically, she points out how homeland security spending is a gigantic pork barrel with political considerations exercising undue influence over how the money is spent.

Applebaum offers as one example the million dollars of Homeland Security money that funded an “emergency operations center” in tiny Poynette, Wisconsin. I have nothing against the people of Poynette, but it is almost certainly a less inviting target than a major metropolitan area like New York or Boston. Applebaum points out–correctly–that a dollar spent on a Poynette emergency operations center probably delivers a lot less Homeland Security than a dollar spent in New York or Boston.  The million dollars spent in Poynette is a million dollars that can’t be spent elsewhere.  All else equal, we should spend our homeland security dollars addressing the greatest risks.

Critics of President Obama’s health care proposal have questioned it on Constitutional grounds. Others have decried the practice of voting on legislation before it is read.  Commentators on the right made sport of Democrats’ claim that legislation had to be passed so that we can find out what is in it, and yet if there is an example of “pass it to find out what is in it” legislation, it is the PATRIOT Act, which was passed by near-unanimous votes in a Republican-controlled House of Representatives and a Senate in which the Democrats only held a one-seat majority.  It was signed by a Republican President.

The Department of Homeland Security and the TSA are clear examples of trading something to get–not nothing, but actually less than nothing because they actual imperil our safety.  If we are serious about the Constitution and serious about security, we will get rid of them.

 You can also see this and more in the latest from AOPA!

Once again, irresponsible reporting helps us out….

From Atlantic Magazine (Jan/Feb 2011):

Jeffrey Goldberg, an apparent security expert, tells all that he can just walk out at Teterboro and get on a jet.  Failing completely to do any background investigation or even mention the four programs in effect for Part 135 operators, and to make sure he’s covered all the bases, he asks his friend, the non-pilot that invited him along, what security measures are in place.  This other obvious expert alludes to it only taking money.

“I’ve been writing for years about the TSA, and about the uneven and unthinking methods it employs to secure our nation’s commercial airports. I had been under the impression that the TSA stationed personnel at many general-­aviation terminals, but it typically does not. The general-aviation industry is almost entirely “self-regulated.” The TSA has proposed that it be allowed to impose certain security measures on private jets, such as requiring operators to ensure that their passengers are not on the no-fly list, but for now the agency screens only those Americans who cannot afford to fly on private planes. The TSA administrator, John Pistole, suggested he sees a less substantial threat from general aviation than he does in the commercial realm, and the general- aviation “community” is not enthusiastic about government regulation. “Clearly the general-aviation community has a lot of equities and interest in our rules,” he told me, delicately. The TSA does, however, distribute helpful tips to those who work at private- aviation airports, including, “Always lock your aircraft.” And there is this warning: call 911 if you happen to notice “pilots appearing to be under the control of others.”

I am not a terrorist, but I do share one goal with al-Qaeda: I too would like to have a pilot under my control. But, like most Americans, and presumably unlike al-Qaeda, I am not quite rich enough to buy my way out of airport security. “

Note the numerous mentions of being able to “afford’ to fly on private aircraft.  The class struggle of the downtrodden comes out.  The fact the average GA aircraft costs the same as a bass boat doesn’t seem to get mentioned; it’s all about pain, like Senator Rockerfeller (D-WV) said, he has to stand in line and we don’t.

What seems to upset these people so is not that there’s GA in this country but that they aren’t a part of it.

As a case in point, Mr. James Fallows, another reporter for Atlantic, is an instrument rated pilot.  On 7 Jan 2011 he posted he will be happy to take Mr. Goldberg flying and assuage his fears about the menace of GA.  Good for him!

This irresponsible reporting is what gets us in trouble.  We are an unknown and therefore scary, to a lot of people.  Get out there, take your representatives flying.  Take a reporter flying.  Take a neighbor flying.

And don’t forget to call and fax your representatives…