{"id":13162,"date":"2016-07-18T20:02:49","date_gmt":"2016-07-18T20:02:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/?p=13162"},"modified":"2017-10-19T09:20:23","modified_gmt":"2017-10-19T13:20:23","slug":"the-tsa-descends-from-incompetence-to-inhumanity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2016\/07\/18\/the-tsa-descends-from-incompetence-to-inhumanity\/","title":{"rendered":"The TSA Descends from Incompetence to Inhumanity"},"content":{"rendered":"

As Americans celebrated their freedom this Fourth of July, headlines graphically proved how diminished that liberty is. Hannah Cohen, 18 years old<\/a> and severely disabled from a brain tumor, sued the TSA and local cops for beating her bloody. Hannah\u2019s \u201ccrime\u201d? She had neither understood nor complied with their orders when trying to board a flight the year before.<\/p>\n

In June 2015, Hannah and her mother, Shirley, were returning home from St Jude\u2019s Medical Center. Hannah\u2019s tumor and the radiation treating it have left her \u201cpartially deaf, blind in one eye, paralyzed, and easily confused\u2026<\/a>.\u201d Not surprisingly, such \u201csubstantial limitation[s are] obvious on sight<\/a>.\u201d No one could have mistaken Hannah for a healthy passenger as the Cohens approached the Transportation Security Administration\u2019s checkpoint in Memphis, TN.<\/p>\n

Hannah wore a shirt with sequins on it. Those metallic bits triggered the TSA’s scanner.<\/a> \u201c\u2018You could see on the screen what it was pointing out,\u2019 Shirley said. \u2026Agents told Hannah they needed to take her to a \u2018sterile area\u2019 where they could search her further. She was afraid, Shirley said, and offered to take off the sequined shirt as she was wearing another underneath, but a female agent laughed at her. \u2026 Shirley \u2026 [explained to] a supervisor standing nearby. \u2018She is a St Jude\u2019s patient, and she can get confused\u2026\u2019\u201d In response, the TSA summoned \u201c\u2019armed guards.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Those \u201cguards\u201d grabbed Hannah\u2019s arms, further scaring her. \u201c\u2019I tried to push away,\u2019she said<\/a>. \u2018I tried to get away.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But \u201c\u2026in the next instant,\u201d Shirley recalled,<\/a> \u201cone of them had her down on the ground and hit her head on the floor. There was blood everywhere\u2026\u201d The heartrending picture Mrs. Cohen snapped<\/a> of her daughter documents that ubiquitous blood as well as Hannah\u2019s terror and anguish.<\/p>\n

Not Isolated<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tragically, this incident was neither isolated nor a misunderstanding. Far too many sick, elderly, and otherwise vulnerable victims have endured similar horrors at American airports. Worse, not all of them have lived to tell about it.<\/p>\n

In 2005,the TSA\u2019s air marshals killed a 44-year-old Christian missionary<\/a> suffering from manic depression<\/a>. Rigoberto Alpizar, jittery and upset, had tried to disembark from a flight preparing to leave Miami, FL. Two marshals followed him off the plane and shot him in the jetway. They claimed he was shouting about a bomb. Other passengers denied that,<\/a> insisting they heard the word \u201cbomb\u201d only from the police who later questioned them.<\/p>\n

To be fair, most of the TSA\u2019s prey doesn\u2019t wind up bloodied or dead. They deal instead with crushing and very public humiliation. Just ask Thomas Sawyer. A bout with cancer of the bladder pushed him into the TSA\u2019s hands\u2014literally. \u201c\u2019Evidently the scanner picked up on my urostomy bag<\/a>, because I was chosen for a pat-down procedure. \u2026 [E]very time I tried to tell them about my medical condition, they said they didn\u2019t need to know \u2026 One agent watched as the other used his flat hand to go slowly down my chest. I tried to warn him that he would hit the bag and break the seal \u2026 but he ignored me. Sure enough, the seal was broken and urine started dribbling down my shirt and my leg and into my pants.\u2019\u201d No wonder Mr. Sawyer was so \u201cabsolutely humiliated\u201d he \u201ccouldn\u2019t even speak \u2026 They never apologized. They never offered to help \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Comply Or Else<\/strong><\/p>\n

The TSA\u2019s ferocity extends even to children, including sick or disabled ones. Four-year-old Ryan Thomas was \u201cborn 16 weeks prematurely.<\/a> His ankles are malformed and his legs have low muscle tone.\u201d He required braces to walk. When his parents tried to fly with him, the TSA insisted that they not only remove his braces after the metal detector beeped but that he walk through the machine without them. Nor did his father\u2019s protests avail (“I told [the TSA\u2019s supervisor], ‘This is overkill. <\/a>He’s 4 years old. I don’t think he’s a terrorist'”).<\/p>\n

Little girls fare no better. Lucy Forck\u2019s parents hoped to introduce their 3-year-old daughter to Mickey Mouse. But Lucy\u2019s spina bifida confines her to a wheelchair. That allowed the TSA to traumatize her until, \u201cweeping uncontrollably,\u201d<\/a> she finally screamed, \u201cI don\u2019t want to go to Disney World!\u201d Adding insult to injury, the TSA also \u201cconfiscated Lucy\u2019s stuffed toy, \u2018Lamby\u2019 \u2026<\/a> \u2018She was crying for her stuffed animal which they wouldn\u2019t let her have for the longest time,\u2019 [Lucy\u2019s father] said. \u2018It\u2019s only about a half foot long \u2026 but she loves it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

What has happened to Americans that we tolerate such savagery against the weakest among us? Does terrorism so menace aviation that children in wheelchairs must forfeit Lamby while manic-depressive passengers are gunned down in jetways?<\/p>\n

The officials responsible for the TSA continually assure us that it does<\/a>; other sources dispute that<\/a>. But even if the threat were as perilous as self-interested bureaucrats contend, does that excuse the TSA\u2019s mortification of patients with urostomy bags and its brutalizing half-blind, half-deaf teens? Does fear of terrorism\u2014or of anything else\u2014justify gross inhumanity?<\/p>\n

The Pat Down<\/strong><\/p>\n

The TSA\u2019s cruelty towards sick, injured or elderly passengers<\/a> is only one of its sins; its ordinary policies and practices are every bit as immoral. Consider the agency\u2019s notorious \u201cpat downs.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the TSA itself admits that it \u201chas used pat downs since \u2026 2002<\/a>.\u201d But it never concedes that they are indistinguishable from sexual assault<\/a>, though neither the TSA\u2019s employees nor passengers can tell the difference. Last year, when \u201ctwo \u2026 screeners<\/a> at Denver International Airport \u2026 were discovered manipulating passenger screening systems to allow a male TSA employee to fondle the genital areas of attractive male passengers,\u201d the District Attorney couldn\u2019t pursue charges<\/a> because none of the eleven victims had complained<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Test<\/a> after test<\/a> demonstrates that the TSA can\u2019t find the weapons and explosives on passengers that supposedly justify its existence. And independent experts in security condemn not only \u201cpat downs\u201d but the agency\u2019s entire rigmarole<\/a> as hopelessly ineffective: \u201cMost of the layers of security are little more than illusions<\/a> reinforced by a government agency that feeds off the paranoia and fear of the masses. Doing away with them would make America\u2019s transportation systems no less safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

And far more humane. If we haven\u2019t abolished the TSA for its incompetence, let\u2019s do so for its immorality.<\/p>\n

Source: The TSA Descends from Incompetence to Inhumanity | Foundation for Economic Education<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n