The TSA has made a big show about how next to nobody actually opted for a pat down. While that is true, it’s also a distortion of the facts. Nobody opted for a pat down because the TSA had turned off a number of the full body scanners on National Opt Out Day. What does this tell me? Either the TSA is so worried about making sure to have good public relations and save face, or the full body scanners aren’t needed and/or aren’t as effective as the TSA likes to tell us. It also seems that just the threat of people opting out was enough to scare the TSa into shutting things down.

Speaking of which, how effective are the full body scanners? That’s a good question and one which I have to say, it could be better. For example, the full body scanners failed to detect bomb parts hidden on one passenger’s person and in another case, Adam Savage blundered through a TSA full body scanner while carrying two twelve inch long razor blades. A lot of people like to point at Israel’s airports and wonder why we can’t be more like them. I, however, think that the Dutch have a better way of going about full body scans. It seems they have bought a number of machines (designed and made in the USA) for their airports which show contraband on a generic mannequin display and which doesn’t generate an image of the person being scanned. It seems these units also cost less than what the TSA has now.

There are a number of things we could be doing differently, but to say National Opt Out Day was a failure doesn’t do it justice.

We’re told that privacy is no longer a reasonable expectation, that we should be grateful that the government is continually conducting surveillance on our personal communications, and intruding into groups of activist dissidents using Patriot Act powers. It’s all for our own safety, we’re told.

The Homeland Security Regime is a paternalistic Big Brother, and we’re told not to worry our heads none – Big Brother is watching!

Hi, my name is Mike Gravel and I’m a former US Senator from the state of Alaska.  I’m standing in front of the Iwo Jima Memorial, and I’m blessed to live a block away, in fact, from my balcony I can look down at the Iwo Jima Memorial.

What this memorial represents is a sacrifice our young men have given for the safety of this country.  Today we are visited with threats to our safety, but they’re of a different kind.  They’re not of the kind of the Second World War, nor are they of the kind of the Cold War.  What we have today is global terrorism.

Terrorism is not addressed with large armies, large military expenditures.  It is addressed with a global intelligence effort where countries share their knowledge of the terrorists regardless of where they are.  And then, with that kind of arrangement, we can prosecute and bring to justice these terrorists after they’ve committed a crime, and even before, when they’re plotting to commit a crime.

Now, that’s what we need more of, not what we presently have, which of course, is expenditures for jet fighters, for all kinds of hardware that was relevant in the Cold War, but is not relevant today.  We spend more on defense, or war-making capability, than the rest of the world put together.  And we now involve ourselves with two wars.  One in Iraq, which was a fraudulent undertaking, and one in Afghanistan that need not be persued.  We’re fighting for a country that is rampant with corruption.

And the same thing in Iraq:  rampant with corruption.  But they’ve taken our precious tax dollars and put it out in these countries so that these warlords, so that these people can be bribed and go out to the Arabian Peninsula and buy expensive homes and live off of the tax dollars that Americans have put forth.  This is not a foreign policy that will lead to success.  It will lead to the bankruptcy of the American people.

Now, keep in mind what we have is a situation where we spend more on defense than all the rest of the world put together.  And the American people don’t even act as if they care.  Now, that is a reflection, not only on the brainwashing that’s taken place, but it’s a reflection on the perceptions that Americans have about their role in the world.

That’s something that must change, and it can only change if we can bring about direct democracy – the enactment of the National Initiative – where people can make laws…The only force that can stop the military industrial complex is going to be the American people voting to stop this foolishness, this useless expenditure that goes for war-making capability when we need it for peace-making capability here at home, for the success of our economy.

Thank you.

Watch the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzF0evkTV2g&feature=player_embedded

Congressman Schauer had a scheduled appearance in Lenawee County, where most of the arrests were made. His appearance was on Monday, the day after the arrests of the alleged terrorists were made public.

So, what did Schauer do in recognition of the Hutaree arrests? What did he say?

Nothing. In the face of homegrown terrorism centered in his own congressional district, Congressman Mark Schauer was silent. He said nothing. He did nothing. Now, two days later, Schauer continues his path of silence and inaction.

Why was Schauer afraid to speak out against extremism? Is he afraid that he’ll lose the votes of Hutaree supporters?

For that reason, to accompany our articles about the threat of military drones, I think it’s important to offer our readers some simple photographic evidence of what’s going on. Here’s one pixel from that larger picture:

This photograph comes from the White House archives, and it shows President George W. Bush and his Secretary of Homeland Security standing right in front of a robotic airplane. The official seal of the Department of Homeland Security is shown on the robot.

All that’s history now. What’s not history is the Patriot Act.

Just last week, the House of Representatives voted to pass an extension of the Patriot Act without any reforms at all, sneaking the vote in as an approval of an unspecified amendment to a Medicare bill.

Two-thirds of the House Democrats voted with the Republicans to approve the reform-free extension of Patriot Act spying powers that the government uses against Americans. Mike Capuano was not one of them. Capuano voted against the perpetuation of George W. Bush’s spying programs.

“You may recall that in 2001, I voted against the Patriot Act because I strongly believed that it did not do enough to protect our cherished civil liberties. I continue to have serious concerns about some of its provisions,” Capuano wrote, explaining his vote. “I want to be clear that it is important to give law enforcement the tools they need to pursue criminals. However, there is a way to do that and still recognize the importance of civil liberties – and such a solution is not currently being pursued by the House and Senate.”

Thank you, Representative Capuano, for taking a stand against the politics of fear.

In yesterday’s defeat of Martha Coakley, Massachusetts Republicans explained their votes as motivated by a need to keep the United States safe from the threat of foreign enemies. A Massachusetts voter writes, “Scott Brown will do what it takes to keep America safe and never put the rights of terrorists above yours!” Another, self-described “Reaganite Republican” said that Brown’s agenda would focus on “taking-out-the-terrorists”, apparently forgetting that the Republican Party, in its years of controlling both Congress and the White House, failed miserably to do so.

That’s the weird thing about the Homeland Security regime: It’s not required to make sense. Its job is to create a rough bluster of tough posturing in order to make people feel protected, whether they actually are or not.

Some Americans still have the moral strength not to cower under the Homeland security blanket. Some Americans still choose to live in freedom rather than fear. Wearing this satirical Department of Homeland Insecurity shirt to show yourself as one of the stalwart lovers of liberty.

Part of my response to this news was to write the article here on Irregular Times. I believe that simply spreading information can provoke some people into action.

But what about me? What would my response be? I looked at my own part in this story, at my own account on Facebook. I saw that while Facebook brings me nice bits of little news about friends I’m not in touch with on a regular basis, the service also brings me a lot of irrelevant bits of information that has nothing to do with me or my relationships to my friends. I saw a lot of advertisements and pointless, relatively boring games. I remembered how it used to be, that when I wanted to know something about one of my friends, I talked to them in person, and if I didn’t want to know about something, I just didn’t ask.

I looked at what Facebook was doing for me, and asked myself whether it was worth allowing government spies to have access to information about my social life. The answer: No, Facebook is not worth it.

So, my response to the Obama Administration’s refusal to be honest about its social networking spy operations is this: I’m off Facebook. I have deactivated my account, and I don’t plan on going back.

The sad thing is that a deactivated account is not a deleted account. While deactivating, the following notice came:

“Note: Even after you deactivate, your friends can still invite you to events, tag you in photos, or ask you to join groups. If you opt out, you will NOT receive these email invitations and notifications from your friends.”

I opted out, of course. Still, I realize that Facebook is keeping all the information I loaded up about my life, and will share that information with government spies if they ever demand it. The deactivation matters, nonetheless: At least I’m not adding new information. My little window in the Facebook panopticon is now shuttered.

Members of Congress have picked up the alarming tone, speaking in tones of dread about the attack. “A powerful attack overwhelmed computers,” Representative Adrian Smith from Nebraska warned on Friday.

Actually, the attack was not particularly powerful, nor were most U.S. government computers overwhelmed. Mostly what happened is that there were a few glitches in public access to a few government web sites. The American people, including journalists who frequently use government web sites, had to be told that a cyberattack was underway a few days after it began. It wasn’t self-evident.

The attack was a DDOS campaign – dedicated denial of service. It was equivalent to a Ferris Buehler prank in sophistication. Government web sites were inundated with automated attempts to access its web sites, making the sites slow in responding to legitimate users. For the most part, these surges were not successful in disabling government systems.

This form of attack is nothing new. Private web sites have been attacked in this way for years. Irregular Times was attacked in this way a couple years ago by people upset at our irreverent attitude about Islam.

Irregular Times was knocked down for a couple of days, but then we bounced right back. There was no lasting damage. We don’t have any dedicated technnical staff. We’re just a small group of writers. If we can withstand this kind of attack, then the government can deal with the issue easily.

The issue of denial of service attacks is worth paying attention to, because these attacks are an annoying nuisance that interfere with the ordinary free flow of ideals through the Internet. They should not, however, be exaggerated as a new front in the war on terror. Politicians like Adrian Smith who suggest that the USA is under threat from a devious foreign enemy that has the power to destroy the Internet as we know it need to turn down the volume of their rhetoric, and not give the hackers more attention than they deserve.

A particularly useful instruction is found next to the elevators on the first floor: “ALARM SOUNDS LIKE WHOOP”. Remember: Alarm does not sound like DING or OOOOOOO. Alarm sounds like WHOOP.

Practice that sound now, before you go to sleep.