Wednesday, November 24, 2010 is National Opt Out of TSA Abuse Day

Mature Content

One would of course want to do more than just ‘opt out’ if a child were treated this way by the frighteningly imbecilic TSA. You know, the regular airport police really don’t much like the TSA people very much and are probably just itching for a good reason to arrest one or two.

I thought of a possible alternative to the TSA’s threat to arrest or financially penalize people who try to opt out of the full body nude scanners and the groin touching pat down. One could simply opt out of the scanner and then state that although not refusing the pat down a request for local or airport police observation of the pat down procedure is insisted upon because one has a real fear of imminent sexual assault. That would seem to me to put the TSA officers at a serious disadvantage legally and force local police to come to the scene. Just a few episodes like this will really jam up airport gates all across the country and then the hand-job President might get the message that we’re all just fine without hands in our pants.

At the very least, passengers all across the country should be filming with their cell phones just like the guy in the video above.

MUBI Presents Free Online Screening of Revolución

Tomorrow, Saturday November 20 through Sunday November 21, MUBI.com presents a free screening of Revolución.  Ten directors contributed films to the project which looks back at the violent upheaval of the Mexican Revolution and compares conditions then to the situation today in Mexico.

The MUBI screening event has a Facebook page with more information.

Go here to attend the MUBI screening of Revolución.

Obama Orders Touching of Genitals Nationwide

Mature Content – Language

When was it you realized that Americans had unwittingly elected a horrible president?  Was it when he decided to cover up photographic evidence of systematic atrocities by U.S. troops?  Was it when he took tax money to buy General Motors?  Was it when he decided to continue an illegal war of aggression against Iraq?  Was it when he decided to continue a Vietnam-like quagmire in Afghanistan?  Was it when he decided that he would let British Petroleum defecate into his mouth?  Was it when he began to falsify scientific research data about the water in the Gulf?  Was it when he decided that he could constitutionally force every American citizen to purchase health insurance from brutally self-interested corporations?  Was it when he decided to use the power of his office to forcefully defend the military’s anti-gay bigotry and discrimination?

Or was it when he ordered his Homeland Security employees to stick their fingers into your genitals if you decide not to allow the government to blast you with x-rays in a ‘full body scan?’

President Barack Obama has finally positioned himself, uniquely among modern presidents I think, so that actual physical resistance to a presidential order is not only logical but morally imperative.

The Transportation Security Administration is installing full body scan machines that use x-rays in airports across the nation.  If you refuse to be photographed naked and dosed with x-rays that many scientists are very worried about, the TSA will force you to accept a physical ‘pat down’ that involves the probing and touching of your penis, vagina, breasts, and buttocks.  In one airport, a woman’s blouse was removed in full public view to expose her bare breasts.  Nearby agents then taunted and mocked her for several minutes as she tried to regain her composure and escape the area.  This is a full-blown sexual assault that warrants a full physical response in self-defense, followed by prosecution of the TSA agents involved.

Why not just go through the full body scan machine?  Because it photographs you naked.  The TSA and the manufacturers have continually asserted that the machines cannot store images.  But they have been proven repeatedly to be lying about this and thousands of the nude photos have been stored by the machines.  Think about it.  Would you build a scanning machine that could not save the photograph showing a bomb strapped to someone’s butt?  Don’t you think you might need that photo in a courtroom trial at some point?  Of course the machines store images.  Only an idiot would think otherwise.  They also shoot radiation all over your body.  The pilots’ union is very nervous about this and wants pilots exempted from the machines.  Scientists are weighing in to say that the radiation can have long-term effects on the human body.  This is scary enough.  But stop to think about how these machines will sit in airports and be tended to by dimwits earning minimum wage.  Are we to expect these crotch-grabbing imbeciles to keep sophisticated x-ray machines in proper adjustment?  Will it take a baby getting barbecued in one of these things to wake people up?

Yet, the TSA asserts that it has the right to pursue incredible monetary damages against you if you refuse the full body scan and the genital touching procedure.  They can come after you even after they make you miss your flight and leave the airport.  Shocking.  The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals actually upheld this civil penalty right.

We are far down the rabbit hole when a person, who doesn’t want to risk his or her health to x-ray radiation managed by low-level government employees, cannot reasonably refuse having their genitals and breasts touched without being turned into a criminal and put at risk of at least a ten thousand dollar penalty.

These TSA people can feel the genitals of children also.  There’s no protection.  You think this is pretty bad?  Well it gets worse.  They can also go inside your pants.  If the agent decides that your clothing is a little too loose, they can go inside to feel your private parts.  They can do it to children.

If some dude in an airport touches my special Christmas package, I’m going to put his head on the floor.  I think anyone else should do just the same.

Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of Homeland Security, insists that the new procedures are necessary to thwart terrorist threats.  Bullshit.  These x-ray machines that they are trying to zap us with come from a company that employs the former Secretary of Homeland Security.  Sound odd?

November 24, 2010 is National Opt-Out Day.  People going through security at American airports are encouraged and expected to resist the governmental assault on freedom from unreasonable search – to resist being dosed with radiation and groped in the groin.  I frankly hope that Opt-Out Day turns into a real nightmare for the TSA and for airlines.  Thousands of people refusing to be assaulted by government goons will jam up airport lobbies very quickly.  Flights will be delayed.  Passengers will be asking for refunds.  The airlines will react with anger on Capitol Hill.

Terrorists don’t have to blow up airplanes.  Why are we allowing ourselves to be victimized at airports?  Terrorists can just as easily climb onto trains or buses and blow them up.  Will the TSA start touching our penises and vaginas at train stations and bus depots?  Why wouldn’t they?

On November 24 American air travelers need to stop pretending to be mild sheep in their own airports.  Have you ever noticed how when we set foot in an airport we suddenly become Mr. and Mrs. Proper?  We behave as if we are all the most casual of normal harmless little people without the least tendency toward even the slightest outburst.  We take it up the ass because we are all told to behave in just a certain way or we’ll be arrested.  It’s a waste of energy to worry too much about terrorists.  What air travelers should be more worried about is inattentive airline mechanics down on the tarmac.  That’s where the real damage is done.  Incompetence is far more dangerous than terrorism.

Americans have punched the idiot Obama hard in the face with the recent election results.  They can do it again by punching gropers.  ‘Touch my kid’s crotch and I’ll stick my fist down your throat.’  That’s the proper response.

One suggestion I have for our smiling President is that he should offer to demonstrate the new ‘pat down’ procedure on Secretary Napolitano.  He could reach those long slender fingers of his down into her business pants, lift a roll or two of fat out of the way, and give the Secretary a good finger job for national security.  We’d all be watching.

We all have a right to travel freely in this country without being subjected to dangerous radiation or getting groped.  We have shown our crappy politicians what our anger can do in the recent mid-term elections.  On November 24 let’s show them again.

Update 11/18: New York lawmakers are introducing legislation to prohibit the TSA from using the nude full body scanners at all airports in the state, including JFK, the largest international airport in the country.

Goethe’s Derl Erlkönig: A Film by Raymond Salvatore Harmon

Really frightening film adaptation of Goethe’s Der Erlkönig. Raymond Salvatore Harmon made this film that revels in the dark terror of fairy tales. It’s a densely layered film that conveys the sense of riding through the forest beautifully.  Those trees keep going by and the dolls bounce along on their horse.  Amazing! I love terrifying fairy tales!  A child, held tight in his father’s arms, senses a supernatural being of some sort approaching.  You’ve got to pay attention to this one right up to the end!

MOCA Film on Artist Alexis Smith

The Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles is producing a series of short films about LA artists in their studios. They sort of lean toward the cute clever artist in their oh so picturesquely messy work spaces mentality. But sometimes it’s nice to see a little mess and hear a few comments from an artist. I happen to like this one about Alexis Smith. I like her comments about not knowing where her art is going and how she keeps all this stuff around to make it with. I think what she means is that she just digs around in pile of crap and throws a whole bunch of junk together and suddenly goes ‘Oh wow! There it is!’  Of course, to do that you’ve got to have a really fine pile of junk.