There was a time when the United States of America was known as the land of the free. Home of the brave. And some very inventive people. Early Americans invented things like passenger ships powered by steam engines, cotton gins, and the Colt revolver.
Many hobbyists in America still pride themselves on their ability to build things from model airplanes to computer technology to timekeeping devices.
Hell, the inventiveness of some of those hobbyists turned them into millionaires, multimillionaires, or even billionaires.
Today, it might just land you in jail.
You have to love the Orwellian way this story starts out:
Police arrested 49-year-old Geoffrey McGann, after they say he tried to pass through airport security with an ornate watch, that had switches, wires, and fuses….
Yes. That’s right. He wasn’t trying to fly anywhere. He wasn’t traveling. He wasn’t an ordinary United States citizen trying to get from one place to another. He tried to pass through airport security.
The balls that man must have.
Is this really what the United States has become? A place where anyone who appears to be different — in this case because he didn’t get his watch from Walmart — is subject to arrest?
Yes, that’s the kind of place the land of the free, home of the brave, has become.
In fact, it’s worse.
A new survey commissioned by Infowars and conducted by Harris Interactive has found that almost one third of American adults would accept a “TSA body cavity search” in order to fly, with a majority of Americans also feeling a law that would make disobeying a TSA agent in any public place illegal is reasonable.
That’s right. One-third of Americans think that if a TSA agent wants to stick his (or her) finger up your ass, that’s okay.
And if you object, they’re okay with you being arrested for disobeying Mr. (or Ms.) Poopy Fingers.
Don’t think you can slip through the GAP — government’s anal probers — just because you don’t fly, either. Did you get the “in any public place” language?
Driving in your car, all by your lonesome, won’t necessarily protect you from anal digitization by a government agent. TSA recognizes — even if you don’t — that transportation encompasses more than just airlines. Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) can tell you:
[A]s TSA officials like to routinely point out, their agency’s acronym stands for Transportation Security Administration, not the Airport Security Administration. This fact has extended the TSA’s reach has [sic] far beyond the confines of our nation’s airports. Many of my constituents discovered this first hand [sic] this past fall as those familiar blue uniforms and badges appeared on Tennessee highways. In October Tennessee became the first state to conduct a statewide Department of Homeland Security Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) team operation which randomly inspected Tennessee truck drivers and cars.The United States of America. The country that stood for almost two centuries as the symbol of freedom and democracy.
My only hope is that as your unfriendly neighborhood TSA agent retrieves his, or her, fingers from your ass, they will accidentally pull your head out with it.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to decide between following in the footsteps of Samuel Colt, or moving to the land of the free.
Because the truth is, if you live in the United States today, the government thinks you might just be a terrorist. (Update 7/2016: link broken by censors)
I imagine with the Tennessee Road checkpoint it would be impossible to tell the TSA agent ” I do not consent to a search” wouldn’t it?