Young man, you are an idiot.

Hawkridge is the coolest surname I've heard in a while.

It seems everyone this writer tried to contact for this story realized that as well. Love it or leave it--although apparently not via the air.

Are you still here?

Why?

If the TSA workers went on strike, would you cross the picket lines to scan people?

I do hope you have a happy Thanksgiving though unpaid intern (and all unpaid interns everywhere).

This line seems to counter your conclusion.

"As you might guess, I have no use for the TSA "

To paraphrase a friend of mine, it is fascinating how people will become so infuriated about scans and pat-downs, but invading, occupying, and bombing other countries is just a part of life. I don't like the TSA either, but in the scheme of the humiliations people around the world endure every day this is minor. For most of the world flying is an activity only for a privileged few, including unpaid interns pretending to be journalists.

Also, do yourself a favor and read some Peter Kropotkin, Emma Goldman, or Alexander Berkman. They are true libertarians.

@ Urgutha -- Thanks! Enjoy yours, too. And to answer your question, you'd have to put a gun to my head to make me serve as a TSA agent.

@ svensken -- If you really think my point about the bag was to call for a more activist TSA, then...I worry about you.

@ bhowie -- Are you trying to imply Kropotkin and Goldman would have supported TSA scans? Because I really don't think you've read them, then.

Your point about flying being a great privilege is beyond weak. You're creating this false scenario in which people who don't support scans do support imperialism and war abroad. The people at this protest were talking about this development being a consequence of blowback, for pete's sake. I'm a pacifist. And even if flying was some great privilege, that doesn't mean the government should be permitted to coerce people into giving their rights in order to exercise it.

So now the filthy scab wannabee is opposed to government produced radioactive pornography?

Unpaid Intern: Again, you missed my point. I would hardly say Kropotkin and Goldman would support scans and pat-downs, nor do I, nor was I trying to create an either/or scenario. But you are right that it's all a part of imperialism.

I was just trying to put it all into perspective. I was also trying to get a rise out of you, which is, I admit, trolling. I apologize for that and should know better.

I'm glad you are a pacifist and at least know who Kropotkin is.

Thank you ever so much for sharing your valuable opinions, Mr. Luby. It its truly a blessing that you are endowed with not only expertise in economics (And without need of education or experience! A miracle!) but you also can hold forth so wisely on subjects as disparate as airport security and direct action protests. Is there any subject you're not an expert on?

Dear Intern,

There is an experiment I have always wanted to try in the TARDIS. I want to shove a humanoid in the very heart of the TARDIS and see what would happen. No, not look into the heart of it but actually go into it.

Meet me at the corner of Republican and 15th in 30 minutes. I'll be hanging out in the blue police box parked on the corner by Walgreen's.

@ bhowie -- I have more than a passing knowledge of Kropotkin. I haven't read him yet directly, but I have read books like "To the Finland Station" that touch on his ideas. And FWIW, I have been to Stantsija Kropotkinskaja on the Moscow Metro and seen his jail cell in Petropavlovskaja Krepost' in St. Petersburg.

@ Fox -- Try harder. I actually majored in Economics at university. I'm in an economics book club here in town. I have econ lectures on my iPod. I know this is hard to fathom for a guy/gal like you who thinks cable news talking heads are public intellectuals, but yeah...that's how it is.

@ 12 -- Now see, Dr. Who references--this is somewhere that I will not even attempt to claim I'm an expert.

What a childlike response to my honest criticism.

You mention how you have no use for the TSA but here you are writing an article about their obvious flaws. It would have been a better argument if you omitted that line.

The bag is no conclusion and that knee in the photo brings into question whether it was unattended.

@ svensken:

Tell us what you think about the TSA, and in particular, its new nude body scanners, and sexual assault "pat downs" - if you dare. Do you have anything useful to contribute, or are you simply looking for distracting nits to pick.

I try to understand why people say things like this:

"You know, if it keeps someone from blowing up a plane, it's OK."

They don't need proof that it works or understand why we're doing it. They just need to know that some faceless security official (who maybe had a vested interest in selling backscatter machines) tells them it's the only way to stop the terrorists from knocking planes out of the sky.

I wonder at what point things become invasive enough for the average American to stop and question this security theatre... I'm eagerly awaiting the day the get out stirrups and forceps "because otherwise the terrorists might smuggle a bomb in their vahjayjays!" Ludicrous. We're a nation of fucking sheep.

And yet... it's still one of the greatest places to live. Sigh.

One question, *how* does the image of the scanners amount to NUDITY????

This is where I get off-the complaining train. Nudity is on xtube.com. Has anyone complaining ever *seen* a nude body? The images on these scanners is vague, impersonal, indistinct and only for the expressed purpose of determining explosive material and/or weapons. If doubters are so concerned with paid staff getting off with on-screen civilian images, they should protest the tons of CCTV in airports (+ everywhere else) and the people who monitor them from control rooms everywhere. Get over yourselves. Nobody is "getting-off" to your ambiguous computer image...and if they are, let them do it and get on the plane.

Btw, the only way the radiation exposure rates (to the avg passenger) become *dangerous* is if you're flying daily 360 days p/year. Basically, for excessive radiation to be a valid argument would require you to maintain a frequent flyer status comparable to pilots and crew. Not to mention that everyone is exposed to radiation from the actual flight...what are you going to do about that?!?

So-don't like pat downs? Go through the scanner. Don't like radiation, don't fly...and by that I mean, don't go to airports & literally-don't fly in the air on airplanes. Unless you're a pilot, crew member, or avg 1,000,000 AAdvantage miles p/year, this "controversy" is falsely equivalent to...nudity & fondling.

Matt, your whole oeuvre is bleating, "try harder, try harder." It's repetitive and meaningless. It doesn't bolster your credibility any more than your trying to sound Canadian. It's just sad.

The only thing more sad is to hear that you're not an empty-headed child. At least kids have an excuse. Of course, it could be that your economics education "at university" (*barf*) is as phony as your Canadian affect, but if you're not faking it, well... What a waste of an education. Sad indeed.

@ Jiqae:

" I try to understand why people say things like this:

"You know, if it keeps someone from blowing up a plane, it's OK."
"

They say things like that because blowing up a plane is ba aa aa aa aa aa ad.

"They don't need proof that it works or understand why we're doing it. They just need to know that some faceless security official (who maybe had a vested interest in selling backscatter machines) tells them it's the only way to stop the terrorists from knocking planes out of the sky."

They are oblivious to the tight connection between various state edicts and policy making, and the collaborative private profiteering that usually goes with it. It don't compute. Poor souls.

"I wonder at what point things become invasive enough for the average American to stop and question this security theatre... I'm eagerly awaiting the day the get out stirrups and forceps "because otherwise the terrorists might smuggle a bomb in their vahjayjays!" Ludicrous. We're a nation of fucking sheep."

There will always be morons around to repeat the ignorant lemming refrain:

"You know, if it keeps someone from blowing up a plane, it's OK."

"And yet... it's still one of the greatest places to live. Sigh."

Sadly. And this is now becoming more a statement about the sad state of affairs of the other places to live.

Miserable scab.

What I love is how we sucked the Washington Post into making this a national press event.

Naturally, a privately-owned and -operated TSA would never institute the full-body scanners, since private companies never put their consumers in danger...

Naturally, a privately-owned and -operated TSA would never institute the full-body scanners, since private companies never put their consumers in danger. The market forbids them to!

Also, Unpaid Intern,

What rights are people being "coerced" into giving up in order to fly?

To Unpaid Intern: Fuck you, you fucking scab.

To anyone who thinks these scans/sexual assaults keep us safe, pull your head out of the sand, dears. The grown-up nations are LTAO at our feeble attempts at security theater.

Luby, how great was security at the airports prior to the TSA. You know when we had private companies handling it? There has not been a single terrorist attack emanating from an American airport since the TSA was formed. We know of at least 3 when the security was handled privately. Read this interesting takedown on this Astroturf "Opt Out ' movement - http://exiledonline.com/tsastroturf-the-…

Why is everybody jumping on the author here? He's standing up for your rights not to be pointlessly irradiated and/or groped by strangers.

@25: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Amen…

Unpaid Intern - the Libertarian ideal is no more possible for humans than it is for bees.

@11: Bhowie wrote, "To paraphrase a friend of mine, it is fascinating how people will become so infuriated about scans and pat-downs, but invading, occupying, and bombing other countries is just a part of life. I don't like the TSA either, but in the scheme of the humiliations people around the world endure every day this is minor."

Bhowie, those humiliations people around the world endure every day are horrible. But we happen to live in a place where there's a Constitution that is supposed to protect us from government infringement upon our liberties. You can go help those other people revolt and institute a constitutional form of government, and I'll be over here working within the system, trying to draw attention to TSA running amok.

I don't like any of those things you listed. But when I talk about U.S. occupation of foreign lands -- and I do -- my voice is one of many thousands. Wednesday, I was one of about eight people down at Sea-Tac handing out information about passenger rights at TSA checkpoints (that's my knee in Matt's photo).

Similarly, there are plenty of causes to support that could reasonably be considered more important than drug policy reform, but that's what I spend the majority of my volunteer time working on. It doesn't mean I'm any less concerned about those other causes, just that this seems like a useful expenditure of my time, one that I'm comfortable making, and one that makes my efforts feel significant.

And I didn't think of this action at Sea-Tac as a protest, just a chance to go counter some of TSA's bullshit at a time when that effort was amplified by the media attention to "National Opt-out Day". TSA are a totalitarian agency, and now is the time to resist their spread into every aspect of our lives. Napolitano is already out suggesting that we expand the use of strip search machines into trains, boats, and public transportation.

@28: They're still pissed at him about his union articles. He's going to have to start posting under a pseudonym.

@29 key word "unreasonable"

I traveled on tuesday and opted out. They started to hassle me and took me to be patted down. Every time the tsa loser asked me to lift my shirt so he could see my belt i took it all the way off which amusingly pissed him off and he would yell for me to put it back on. I would then he would ask me again to lift my shirt so he could see my belt line- i again lifted my shirt all the way off. Same reaction- he yelled put your shirt on and i smiled. One more time because these guys never learn do they- "lift your shirt" i said shit dude i will take it off again and i did.
Then for my best amusement of the tsa circus as he bent down to pat my legs from behind i told the idiot, molesting, raping tsa guy that i would fart in his face if i could. what can he do, you sure can't arrest me for farting in the face of a tsa bent down to my ass. TRUE story.

@35/36: I'd be wary before trying your gassy scheme. At least one court has held that purposely blowing cigarette smoke into somebody's face to discomfort them, for example, could be considered a battery. Check out American Law Reports, 46 A.L.R.5th 813, for details.