Processed Deli Meat Could Cause Bladder Cancer
November 17th, 2010
Natural News
By: David Gutierrez
Processed meats have once again been linked with an increased risk of cancer — this time of the bladder — in a study conducted by researchers from the National Cancer Institute and published in the journal Cancer.
Researchers examined the diets of 300,000 adults in eight U.S. states, and used that data to estimate participants’ intake of nitrates and nitrites, which are used to preserve processed meat and have been implicated as carcinogens.
“Nitrate and nitrite are precursors to N-nitroso compounds (NOCs), which induce tumors in many organs, including the bladder, in multiple animal species,” the researchers wrote.
Participants were aged between 50 and 71, and were followed for eight years. The researchers found that while consumption of non-processed meat was not linked with bladder cancer, higher consumption of nitrates from processed meats increased the risk by nearly 30 percent.
High consumption of red meat (both processed and unprocessed) was associated with a non-Hispanic white ethnicity, being a current smoker, having a high body mass index (a measure of obesity), having a higher beverage and daily calorie consumption, less physical activity, lower educational level, younger age, and a lower intake of fruits, vegetables and vitamins C and E.
The study is only the most recent in a long chain of studies linking processed meat consumption to an elevated risk of numerous cancers.
“A recent study conducted at the University of Hawaii shows that even moderate consumption of processed meats causes a 6,700 percent increase in pancreatic cancer (that’s a 67-fold increase in cancer risk!),” writes Mike Adams in Spam Filters for Your Brain.
“Thus, consuming these foods causes cancer. Yet, these packaged meat products appear to be perfectly healthy, thereby distracting you from their true nature, which is that of chronic disease.”
Click here for the full report from Natural News
Texas Officials Covered Up Dangerously Radioactive Tap Water For Years
November 17th, 2010
Raw Story
By: Stephen Webster
Texas officials charged with protecting the environment and public health have for years made arbitrary subtractions to the measured levels of radiation delivered by water utilities across the state, according to a series of investigative reports out of Houston.
Those subtractions, based on the test results’ margin of error, made all the difference for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ): without the reduction, demonstrated levels of dangerous radiation would have been in excess of federal limits for years.
This was being done in direct contravention of an order by the US Environmental Protection Agency, which told state regulators in 2000 to stop subtracting the margin of error.
The findings are part of an investigation by Houston CBS affiliate KHOU.
Confronted by reporter Mark Greenblatt, TCEQ staffer Linda Brookins claimed that the radiation was “natural” and people shouldn’t be concerned. She also refused to read on camera the EPA’s order to stop subtracting margins of error from radiation test results.
KHOU called it “Texas math,” in part two of its ongoing series.
Thanks to the TCEQ’s under-reporting of radioactive content, one particular water provider in Harris County was able to skirt needed maintenance for years, even though uncensored tests showed radiation was almost always above legal limits.
Independent tests, the station noted, showed that some of the radiation contained harmful alpha particles, which can cause cell mutations and increase the risk of cancer.
The practice of under-reporting radiation continued until last year, when the EPA once again demanded Texas comply with the law.
The state, governed a large majority of Republicans, has long flouted the EPA’s air quality standards, with TCEQ officials claiming the federal agency does not have the authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.
“What was illegal and a bad idea yesterday is illegal and a bad idea today,” TCEQ chairman Bryan W. Shaw told The Dallas Morning News. “We won’t see any environmental benefits from this. We’ll just see the additional bureaucracy associated with permitting in this state and across the U.S.”
In an editorial, the paper called Republicans’ fight to protect industry over environmental regulations a “dangerous roll of the dice” when it comes to federal dollars, noting that new regulations require the state to create a permitting authority to govern emissions, but it refuses. When the new rules take effect next year, the state’s energy industry could effectively be brought to a standstill, with no new construction being permitted.
And now water standards, it would seem, may be the next major clash between Texas regulators and federal authorities.
“Is this what [Governor] Rick Perry means when he talks about standing up to the feds?” The Texas Observer asked.
Click here for the full report from Raw Story
The Fast-Food Industry’s $4.2 Billion Marketing Blitz
November 17th, 2010
Grist.org
By: Tom Philpott
Last week, I praised fast food, which has probably been around as long as people have lived in cities.
But there’s a particular type of fast food that goes back just a half-century, dating to the post-war rise of car-centered cities and suburbs. It relies on regimentation, weird additives, flavor “engineering,” super-cheap (but highly subsidized) ingredients, and super-expensive marketing. I won’t bore you with why I think this type of fast food sucks; wouldn’t want to be labeled a food snob!
But let’s talk about that marketing. Yale’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity has just put out an extraordinary report on fast-food industry marketing.
Here’s the report’s headline number: $4.2 billion, which is how much the industry spent marketing its wares in 2010.
To put that amount in perspective, consider the Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion, the USDA’s sub-agency that “works to improve the health and well-being of Americans by developing and promoting dietary guidance that links scientific research to the nutrition needs of consumers.” Its annual budget? $6.5 million, according to The New York Times reporter Michael Moss.
So $4.2 billion vs. $6.5 million. That means that for every $1 the industry spends haranguing Americans to eat stuff like Burger King’s 2,500-calorie Pizza Burger, about a tenth of a penny gets spent urging folks to eat their spinach.
And of course, as Moss’ superb recent piece shows, the USDA also openly collaborates with the industry to cajole people to eat more corporate fast food.
A $4.2 billion marketing budget in 2009, a year characterized by a brutal economic slump, is the sign of an extremely profitable industry. Corporate fast food is what is known as a “countercyclical” industry — it tends to thrive when the economy goes to hell. When money is tight, McDonald’s dollar menu looks like a bargain — and stuff like Domino’s now-infamous eight-cheese Wisconsin Pizza seems like a reasonable indulgence.
How well are these companies doing? The stock market gives us a clue. Over the past two years, shares of Yum! Brands (owner of owner of KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, and Long John Silver’s) and McDonald’s have both more than doubled. Meanwhile, the overall stock market, as measured by the S&P 500 index of the nation’s largest publicly traded companies, has flat-lined. In other words, investors are quite bullish on junk food corporations.
When times are flush, the industry is using its $4.2 billion marketing stash largely to cultivate new generations of customers: i.e., kids. The Rudd report doesn’t estimate how much of the fast-food industry’s marketing budget is directed at children (a 2006 study estimated a tidy $1.6 billion), but it offers a dizzying array of data to demonstrate the industry’s devotion to this dubious cause. Get this:
The average preschooler (2-5 years) saw 2.8 TV ads for fast food every day in 2009; children (6-11 years) saw 3.5; and teens (12-17 years) saw 4.7.
People have been scolding the fast-food industry for marketing its wares to kids for years. The industry’s response? A ramped-up effort to market its wares to kids:
Compared to 2003, preschoolers viewed 21% more fast food ads in 2009, children viewed 34% more, and teens viewed 39% more. … McDonald’s and Burger King have pledged to improve food marketing to children. However, both restaurants increased their volume of TV advertising from 2007 to 2009. Preschoolers saw 21% more ads for McDonald’s and 9% more for Burger King, and children viewed 26% more ads for McDonald’s and 10% more for Burger King.
There’s also an uncomfortable racial aspect to fast-food marketing — these companies evidently see major opportunity in selling product to African-American and Hispanic families:
McDonald’s and KFC specifically targeted African American youth with TV advertising, websites, and banner ads. African American teens viewed 75% more TV ads for McDonald’s and KFC compared to white teens.
How is all of this marketing working? The proof is in the whining. In a survey commissioned by the Rudd Center, 40 percent of parents report that their children ask to go to McDonald’s at least once a week, and 15 percent of parents of 2- to 5-year-olds report that their children harangue them for a Mickey D’s trip every day. As a result:
Eighty-four percent of parents reported taking their child to a fast food restaurant at least once in the past week; 66% reported going to McDonald’s.
What to make of all of this? To me, it underscores the importance of the National School Lunch Program. School lunches are our society’s most concrete, tangible way of transmitting foodways to rising generations. The public-school cafeteria is where we create a public vision of what the food system should be. In short, it’s the public contribution to the formation of kids’ eating habits. And it is in the cafeteria, I think, where the fast-food industry’s marketing efforts could be effectively rebuffed.
Unfortunately, I don’t have much good news here, either. Currently, we spend about $11 billion annually on school lunches — of which two-thirds goes to overhead and labor costs. That leaves about $4 billion to spend on ingredients — roughly equal to the fast food industry’s marketing annual budget. Per child, schools have about 90 cents per day to spend on ingredients.
At those levels of funding, it’s no wonder that public-school administrators are increasingly outsourcing cooking to … the fast-food industry, which knows a thing or two about engineering low-quality ingredients into something people will crave. And guess what? The USDA is cheering them on. Listen several minutes into this boring radio clip, and you’ll hear a Domino’s exec babbling about how USDA officials are helping the company get its pizza into school cafeterias. And if that doesn’t kill you, here’s a report about a Connecticut town that has invited McDonald’s PR flacks into its public schools to provide nutritional counseling.
There are school districts that are trying to teach kids other visions of what food is. Grist contributor and parent-turned-school-lunch-activist Ed Bruske is writing about the one in Boulder, Colo., right now — and how it’s struggling to balance the budget after tossing the junk food out.
Meanwhile, San Francisco is about to become the first major city to ban chains from providing toys in certain fast-food meals. The measure has aroused scorn — what will San Francisco ban next? the Times’ Freaknomics blog asked. But when cash-strapped parents and school districts are up against $4.2 billion in carefully plotted ways to get kids to beg for fast food, any public effort to fight back seems welcome.
Click here for the full report from Grist.org
U.S. Doctors Still Too Cozy With Drug Industry
November 17th, 2010
Reuters
By: Julie Steenhuysen
Doctors in the United States are still too cozy with drug companies, although they have managed to break some of those ties, U.S. researchers said on Monday.
The team at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital did a national survey of 1,900 primary care doctors in 2009 about their contacts with drug companies.
They found 84 percent reported some type of relationship with drug companies, compared with 94 percent in 2004.
About two thirds accepted drug samples, 70 percent accepted food or beverages from drug companies and 14 percent accepted payment in exchange for their professional services, they reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
“We found a significant decline overall in the percentage of physicians who have relationships with industry,” Eric Campbell of Massachusetts General, who led the study, said in a telephone interview.
In the team’s first study of industry ties in 2004, getting drug samples or accepting lunches or other food from drug company salespeople were most common, followed by payments from drug companies for attending medical meetings or continuing education seminars.
Since then, several government and academic groups have pressured doctors to sever their ties to drug companies.
Members of Congress, including Senator Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican, have been pushing to limit the influence of drugmakers over the practice of medicine after a probe showed a noted Harvard neuroscientist had failed to disclose payments from drug companies.
The moves appear to have paid off, Campbell said. Doctors in the survey say they now have fewer meetings with drug company representatives, dropping from an average of three a month to two.
But Campbell said the numbers are still unacceptably high.
He said doctors continue to think they cannot be influenced by free drug samples or a fancy lunch — a notion he said defies basic social science.
“Cultures to the beginning of time have figured that gifts engender a positive response toward the giver. What’s hysterical is the fact that physicians deny that these happen,” said Campbell, who also teaches at Harvard Medical School.
“It’s absolutely ludicrous to think that drug companies would spend all their time and money giving away this stuff if it didn’t work.”
Click here for the full report from Reuters
Backlash Grows Over TSA’s ‘Naked Strip Searches’
November 17th, 2010
CNET.com
By: Declan McCullagh
Two months ago, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced that the federal stimulus legislation would pay for the purchase of hundreds of controversial full-body scanners.
“Through the Recovery Act, we are able to continue our accelerated deployment of enhanced technology as part of our layered approach to security at airports nationwide,” Napolitano said at the time.
The number of scanners has roughly doubled since Napolitano’s announcement and they are now found in 68 U.S. airports, and the Transportation Security Administration says the controversial devices have proven to be a success.
“We have received minimal complaints,” a TSA spokeswoman told CNET yesterday. She said that the agency, part of DHS, keeps track of air traveler complaints and has not seen a significant rise.
A growing number of airline passengers, labor unions, and advocacy groups, however, say the new procedures–a choice of full-body scans or what the TSA delicately calls “enhanced pat-downs”–go too far. (They were implemented without much fanfare in late October, amid lingering questions (PDF) about whether travelers are always offered a choice of manual screening.)
Unions representing U.S. Airways pilots, American Airlines pilots, and some flight attendants are advising their members to skip the full-body scans, even if it means that their genitals are touched. Air travelers are speaking out online, with a woman saying in a YouTube video her breasts were “twisted,” and ExpressJet pilot Michael Roberts emerging as an instant hero after he rejected both the body scanning and “enhanced pat-downs” options and was unceremoniously ejected from the security line from Memphis International Airport.
One lawsuit has been filed and at least two more are being contemplated. There are snarky suggestions for what TSA actually stands for, attempts at grope-induced erotic fiction, and now even a movie.
These privacy concerns, and in a few cases even outright rebellion, come as an estimated 24 million travelers are expected to fly during the 2010 Thanksgiving holiday season. One Web site, OptOutDay.com, is recommending what might be called strict civil obedience: it suggests that all air travelers on November 24, the day before Thanksgiving, choose “to opt-out of the naked body scanner machines” that amount to “virtual strip searches.”
Normally, that kind of public outcry might be enough to spur TSA to back down–after all, in 2004 it relaxed its metal detector procedures to allow passengers a second try, and a year later it relaxed its rules to allow scissors in carry-on bags. Plus, the U.S. House of Representatives (but not the Senate) approved a bill saying that “whole-body imaging technology may not be used as the sole or primary method of screening a passenger.”
But with a lame duck Congress not even in session until next week, no hearings on full-body scanners currently scheduled, and renewed concerns about explosives in printer cartridges, an immediate reversal seems unlikely.
Instead, TSA is defending its practice. “TSA constantly evaluates and updates screening procedures to stay ahead of evolving threats, and we have done so several times already this year,” a spokeswoman said. “As such, TSA has implemented an enhanced pat-down at security checkpoints as one of our many layers of security to keep the traveling public safe.”
“Administrator John Pistole is committed to intelligence-driven security measures, including advanced imaging technology and the pat-down procedure and ordered a review of certain policies shortly after taking office to reinforce TSA’s risk-based approach to security,” TSA said. “We look forward to further discussion with pilots on these important issues.”
TSA’s official blogger, who uses the apparent pseudonym Blogger Bob, went so far as to say this week that: “There is no fondling, squeezing, groping, or any sort of sexual assault taking place at airports. You have a professional workforce carrying out procedures they were trained to perform to keep aviation security safe.”
Another possible catalyst for an eventual change in screening procedures is a lawsuit that the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a nonprofit advocacy group, filed against the TSA and Homeland Security last week.
“The agency went off the rails in the spring of 2009 when it decided on its own authority to make body scanners the primary screening technique in the United States,” says Marc Rotenberg, EPIC’s executive director. “We think there had to be a public rulemaking. We think the conduct implicates freedom of religion. We think it implicates the Privacy Act.”
EPIC’s lawsuit is ambitious. It says that TSA should have conducted a formal, 90-day public rulemaking to “fully evaluate all privacy, security, and health risks” and wants the D.C. Circuit to require the agency to conduct one. In addition, making full-body scanners the primary method of screening violates the Fourth Amendment, the suit says, because the scans are “far more invasive than necessary.”
In September, the D.C. Circuit shot down EPIC’s initial request for an emergency halt, saying the standards for a preliminary injunction against TSA were not met. Rotenberg remains optimistic, saying “these are obligations that are written into federal law” that TSA must follow. (This time, EPIC is not asking for an emergency injunction.)
The ACLU says it’s also weighing a lawsuit but has not filed one so far.
TSA has “always done pat-downs,” but until recently they haven’t been so aggressive, says Chris Calabrese, legislative counsel at the ACLU in Washington, D.C. “The pat-downs never used to go up a woman’s skirt.”
“It’s become troubling,” Calabrese says. “You’ve got these controversial naked strip search machines that they’re rolling out at airports across America. And if you choose not to go through the naked strip search machine, you’re subject to this (level of intrusive physical contact). It seems punitive. It seems designed to drive you to the naked strip search machine.”
Click here for the full report from CNET.com
Body-Searching Children: No for the US Army, Yes for the TSA
November 17th, 2010
The Atlantic
By: James Fallows
Please read the note below. A US Army staff sergeant, now serving in Afghanistan, writes about the new enhanced pat-down procedure from the TSA. Summary of his very powerful message: to avoid giving gross offense to the Afghan public, and to prevent the appearance of an uncontrolled security state, the US military forbids use on Afghan civilians of the very practices the TSA is now making routine for civilian travelers at US airports. Here is what he says:
>>In reading your post and the most recent one from Mr. Goldberg about the War on Terror and pedophilia, I am disturbed. What bothers me is that I am on the verge of re-deploying from Afghanistan after a 10-month combat tour that involved having to deal with, among other things, conducting searches of local nationals when involved with security tasks within my Infantry company. At no time were we permitted or even encouraged to search children or women. In fact, this would have been considered an extreme violation of acceptable cultural practice and given the way word travels here, been a propaganda victory for the Taliban.
Yet somehow the TSA is engaged in this at home while my unit and I spent our tour unable to safeguard ourselves equally in an environment where the Taliban have often disguised themselves in burkas and used children as both spies and fighters. While I have no conflict with the necessity to safeguard civilians against terrorism or with the risks we all voluntarily assumed as Soldiers, it seems as if the bureaucracy has become so obsessed with safety that we have forgotten that war entails risks beyond those of physical combat. If we are truly at war, then we need to decide what civil liberties we truly view as negotiable and which are inviolate- otherwise the greater risk than underwear bombers at home will be losing the values that make us unique as a nation.
These people terrify us as much as we allow them to. Apparently FDR’s idea about “the only thing to fear” is lost on TSA and the current administration.<<
Everything about security involves a balance. “Perfect” security would mean complete controls on freedom, elimination of privacy, etc. Someone who is now exposed to real, daily danger in Afghanistan because of decisions about the proper balance argues that we need to be braver society-wide. Yes, soldiers accept different risks from those that are tolerable for society at large. But this is profound and powerful testimony.
Click here for the full report from the Atlantic
Pilots and Passengers Rail At New Airport Patdowns
November 17th, 2010
Reuters
By: Jeremy Pelofsky
Stepped-up security screening at airports in the wake of foiled terrorism plots has provoked an outcry from airline pilots and travelers, including parents of children who say they are too intrusive.
With the busiest holiday travel season nearing, fliers face long security lines and new rigorous patdown checks begun in recent weeks aimed at discovering hidden explosives. As a result, some travelers are questioning whether to fly at all.
The Transportation Security Administration has ramped up airport security after two plots by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. A Nigerian man hid a bomb in his underwear last Christmas and the group tried to send package bombs via U.S. cargo carriers but none of the explosives detonated.
To thwart such attacks, TSA is deploying body scanning machines to U.S. airports but travelers and pilots have complained about potential health risks and that they are too intrusive. The alternative is a physical patdown by a TSA officer.
“Pilots are not the terrorist threat,” said John Prater, president of the Air Line Pilots Association and a veteran pilot for United Continental. “Seeing scarce security resources being used on pilots makes absolutely no sense.”
Some pilots, male and female, have complained the patdowns make them feel uncomfortable. The group urged any pilot who feels unfit for duty afterward to “call in sick and remove themselves from the trip.”
That has prompted urgent talks between the pilots’ group and TSA Administrator John Pistole. The two sides hope to resolve the matter in a few weeks, Prater said.
‘GATEWAY TO COMMERCE’
Executives from the travel industry, including online travel sites, theme parks and hotels, were set to meet Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Pistole on Friday to discuss their concerns that security is crimping travel.
“We have received hundreds of e-mails and phone calls from travelers vowing to stop flying,” said Geoff Freeman, an executive vice president of the U.S. Travel Association, which set up the meeting with the Obama administration officials.
“You can’t talk on the one hand about creating jobs in this country and getting this economy back on track and on the other hand discourage millions of Americans from flying, which is the gateway to commerce,” he said.
Privacy groups have challenged the new body scanners in court, saying they are a violation of privacy and illegal. Lawmakers plan to hold hearings on aviation security next week when they return to Washington.
Some travelers are also livid about how children are being screened. During a trip last Sunday by a father and son through Orlando airport in Florida, the 8-year-old boy was selected for extra screening by TSA after going through the metal detector.
The father said the officer described the procedure before conducting it. Then he patted down the boy in the open security area, using the backside of his hands to check his genital area, he said.
“I didn’t think it was going to be as horrible as he was describing,” said the boy’s father, Bill, who works as a lobbyist in Washington and did not want his full name used.
Click here for the full report from Reuters
TSA Rage Hitting All Age Demographics Now
November 17, 2010 by Andrew
Filed under Government
November 17th, 2010
Time.com
By: Megan Gibson
It seems like pretty much everyone hates the TSA these days.
After refusing a full body scan, John Tyner in San Diego was told that he’d have to submit to a pat down. Tyner then recorded his conversation with security personnel, where he tells them, “If you touch my junk, I’ll have you arrested.” He was also threatened with a $10, 000 fine. The video, and the controversy over TSA practices, has received some serious attention online. CNN covered the story Monday.
And on the heels of this story comes news of another passenger getting dramatically irate with security. Although this time it’s a 3-year-old girl being searched.
The TSA at an airport in Chattanooga, Tenn. conducted a body search on the three-year-old daughter of a television reporter, Steve Simon, after the little girl set off the metal detector twice. Dad then recorded the incident on his phone and the video shows a terrified Mandy being searched by a guard, screaming and crying the whole time.
Whether or not you agree with the TSA security measures, it is a bit of a head-scratcher to hear of a terrified three-year-old being searched by a guard, or extra security being requested because a traveler requests that his “junk” not be touched.
Then again, sometimes security doesn’t even know who is getting on the plane — so maybe you never can be too careful.
Click here for the full report from Time.com
TSA Screener Terrorizes 3-year-old Girl
November 17th, 2010
The Examiner
By: Joe Newby
Imagine taking your family to the airport and watching as Federal agents terrorize your 3-year-old child.
That is exactly what happened to little Mandy Simon.
She was first forced to surrender her teddy bear, and ended up getting flagged for further screening.
As the girl’s mother held her, the TSA agent scanned her with a wand, and then proceeded to give the girl a more thorough search. As the screener searched her, the frightened girl screamed for the agent to stop touching her.
The girl’s father, Steve Simon, works as a reporter for CW-39 from Houston, Texas, and managed to capture the encounter on his cell phone camera.
In the video, the girl is clearly traumatized as the TSA screener attempts to search her.
But the question remains – what is the TSA doing screening toddlers like this? Do they honestly think the little girl is concealing a bomb in her stuffed toy?
Terrorists have been known to use children in places like Iraq, but Houston does not have a history of bomb-wielding toddlers.
The TSA is charged with providing security on our airlines, but many are questioning their methods.
The Dallas Morning News reported last Monday that:
The TSA recently changed its hand-search policies. Before, the officers would use the back of their hand to check a person; now they are to use their open hand and fingers to go over one’s body, including the genital area and breasts.
Mike Cleary, President of the US Airline Pilots Association, issued a statement which read, in part:
“Let’s be perfectly clear: the TSA procedures we have outlined above are blatantly unacceptable as a long-term solution. Although an immediate solution cannot be guaranteed, I can promise you that your union will not rest until all U.S. airline pilots have a way to reach their workplace … the aircraft … without submitting ourselves to the will of a TSO behind closed doors.
“This situation has already produced a sexual molestation in alarmingly short order. Left unchecked, there’s simply no way to predict how far the TSA will overreach in searching and frisking pilots who are, ironically, mere minutes from being in the flight deck.
“As we all know, it makes no difference what a pilot has on his or her person or in their luggage, because they have control of the aircraft throughout the entire flight. The eyewash being dribbled by the TSA in this instance is embarrassingly devoid of common sense, and we will not stand for it.”
The agency is also under fire for the use of a scanner that can see through a passengers clothing. As reported by CNN Travel, passengers and pilots alike are up in arms over the scanners.
A group called National Opt Out Day is calling for travellers to opt-out of the screenings on Thanksgiving Day – traditionally the busiest flying day of the year.
After the incident with Mandy Simon, TSA officials said that screeners would undergo “sensitivity training” in order to deal with children better.
Perhaps the TSA should include a course on common sense followed by a course on the Fourth Amendment, which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures.
In the meantime, they should keep their hands off our children and our bodies and instead focus on keeping terrorists off of commercial aircraft.
Click here for the full report from the Examiner
‘If You Touch My Junk, I’m Gonna Have You Arrested,’ Man Tells TSA Agent After Refusing Body Scanner
November 17th, 2010
Raw Story
By: John Byrne
TSA threatens man with lawsuit, $10,000 fine after refusing pat down
A man trying to board a plane at San Diego International Airport refused the airport’s “backscatter” machine (which takes a snapshot of items beneath a passenger’s clothes) got into an altercation with a Transportation Security Administration agent after telling him he’d have him arrested if he touched his “junk” — and captured the entirety of the incident on his mobile phone.
He posted it to the web, along with an extended blog post on Saturday. He said he viewed airport security policy as “sexual assault.”
“I stated that I would not allow myself to be subject to a molestation as a condition of getting on my flight,” he wrote in an extended blog post.
The incident comes on the eve of an effort by pilots and flight attendants to protest the new machines. A group leading an effort they say is intended to allow flyers to “see for themselves how the government treats law-abiding citizens” has called for a national boycott of the body scanners Nov. 24.
“We’re going to do a groin check,” the agent says, at about 3:32 into the video.
“If you touch my junk, I’m gonna have you arrested,” the main replies.
“Security is everyone’s responsibility,” booms the airport announcer. “We recommend you keep your luggage and personal belongs in view at all times.”
At his blog, the man writes:
A male agent (it was a female who had directed me to the backscatter machine in the first place), came and waited for me to get my bags and then directed me over to the far corner of the area for screening. After setting my things on a table, he turned to me and began to explain that he was going to do a “standard” pat down. (I thought to myself, “great, not one of those gropings like I’ve been reading about”.) After he described, the pat down, I realized that he intended to touch my groin. After he finished his description but before he started the pat down, I looked him straight in the eye and said, “if you touch my junk, I’ll have you arrested.” He, a bit taken aback, informed me that he would have to involve his supervisor because of my comment.
We both stood there for no more than probably two minutes before a female TSA agent (apparently, the supervisor) arrived. She described to me that because I had opted out of the backscatter screening, I would now be patted down, and that involved running hands up the inside of my legs until they felt my groin. I stated that I would not allow myself to be subject to a molestation as a condition of getting on my flight. The supervisor informed me that it was a standard administrative security check and that they were authorized to do it. I repeated that I felt what they were doing was a sexual assault, and that if they were anyone but the government, the act would be illegal. I believe that I was then informed that if I did not submit to the inspection, I would not be getting on my flight. I again stated that I thought the search was illegal. I told her that I would be willing to submit to a walk through the metal detector as over 80% of the rest of the people were doing, but I would not be groped. The supervisor, then offered to go get her supervisor.
After TSA turned him around, and told him he couldn’t get on his plane (they threatened him with a lawsuit and a $10,000 fine), he asked American Airlines for a refund:
I made my way over to the American Airlines counter, explained the situation, and asked if my ticket could be refunded. The woman behind the counter furiously typed away for about 30 seconds before letting me know that she would need a supervisor. She went to the other end of the counter. When she returned, she informed me that the ticket was non-refundable, but that she was still trying to find a supervisor. After a few more minutes, she was able to refund my ticket. I told her that I had previously had a bad experience with American Airlines and had sworn never to fly with them again (I rationalized this trip since my father-in-law had paid for the ticket), but that after her helpfulness, I would once again be willing to use their carrier again.
At this point, I thought it was all over. I began to make my way to the stairs to exit the airport, when I was approached by another man in slacks and a sport coat. He was accompanied by the officer that had escorted me to the ticketing area and Mr. Silva. He informed me that I could not leave the airport. He said that once I start the screening in the secure area, I could not leave until it was completed. Having left the area, he stated, I would be subject to a civil suit and a $10,000 fine. I asked him if he was also going to fine the 6 TSA agents and the local police officer who escorted me from the secure area. After all, I did exactly what I was told. He said that they didn’t know the rules, and that he would deal with them later. They would not be subject to civil penalties. I then pointed to Mr. Silva and asked if he would be subject to any penalties. He is the agents’ supervisor, and he directed them to escort me out. The man informed me that Mr. Silva was new and he would not be subject to penalties, either. He again asserted the necessity that I return to the screening area. When I asked why, he explained that I may have an incendiary device and whether or not that was true needed to be determined. I told him that I would submit to a walk through the metal detector, but that was it; I would not be groped. He told me that their procedures are on their website, and therefore, I was fully informed before I entered the airport; I had implicitly agreed to whatever screening they deemed appropriate. I told him that San Diego was not listed on the TSA’s website as an airport using Advanced Imaging Technology, and I believed that I would only be subject to the metal detector. He replied that he was not a webmaster, and I asked then why he was referring me to the TSA’s website if he didn’t know anything about it. I again refused to re-enter the screening area.
As noted earlier in this post, a website is urging travelers to “opt out” from the body scanners and instead choose to have a pat-down in public view.
OptOutDay.com declares Nov. 24 to be the day when air travelers should refuse to submit to a full body scan and choose the enhanced pat-down — an option many travelers have described as barely short of a molestation.
The three videos the man produced about his interaction with TSA over refusing to use the airport body scanner follow.
Click here for the full report from Raw Story
