The best part of the story is that these things are called "VIPR Teams." When you learn what the acronym stands for, you'll understand how far they were stretching to give themselves a scary, scary name.
The TSA sends out its Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) teams to set up unannounced checkpoints used to “Dominate, Intimidate, & Control” American travelers. The purpose of VIPR teams is to maintain a presence in public areas and force travelers to submit to searches, including opening up bags and being patted down.... TSA records show that the teams ran more than 8,800 unannounced checkpoints outside of airports last year alone. These included searches at train stations, bus stations, the Indianapolis 500, the Superbowl, the Democratic and Republican national conventions, political speeches, and sports stadiums, more. CBS Los Angeles reported that TSA conduct an estimated 9,300 “suspicionless” spot searches of travelers in 2011.("Dominate. Intimidate. Control." is apparently the motto posted at the TSA's Air Marshal training center.)
Does that change anything for anyone from our previous discussion?
12 comments:
Sounds like they should be called DIC teams.
There wouldn't be much change in my point of view from the previous thread, of course.
VIPR works. There was a team of bad guys in the comics, I think "VIPER."
Valerie
Why do you insist upon calling them "baseless searches"?
Because they have no basis. A search on probable cause has some probability that a crime has been committed; a search on reasonable suspicion has some reason that can be articulated for the search. These searches are allegedly based on nothing, just random grabs out of the crowd.
And that's taking TSA's word about it. The best case for them is if these searches are baseless. If there really have some basis that is covert -- "Hey, he's black and young," or "Hey, he's got a Romney sticker" -- then it's worse. I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt by assuming the searches are baseless.
Well, I guess you could say that the basis is "It's the Indy 500".
But, to me, that seems a pretty thin basis. And further demonstrates the problem of a defensive seige strategy against terrorism.
Valerie: Yes, VIPR works, but 'DIC(k) team' is more descriptive.
YAG: This isn't really part of a war on terrorism; it's a war on citizenship. They aren't out there to DIC with terrorists, but to turn citizens into subjects.
Anyway, I should probably stop with the vulgarity now, but, like a kleptomaniac, I couldn't resist the low-hanging fruit. (Or the mixed metaphor.)
Unspoken motives aside, the *stated* purpose is to prevent terrorism and/or crime.
My husband, who is entirely of Cassandra's way of thinking on this issue, has been taking her part with me this afternoon. He points out that I prefer El-Al's security approach to TSA's, and that ElAl seems to include significant ethnic danger signals. (Although if "ethnic" means something more behavioral and less inborn, I don't have much of a problem with it.)
He also argues--and I'm not sure whether this is true--that a significant tool in Giuliani's successful cleanup of the armpit that NYC became in the 70s was stop-and-frisk programs that, if not completely random, were at least so subjective and ad hoc that they would fail my "articulable suspicion" test.
I still think this is a perilous direction to let the state go in, but I can concede that extraordinary measures may be called for in extraordinarily fouled-up communities. I would not like to see nationwide roadblocks where police stopped and searched every 10th car on general principles, even knowing that statistics show they would net a certain amount of contraband that way. But I can imagine making an acceptable case for "reasonable suspicion" that was based on the circumstances in a specific and thoroughly collapsed neighborhood rather than on the individual behavior of its residents.
There was a team of bad guys in the comics, I think "VIPER."
Wasn't that "COBRA"?
Police. State.
YAG: I'll concede that point.
T99: Like you, I'd want to see evidence that the SaF program was actually effective.
Even if it was, however, times have changed. Extraordinary circumstances may call for extraordinary measures, until the extraordinary circumstances have been changed. They are quite different now.
And nothing so far has answer my objection that SaF might never have been necessary if citizens had been allowed their natural right to effectively defend themselves.
EB: I used to think your 'police state' bit was silly. After the IRS and NSA revelations, however, I may have to concede that point as well. I need to think it through, though.
Andy, over at Ace of Spades, also connects NYC's earlier 2nd amendment violations with the perceived need for 4A & 14A violations with Stop and Frisk.
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