“Declaring that airport screeners shouldn’t be hampered by ‘political correctness,’ House Homeland Security Chairman Peter King has endorsed requiring people of ‘Middle Eastern and South Asian’ descent to undergo additional security checks because of their ethnicity and religion.”

How do you profile someone by religion? It’s so easy to lie about it.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:28 amWhat a dumbass.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:30 amwhy not address the root cause of terrorism?………oh, that discussion would have to include Israel…..me bad
August 17th, 2006 at 9:31 amLet’s just cut to the chase and put them in WWII style internment camps for the duration of the War on Terror.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:33 amThis turns my stomach.
Continuing to protect us from the last attack …
Of course, since 9/11, what actual incidents of ALLEGED airplane-based attempted terror (assuming you believe the propaganda) have occurred? The shoe bomber? And he’s white? He would have gotten past that kind of ethnic profiling.
Peter King must ride the short bus with the president.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:35 amI expect when Rep King is up for re-election, his opponent will have ready-made campaign commercials.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:36 amWhich means people like Timothy McVeigh will have an easier time getting past security. What’s to prevent “terrorists” from recruiting people who don’t fit the profile. Discontent with the status quo spans all ethnicities.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:38 amI agree. We should detain and strip search all the Christians first…..
August 17th, 2006 at 9:42 amIsn’t this illegal? It is discrimination. In the contitution, American citizens are given the inalienable right of not being discriminated against due to ethnicity or religion. Establishing that Muslims should get different treatment than everyone else is also preferencing religions, also constitutionally illegal.
Then again, when was the last time someone with an R next to their name cared about the constitution?
August 17th, 2006 at 9:43 amRep King has and always will be an emotionally driven retard.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:44 amLarry Person sez:
The shoe bomber?
Actually, there are numerous problems with the “shoe bomber” fantasy pushed upon us by our government. Lack of detonator caps, changing of reports about what type of explosive was allegedly employed, and the small fact that det cord cannot be lit with matches all point to the “shoe bomber” caper as yet another scare tactic pushed down our throats by the administration to keep us compliant. Remember this next time you’re told to remove your shoes at the airport.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:45 amAt this point, it appears the Repugs are actually working to create more anti-American sentiment among Middle Easterners. This seems irrational at first, but makes more sense once you realize they need an enemy if they are going to utilize fear and ‘National Security’ to stay in power.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:46 amYep, I’m sure terrorists will be jumping out of their basement apartments to declare that they’re Muslims, right?
Dumbass.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:46 am.
It is obvious that this is not about security, but about making calculated appeals to the racist base of the Republicans.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:47 amAnd how does one check for religion? The following will all be subject?
August 17th, 2006 at 9:48 amThe wearing of turbans? Yarmalkas? Forehead ashes on the first day of Lent?
Saffron robes? Beards? Dreadlocks?
Ah the first stages of creating home bred terrorism. Nice job King you dirtbag.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:50 am…and again, if we’re going to use religion to determine who is most likely to be a terrorist in an airport, then we need to do it right. Anyone who actively participates in religious activities should be screened while the atheists and agnostics can bypass the search.
Focusing on Muslim-looking people will not catch a John Walker Lindh or Tim McVeigh… and I don’t recall any atheist terrorists.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:51 am“…King, who has said that all Muslims aren’t terrorists but that all recent terrorists are Muslim, favors an ethnic and religious profiling scheme that would include foreign and American-born travelers…”
Notice how he was careful to put “recent” in there so we don’t give him any of our “Timothy McVeigh” nonsense. “RECENT! I’m talking about RECENT” says Mr. King. 1990’s don’t count. (forget about those Tamils or Nepalese Maoists or militias in Colombia, the only BAD terrorism (recently) comes from Muslims.
from #5 “I expect when Rep King is up for re-election…”-that’s right now.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:52 amBecause, hey, if a position isn’t politically correct, it must therefore be correct.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:54 amI think he personally should have to do all the screening, leaving his seat in Congress to someone less dipshitty.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:54 amThe London plot apparently included women with babies on board.
That eliminates screening by gender.
Screening by color is a slippery slope, indeed.
Religious fundamentalists will quickly learn to send white people
if they plan air terror.
Meanwhile, the general public will be delayed more, ridership will
diminish, airline corporations will crumble & ticket prices will rise.
Yeah, good idea King!
How about you go back to the ports & demand 100% screening of
containers? With events in Seattle yesterday, you’d think that the
awareness for the profile of attacks would be more urgent, eh?
Terrorists will not be bombing us from the air, they will sneak in the
components for whatever & detonate them at a planned time / point.
Maybe we could have George Allen screening anyone of color & call
August 17th, 2006 at 9:55 amthem names! That would give George something to do after he loses.
leiberman increased his lead over lamont to 12 points
August 17th, 2006 at 10:00 ameveryone from the kooky left should be profiled
August 17th, 2006 at 10:01 amI’m just glad that most of the racist pricks the R’s are appealing to these days have trouble finding their own ass. That means they’ll have trouble ‘werkin dem fancy new vot’n mahsheens’ and give up in favor of manking a run for more Bud Light.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:04 amlike that one
August 17th, 2006 at 10:07 am.
W H O
A R E
T H E
R E A L
T E R R O R I S T S ?
August 14, 2006
The UK Terror plot: what’s really going on?
I have been reading very carefully through all the Sunday newspapers to try and analyse the truth from all the scores of pages claiming to detail the so-called bomb plot. Unlike the great herd of so-called security experts doing the media analysis, I have the advantage of having had the very highest security clearances myself, having done a huge amount of professional intelligence analysis, and having been inside the spin machine.
So this, I believe, is the true story.
None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn’t be a plane bomber for quite some time.
In the absence of bombs and airline tickets, and in many cases passports, it could be pretty difficult to convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that individuals intended to go through with suicide bombings, whatever rash stuff they may have bragged in internet chat rooms.
What is more, many of those arrested had been under surveillance for over a year - like thousands of other British Muslims. And not just Muslims. Like me. Nothing from that surveillance had indicated the need for early arrests.
In all of this, the one thing of which I am certain is that the timing is deeply political. This is more propaganda than plot.
http://www.craigmurray.co.uk/ archives/ 2006/ 08/ the_uk_terror_p.html
T H E
T I M I N G
W A S
D E T E R M I N E D
B Y
K A R L
R O V E
T H E
T E R R O R I S T
.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:07 amSo we are going to overturn our civil rights in order to stop imaginary plane bombers? If so lets investigate all white Republican males as potential child molesters. Both ideas are equally ridiculous.
Lets see how many more people get killed in a new American Civil war than from planes exploding in the air. Oh if MA shows up the two sides in the Civil war will be the neoFascists against the supporters of Civil rights.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:08 amIs TP going to do something about these off topic spammers that hit every thread nowadays?
August 17th, 2006 at 10:09 amThe Topic is “Terrorism”
For those of you who actually believe that Bin Laden was involved in the 9/11 attacks, the FBI Most Wanted web site disagrees with you, and so does Wikipedia:
“The FBI does not yet have ‘hard evidence’ linking him to the 9/11 attacks and so as of 2006 he has only been indicted on the embassy murders; he is officially still only a suspect in ‘other terrorist attacks throughout the world’.”
http://www.fbi.gov/ wanted/ topten/ fugitives/ laden.htm
To each of you - go ahead, tell me again about the one where Osama Bin Laden attacked America on 9/11.
Anybody?
Anybody?
Have you actually LOOKED at the person in the fake Bin Laden video?
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/osamatape.html
The FBI declines to confirm its authenticity.
BECAUSE IT’S FAKE!
BIN LADEN DID NOT ATTACK US ON 9/11.
.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:11 amThis is the same pompadoured asshat that was claiming Democrats were racists for their stance on the Dubai Ports Deal.
See how the Republicans do it? Orwell would be proud.
-GSD
August 17th, 2006 at 10:12 amYesterday a talking head on Faux News proposed the same thing. Must have sent out a talking points fax from the RNC. Can concentration camps be far behind?
August 17th, 2006 at 10:13 amPlunger;
August 17th, 2006 at 10:13 amif you don’t want to talk on this topic, please go away quietly.
Just wondering. Was he wearing a Brown shirt when he made his statement?
August 17th, 2006 at 10:13 amEthnicity can be used for profiling if their is a compelling interest…this ruling supports numerous government programs (affirmative action, public health programs, academic admissions) where there are limited resources. Airport security is probably compelling from a government standpoint and would lead to an efficient use of resources. You won’t catch everybody just as every minority targeted government program does not reach everyone, but you’re more likely to nab a terrorist. I hardly think of 20 questions and a quick pat down as internment like the Japanese, heck I’m pretty sure I was profiled when I went to Britain a few years back (red hair, freckles, irish ancestry, young male)…I got the whole shebang while the rest of my friends went through without a problem.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:14 ammikep; I am sorry that you were targeted as the result of stereotype discrimination. Did you read the article? No one agreed that profiling would be affective in this case.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:16 amI see 19 comments and not one is of any value.
Why react to something that will not happen? Talk about something that is only put out to make noise and generate talking points for the right to use against all who are not like them, which is the rest of America. Fuck his GOP talking points.
Have a real discussion of national security. This shit at the airports security points is fake. There is no security provided by checking shoes, small knives, liquids, or any of the other shit we go through.
If the Bush administration is checking our use of telephone, checking our telephone records, reviewing our finical records, tracking our buy habits, tracking who is buying what items to make explosive devices, checking our political activities, checking our religions, reviewing our criminal records, tracking (changing our votes too?) our voting records, checking our medical records, and all the other things they are doing that is against the Constitution, abridging our rights as Americans, and against the laws of the United States of America then they can surely so an identity check and pull out those who are a threat and stop doing stripe searches of 10 years old and grandmothers.
Force the Bush administration and the GOP to provide a better solution than they have provided. The only thing this shit that is going at the airports does is create a fear factor for the travelers that are unable to understand that the GOP wants everyone to have fear and not security.
Fear First, Fear Last, and Always Create Fear for a better GOP lead America!
Stop the nonsense! Please!
August 17th, 2006 at 10:22 am#
Plunger;
if you don’t want to talk on this topic, please go away quietly.
Comment by Skeptic — August 17, 2006 @ 10:13 am
The topic is terror and security - the former of which we have more of and the latter of which we have less of due to this administrations wilfull efforts to make it so.
Terror is not limited to physical harm.
According to the US State Department, the definition of TERRORISM is not confined to the physical act of killing.
Terrorism occurs when a state utilizes fear tactics against its own people to accomplish political objectives.
The mere act or announcing a falsely construed terror alert - or overplaying the significance of a plot known not to be viable - is itself terrorism.
Tom Ridge admitted that many of the Terror Alerts announced under his command were in fact phony.
Remember the run on duct tape?
That was a clear case of state sponsored terrorism by the Government of the United States under the direction of Karl Rove against the people of the United States to achieve a political objective.
Karl Rove is a Terrorist under the definition ascribed by the US State Department.
So too is Peter King.
FEAR MONGERING IS TERROR.
.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:23 amskeptic,
It is definitely hard to figure out whether any profiling would be effective since there are millions of airport travelers everyday and only on rare occasions are there people seeking to do harm. Scientifically it would be difficult to prove any effectiveness. I work in public health and we often try to define the most at-risk groups. Similar methods can be applied and would likely require some information I would think from law enforcement. I’d try to discuss this more but i have to leave for work…:(
August 17th, 2006 at 10:24 amDude . . . . sounds like something junior bush would agree with.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:31 amWhy react to something that will not happen?
Comment by EasyRider — August 17, 2006 @ 10:22 am
Thats what Nazi oppositors thought back in 1937.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:32 amThe purported plot that precipitated this entire discussion involved supposed terrorists WHO HAD NOT EVEN PURCHASED AIRLINE TICKETS - SOME OF WHOM DID NOT EVEN OWN PASSPORTS.
There was no imminent threat.
The timing of the announcement was political - determined by Karl Rove - specifically to equate AIPAC’s Lieberman loss as a boon to terrorists. Additionally, the timing of this announcment ensured that news of AIPAC’s defeat in the US Courts (they tried and failed to have the AIPAC/Franklin Spy Scandal thrown out) would be buried in the terror news. And finally - Rove ensured that news of Israeli Spy and US Sailor Ariel Joseph Weinmann’s arrest for espionage would be buried as well.
If you’re not cynical - you’re not paying attention.
.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:33 amHouse Homeland Security Chairman Peter King has endorsed requiring people of ‘Middle Eastern and South Asian’ descent to undergo additional security checks
will this include hassidic jews ?
August 17th, 2006 at 10:39 amThe term “political correctness” is a way to ridicule folks who oppose discrimination based on race or religion, much like “collateral damage” is a way to dehumanize those you kill and maim in order to make the killing and maiming seem like it’s not a serious moral problem.
August 17th, 2006 at 10:39 amGo ahead, search granny
IN THE WAKE of last week’s London terrorist-plot arrests, some Americans are calling on the U.S. government to apply racial profiling to airport screening. Their argument goes something like this: Why should the federal Transportation Security Authority search little old white ladies when young Arab and Muslim men were behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and other terrorist plots?
The answer is: The feds should avoid racial profiling because it breeds discontent without enhancing security.
BTW: the writer of this article is a CONSERVATIVE!
August 17th, 2006 at 10:57 amTerrorism occurs when a state utilizes fear tactics against its own people to accomplish political objectives.
JUST LIKE HITLER DID to his people!
August 17th, 2006 at 10:58 amThis is the Rupublicants idea of being “strong” on National Security?
I guess they’re afraid to profile LEGITIMATE threats, because they NEED another attack to maintain their unproven argument that they’re BETTER(?) at keeping us safe. BULLSHIT.
Hey, why not simply add bomb-proof cargo boxes?
Oh yea, that might ACTUALLY be effective, and not likely to create the sense of fear so necessary to control the weak minded among us.
August 17th, 2006 at 11:01 amHow offensive can you get? Is my wife, a Filipina, now going to be presumed to be a terrorist and subject to additional hassling at airports? Peter King has gone off the deep-end on this one. I think the wiser course would be to subject all congressmen to additional screening to insure they are not racist bigots who will rubberstamp anything for Bushco and his Republican Guard and, if they are, censure them and remove them from congress to protect the nation from these “legislative terrorists”.
August 17th, 2006 at 11:03 amI’m so glad we’re taking this reasonable step. This will prevent future atrocities by Indonesian Muslim pigs like Timothy McVeigh or Ted Kaczynski
Oh wait.
August 17th, 2006 at 11:05 amFor some time now I have come to the conclusion that the bush administration has used fear and relegion to march our country back words…Get rid of the constitution and all rights that we use to have..I thought the time line was maybe 60 years of reversing all we had worked to progress our society. Hummm. Now it has become painfuly clear to me this merry bunch of evil incarnates are working in reverse back to the burning times. Having said that ..If I ever plan to get a pass port and viset my ancesters home of Ireland I had better have the tiny mole on my arm removed before I go through screening….Witches were burned for that tiny thing, also for having a cat, broom or a brush……Profiling, and ethnic cleansing must be their big plan..Use the air lines as a tool…What about the port’s.? How about the trains.? Shit why the hell don’t this bunch of basterds in charge just do their jobs instead of making up all this crap to cover their ass?.Why the hell are we allowing them to get away with all this……..When are we the people going to unite and take our country back.? Before many of us are put in concentration camps or burned at the stake please……Blessings
August 17th, 2006 at 11:08 amSharon Cox,
You are right.
August 17th, 2006 at 11:16 amOnce again I ask, How do you know what a persons religon is just by looking at them?
The mullet head repugnacans can’t adjust to the idea that not all people of any one color are all of the same religion. These morons seem to think that only Americans are christians. The depth of thinking that goes on in this nation is astonishingly thin. Conservative-repunacans JUST KNOW certain things and no thought process goes on beyond that. I could just slap the crap out of these people.
I feel better now. I’m going to go hunt down a funamentalist and start an argument.
August 17th, 2006 at 11:25 amThe realy sick thing is…It’s the anti christ and the profesed extreme fundamentelest christian types that have been doing the most killing and promoting war’s..Cases in point…Iraq..bush started and on going…Lebanon and Israel war…backed and promoted by bush…..Afrhan, started and on going by bush….War on the american public..started and on going by bush and his administration…When will all this end.?…..Blessings and Peace
August 17th, 2006 at 11:47 am@ #9, XBot
While I can see that what you’re saying has merit, I have to disagree with it. Why? Because what you said gives credence to the idea that the Constitution somehow “gives” us these rights.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. And one more for good measure - wrong!
The Constitution merely acknowledges that these rights are given to us - and every human being - by default. Whether or not a persons particular government acknowledges it - and notwithstanding the peoples acceptance of a lack thereof.
But I’ll say it again. The Constitution doesn’t “give” us a damn thing. It proclaims to the world that we stand as a people who refuse to settle for anything less than complete government acknowledgment our freedoms. The fact that we allow the government to take them away now is a shameful reminder of how abhorrently weak the people of this nation are.
If that does not sicken you, I beg you to find another country to occupy.
August 17th, 2006 at 12:55 pmHey maybe we can offer each person at airport check-in, immigration, entry in government buildings a slice of bacon. If they don’t eat it they must be Muslim and get increased scrutiny. The bacon test of patriotism.
August 17th, 2006 at 1:00 pm#45 “The term “political correctness†is a way to ridicule folks who oppose discrimination based on race or religion, much like “collateral damage†is a way to dehumanize those you kill and maim in order to make the killing and maiming seem like it’s not a serious moral problem.”
The term political correctness is treated like it’s a neutral term, although it’s really mostly a way of disparaging ideas. I mean, people hardly ever identify themselves as “politically correct” except to put themselves down. No, “politically correct” is almost always a reaction; it’s a put down, it’s what OTHER people are.
When you hear a politician say the words political correctness, it’s shorthand for “this is how an oversensitive elite who are out of the mainstream are attacking our sensible thinking, but sensible people like you and me know otherwise” A politician claiming to stand up to political correctness is establishing a group for his listeners to be threatened by, and identifying himself with “normal people” (the listeners).
Conversely, self proclaimed “politically INcorrect” folks use the term as if they’re being irreverent, or have an outrageous minority opinion and are being really brave for voicing it. Now, in some cases, they actually are being bold for going against a popularly held but unsustantiated opinion, but very often it’s a way of disparaging the people who they know will disagree with them, by implying they’re extremists or cowards for not standing up to the elite. Calling something PC very often is a way of introducing a stupid, unenlightened idea, like Rep. King’s, and saying that everybody who disagrees is doing it because they’re chicken.
August 17th, 2006 at 1:13 pmCan we please apply this same screening process to Christians in the government?
August 17th, 2006 at 2:29 pmI am so tired of all the Theists playing “My God can beat up your God!”
If your 25 year old son still believed in Santa you would be very concerned, but believing in God gets little scrutiny, strange.
Geez. It is about priorities for me.
The US Constitution is in tatters. The US government sanctions torture. The US government wiretaps without warrants and tracks our phone calls.
Are we supposed to get upset by racial profiling at airports? We can direct our energies to more pressing matters.
August 17th, 2006 at 2:42 pmthis idea is an invitation to the terrorists to catch us when we least expect it.
racial & religious profiling - despite being illegal - is like giving a terrorist a roadmap to defeating any security procedure.
we already know they have many recruits who don’t fit the profile.
if you want good security, you apply the same procedure to ALL people.
August 17th, 2006 at 3:01 pm“…requiring people of ‘Middle Eastern and South Asian’ descent…”
As the poster above implied when he talked about his Filipina girlfriend, it can be VERY difficult to distinguish people of Middle Eastern and South Asian descent from other similar-appearing people with completely different ethnic origins. Case in point:
I sing with a group which tours from time to time. In 1988, well before 9/11, well before even the FIRST Iraq war, but after Munich and Lockerbie and other hijacking incidents. We toured Hungary, Yugoslavia, and Italy. To get from Yugoslavia to Italy proper, we sailed across the Adriatic on an Italian ferry ship. We crossed from Yugoslavia into Italy at Trieste, Italy, then across the Adriatic from there.
We were all on a bus. The tour coordinator seated at the front of the bus had a manifest with all our names, and we had just passed our passports to her as we pulled into Trieste.
The Trieste port authorities boarded the bus, glanced at the manifest, which stated that we were a touring choir, where we had been and where we had sung, and where we were going to in Italy (Venice, va bene!) They also just glanced us all over. They spotted Arnold, one of our singers, and of Mexican heritage although a U.S. citizen whose family had also been in the U.S. for several generations. We also had two other members of Mexican descent with Hispanic names, but Arnold was the only “swarthy” member of our group. (Also a member was black but they didn’t care about him.)
They pulled Arnold off the bus, despite the fact that his last name was Hispanic, NOT Arabic, NOT southern Asian of any stripe. But just because he was “swarthy”. They questioned him for some time, and finally let him back on the bus, and waved us through. No one else on the bus was pulled off or questioned in any way. And how much more harmless can you get than a touring choir, for God’s sake?
I was really steamed for Arnold’s sake and said so to him. He just shrugged it off. He was obviously used to being hassled, as in DWB, “driving while brown”. But this attention to him wasted our time and that of the port authorities.
I also remind you that one of the suicide attacks against airlines in the 80s (I believe the Lockerbie incident), the suicide bomber was an IRISH woman enamored of an Arabic man, who smuggled the explosives on board in her vagina. So Peter King’s “profiling” wouldn’t have picked her up, would it?
To the person who suggested the “bacon test”, the trouble with that idea is that Orthodox, Conservative, Hassidic Jews, etc., also don’t eat pork products. Not to mention vegetarians regardless of religious belief or lack thereof.
Profiles of behavior have been developed. Much more sensible to apply those, to require secure cargo containers, etc., then to engage in useless profiling simply based upon one’s presumptive ethnicity.
August 17th, 2006 at 3:32 pmWolfdaughter, don’t you see that everyone who doesn’t eat the bacon is with the terrorists. If you’re Jewish you’d eat the bacon because George Bush loves the Jewish people and you are helping the terrorists if you don’t eat the bacon. The same goes for the vegetarians, we all know they are terrorists. By the way, both of these posts are sarcasm.
August 17th, 2006 at 5:16 pmWhat a plan. I guess next we’ll have to bring back slavery that way your master can answer for you. Look at lease you wont have minorities taking planes anymore. That way we can keep our friendly skies safe making sure the only the right people can fly let the others use ground transportation. Our past is coming back really fast and who would have known there were so many KKK members in our government at lease now we know who they are. Talk about coming out of the closet.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:17 pmIsn’t Peter King that rather swarthy looking Congressman from Long Island?
maybe he needs to stand in that line to which he refers.
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April 13th, 2008 at 4:58 am