Bend Over Please 

The Washington Post is reporting that TSA screening methods may change:

The federal agency in charge of aviation security is considering major changes in how it screens airline passengers, including proposals that an official said would lift the ban on carrying razorblades and small knives as well as limit patdown searches.

Banning blades I can reasonably understand. Nail clippers and nail files, and giving people flack over different types of pens (happened to my sister several times) I don't get.

An initial set of staff recommendations drafted Aug. 5 also proposes that passengers no longer have to routinely remove their shoes during security checks. Instead, only passengers who set off metal detectors, are flagged by a computer screening system or look "reasonably suspicious" would be asked to do so, a TSA official said Saturday.

Don't you love vague definitions like that? "Reasonably suspicious" really means "anyone we damn well feel like." I'd almost prefer it if they just came out and said, "people of arab decent". Sounds horrible I know... I debate this one with myself a lot.

It also suggests exempting several categories of passengers from screening, including federal judges, members of Congress, Cabinet members, state governors, high-ranking military officers and those with high-level security clearances.

Of course it does! After all, why should the people who make the rules be forced to follow the rules and be inconvienced like the rest of us? No! If you make a rule, you have to live with it yourself damnit! This is the United States where laws are supposed to apply to everyone equally.

Chris Sells worries about this last part for a different reason:

Can't you just picture the movie where the terrorists kidnap a Cabinet member, hold their family hostage and use them as a mule to blow up some airplane? I'll take the anal probes at the airport, thank you.