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A threat level assigned to every passenger.

Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Civil liberties groups are objecting to a government plan for a new system that would check background information and assign a threat level to everyone who buys a ticket for a commercial flight.

I put this under the well the country might survive but the things that made it worth saving didn't. What do all of you think?

Comments

  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I, personally wouldn't mind.

    But, as you said, I can see many groups opposing it.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    it would take far too much money and time. when you think about it sensibaly, it would be nearly impossibe to do it. of all the people that fly every day. you can buy tickets over the internet, you can buy them with cash, you can buy them for other people... i've never bought my own airline ticket, how would they check me?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by my_name
    it would take far too much money and time. when you think about it sensibaly, it would be nearly impossibe to do it. of all the people that fly every day. you can buy tickets over the internet, you can buy them with cash, you can buy them for other people... i've never bought my own airline ticket, how would they check me?

    If the ticket isn't in your name, they don't let you board. How's that?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Greenhat


    If the ticket isn't in your name, they don't let you board. How's that?

    you give them the ticket at the gate and they let you in... dear shit, what kind of airlines have i been flying on...
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    my-name,

    oooohhh we are cheeky!:blush:

    Here in the USA you must prove who you are before you get to gate to board. AT that point ticket exchange would be pointless.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Murph the Surf
    my-name,

    oooohhh we are cheeky!:blush:

    Here in the USA you must prove who you are before you get to gate to board. AT that point ticket exchange would be pointless.


    ahhh ic, i guess its just my traveling ignorance. i, also from the usa, have always traveled with my parents or friends who are more responsible than me. i've always just stood in the background and answered random questions the've thrown at me and done anything else they've asked. i never put 2 and 2 together before :blush:
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Re: A threat level assigned to every passenger.
    Originally posted by pnjsurferpoet
    WASHINGTON (AP) -- Civil liberties groups are objecting to a government plan for a new system that would check background information and assign a threat level to everyone who buys a ticket for a commercial flight.

    I put this under the well the country might survive but the things that made it worth saving didn't. What do all of you think?

    You can't surrender freedom for security.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Re: Re: A threat level assigned to every passenger.
    Originally posted by monocrat


    You can't surrender freedom for security.

    Yes you can, it's happening as we speak. It's just not always a good idea.

    I'm not just concerned about the loss of privacy, but about the fact that this kind of profiling might not spot the real threats.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Monocrat I'd like to hear more on that.

    I do think this is the essential debate regarding Al Qaeda. It's much more of a concern than war. To me the war is a given. North Korea, Iran and Iraq do sell weapons and would sell low grade nuclear by-products to anyone. I have no doubt.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    No other nation sells or proliferates weapons and weapons systems to whoever can pay like we do pnj. If proliferation is a truly a concern with you, start by taking our giants to task (Lockheed Martic, Northrup Grumman, Boeing, Allied Research Corp, and numerous secondary and tertiary level suppliers).

    What's good for business my friend, is not good for America and certainly not good for the world.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Here's the ultimate irony regarding this new computerized, security plan: Pakistani's would be checked.

    And yet, who has been more instrumental than Pakistan in handing over our enemies? For instance, my friend is a Pakistani Muslim. If he visited his ethnic homeland and came back to his home, America, the computer would shoot his name out.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Scores of Pakistanis, some no older than yourself pnj, have fled NY (even some with Greencards) to seek asylum in Canada. When interviewed at the border many said they could no longer live in a nation so riddled with fear, xenophobia, racism, and authoritarianism. Given that they know all too well how bad life can get for average citizens under an authoritarian regime (currently financed by our own country), you should really be asking serious questions about what kind of a nation Bush and co are trying to establish whilst they have so many eyes diverted to some far flung troubled and struggling nations thousands of miles away.

    The real threat is right in our own capitol, lil man.

    You might be interest to note that these asylum seekers were decent kids, one of whom had to leave his HS and all his friends (with little more than the clothes on his back) to seek some sense of welcome and personal security. Doesnt say too much about our claim to being the land of the "free" and home of the "brave" does it? More like land of the controlled and home of the paranoid.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I know Clandestine, my friend's a Pakistani American. Many who fled to Canada came here for such reasons as being married to someone who wasn't first approved by the girl's father.

    The civil liberties questions are the biggest ones in this war.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Clandestine
    Doesnt say too much about our claim to being the land of the "free" and home of the "brave" does it? More like land of the controlled and home of the paranoid.

    I think this would happen to any society having to deal with a new threat, especially one of this magnitude. Remember, the same sort of thing happened in the 1950s, only with a political rather than religious/racial group as the target of fear and suspicion. And I feel the only reason this happens more in America than elsewhere now is that they were the most directly affected. Had attacks of the magnitude of September 11th been carried out against London, I suspect that a good many of the anti war protestors would be baying for blood.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Darth can I ask you something because you seem reasonable. Why were there no signs against Saddam or the French in the peace marches? I see no balance in the marchers' sense of justice. They seem to be at peace with people living in fear of being tortured and with the countries, like France, that keep Saddam in power.

    And you're right there is a lot of fear-driven laws in the US right now because these people lived here who attacked us.

    My friend's father, a Muslim Pakistani American, has an American flag on his house and car. I hope they are there out of patriotism...not fear.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by pnjsurferpoet
    Darth can I ask you something because you seem reasonable. Why were there no signs against Saddam or the French in the peace marches? I see no balance in the marchers' sense of justice. They seem to be at peace with people living in fear of being tortured and with the countries, like France, that keep Saddam in power.

    And you're right there is a lot of fear-driven laws in the US right now because these people lived here who attacked us.

    My friend's father, a Muslim Pakistani American, has an American flag on his house and car. I hope they are there out of patriotism...not fear.

    The peace marchers don't particularly care about balance right now. Their sole objective is to prevent the war, and if that means using biased arguments, so be it. Signs against Saddam or the French would cloud the uncompromising message that they are trying to get across, and possibly convince Blair that they are weak and can be safely ignored. They are using the same sort of simplistic message that the government is using, just for opposite ends. The government says "the war is good", the protestors say "the war is bad", and it all degenerates into something of a pantomime, with nobody bothering to point out that the issues here are complex and that there is no black and white answer. Unfortunately, that wouldn't make a good media soundbite, so nobody's going to say it.

    As for being at peace with people being tortured, I suspect that every last one of them considers Saddam repugnant beyond measure, but you have to understand that he is far from the only despot who tortures or kills anyone who gets in his way. Many of us are simply uncomfortable that Saddam alone has been singled out, when places like China (among innumerable others) also have a somewhat questionable history on human rights, and seem to get away without so much as a slap on the wrist. We also wonder why he's only being dealt with now, when we've known for a long time exactly what kind of tyrant he is.

    And as for Chirac, some of us over here in the UK reckon he's just holding on for some kind of extra oil concessions. Personally, I think he's doing it just to prove that he can. French governments do sometimes enjoy putting two fingers up to the US and/or UK just to annoy us.
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