On Wed, 21 May 2008 07:18:44 CDT, Dennis Henderson said: > In the US, anything considered "taking action " or "necessary" violates some > civil or constitutional right or is leaked out by some "conscientious > objector". It would seem some organizations care more about keeping their > phone calls private than allowing the government to do its one > constitutionally mandated function; Protecting us from all enemies, foreign > and domestic.
And exactly how far are they allowed to trample over our Constitutionally mandated freedoms to do it? Should the President be allowed to say "screw even the minimal oversight of the FISA court" and do mass wiretapping of US citizens with zero oversight? In case you didn't notice, he came out and admitted flat out that He. Broke. The. Law. Are we a nation of laws or of men? And do you *really* think that all of the "Security Theater" with trying to get on board a flight actually does any good, when *anybody* who has half a brain can get into the restricted areas of the airport? Consider the following two items from Dave Farber's I-P list about a week ago: > From: K.E. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: May 12, 2008 2:49:16 PM EDT > To: "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, David Farber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: Security and Pittsburgh's Airport > > The airport is restricted private property but if you know someone > and get your name on the list and go shoot animals. > Video: Hunting On Pittsburgh International Airport Property > > Favorite Quotes: > > The airport should have a professional wildlife biologist on site, > as have many other major airports, including Philadelphia and > Cleveland. Those airports contract with the USDA for that service. > Pittsburgh does not. > > Allegheny County Airport Authority gave 28 of its employees > exclusive rights to hunt deer on its 9,000 acres in and around > Findlay Township. > You can carry a gun and shoot . You can even bring your friends with > you and no one at the airport knows who those people are. > http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/16192688/detail.html > "The airport authority allows those 28 authorized employees to bring > buddies along, and officials have no idea who those buddies are. We > do not track the names of the guests," Jenny said. > > Just how many deer live on the airport's 9,000 acres is unknown, > because according to a 2007 USDA document, the airport authority has > never commissioned a deer density survey. > Even without the study, the USDA says current density far exceeds > the recommended five-to-12 deer per square mile. Second item: > From: Vadim Antonov <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: May 12, 2008 6:57:15 PM EDT > To: David Farber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Cc: ip <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: Re: [IP] Security and Pittsburgh's Airport > David -- just to make it clear - deer on the airfield are a very serious > safety issue. Much more serious than all terrorists in the world - the > likelihood of hitting a deer and wrecking the landing gear (with likely > fatal outcome for the pilot and passeners) is much higher than being a > victim of a terrorist attack. And this is not like "no one knows who > these people are", they have to be escorted by a cleared airport employee. > > Besides, "non-authorized" personnel can easily walk onto airfield through > the general aviation parking and FBOs in *all* US airports. As a member of > a flying club I got codes to combination locks on gates in different > airports, so I can pick up aircraft during off-hours - and I didn't have > to go through any clearance process. I can easily bring firearms, too, - > no one's looking, and it is not prohibited (i.e. one can rent an airplane > to go for a hunting trip). The only "guns prohibited" signs I've seen in > GA areas are at the entrances to the federal facilities such as control > towers, radar sites, etc. Heck, I do not even have to show my ID to get > keys to an aircraft, as long as I know the name under which the > reservation has been made, the a/c registration number, and smile nicely. > > The "access to airfield" controls are security theater, plain and simple, > designed mostly to impress and intimidate the sheepie. It is nearly > impossible (and prohibitively expensive) to secure a civilian airfield > against an intruder which has minimal tactical and camouflage skills (and > a bolt cutter, if he's too lazy to climb over the fence), so no one really > tries. > > So this article should be read as a barely covered pimping for more funds > to TSA (and more useless restrictions and hassle for the rest of us), and > not as a valid alert about some new security threat or especially lax > attitude of the airport administration, with obligatory anti-gun paranoia > mixed in for a good measure. There's an airport across the street. There's a chain link fence around it. Nobody actually expects the fence to stop a determined human - it's only to stop *our* local deer from wandering out there. And by and large, it works, as I often see deer on our side of the street, and only rarely have I spotted them on the airport grounds in the 18 years I've been working across the street. A chain link fence is sufficient to stop a *real* threat to many airports. What *real* threat are they stopping with the "no liquids" policy, especially when there's a lot of low-wage people that work on the other side of the security perimeter who can probably be bribed to sell you the *special* bottle of liquid that you gave him before he went on shift? Or any of the 3 zillion *other* ways to attack airport security that are obvious and not much is done about them because they are *HARD* problems to solve - for instance, there's a *really* nice queue of several hundred people on the *outside* of the security checkpoint, where one explosive device could get them all. But that's too hard, so we'll make you remove your shoes and belt and throw out your bottled water and lighters - but you can take your laptop on board, complete with all of the improvised weaponry that you can make with it: A broken CD shard has nice sharp corners, probably works just as well as boxcutters, and we know how well *those* work. Anybody who's carrying around a 3-5 foot Ethernet cable has a garotte. The lithium battery is a *much* more interesting fire source than anything you could have cooked up with liquids in the bathroom. Oh, and did anybody mention that most of the interesting liquids require you to *sit there and watch it* for a half hour or more? Meanwhile people are gonna be banging on the door... If all else fails, the battery and a sock make a nice improvised blackjack...
pgp3UXfv17qYZ.pgp
Description: PGP signature
_______________________________________________ Fun and Misc security discussion for OT posts. https://linuxbox.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/funsec Note: funsec is a public and open mailing list.
