Sheesh, my mother in law would never be allowed on a plane, if a friendly attitude was THE deciding factor!

Terrorism has many faces…

Some more familiar than others.

My sympathies. They are getting more subtle at this sort of thing. It used to be a big read â€Sâ€.

Pretty soon the technology will be such that they will be able to read your mind and automatically ship you to Gitmo. Air Force 1 and Air Force 2 will be exempt.

I’m surprised it wasn’t stamped with a yellow star or some suchness. Progressiven sind nicht erwunscht!

Speaking of snooping, check this out: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/003927.php (Kinda blows the BushCo claims of ’executive privilege’ out of the water, eh?)

disarm, margaret, disarm! first rule of charm: self-deprecating humor.
response to how’s the book selling: â€i can’t give ’em away. ya want one?â€
you also need a biz card for an attorney specializing in TSA harassment, with a funny motto.

Fear and disgust trip off the behavior detection alarms? When you’re anticipating treatment like that in the security lines, who wouldn’t feel fear and disgust? I’m afraid you’re going to get â€pulled over†every single time, Marcy. This kind of thing is disgusting. So much for not being worried about our government unless you’re a terrorist.

one year ago this past june as i went through u.s. customs in sfo upon returning from the balkans, following the thorough physical inspection and â€mutt and jeff†questioning, i was ushered to the next phase of the â€behavior detection†process… my laptop, my digital camera, my cd’s and dvd’s, and my flash memory sticks were taken without warrant and not returned to me until three weeks later… i have since passed through u.s. customs five more times – thankfully not at sfo – without incident, but, i can tell you, NOT without trepidation… i am certain that my laptop’s hard drive was imaged and that, very likely, surrepitious and undetectable tracking and reporting software was added… fortunately, i had already purchased a replacement and now only use that particular laptop for back-up… it’s an ugly world out there, marcy…

http://takeitpersonally.blogspot.com/

You’re on the list, too—welcome to the club. It’s a big tent. If ’Jodi’ has driven home any point, it’s that some of your most avid readers are critics…

I don’t think they miss any of your e-mails or telephone calls, which is why your business cards might have been of specific interest (they sometimes have interesting alternative numbers written on the back; business cards, particularly the ones we carry with us, tend to carry addition personal information). Who might you be talking to off the record?

EW – I would not have related the following story on the blog were it not for your experience, but here goes. At the end of July I took a weekend trip to Seattle from the Great White North, where I bought a t-shirt in the Pike Place Market, black with white lettering on the front: â€B U * * S H * *†. The seller told me that he all kinds of trouble keeping them in stock – as an aside, I don’t know where the alleged silent minority of 25% is hanging out, but I saw no evidence of them in Seattle. Anyway, I was foolish enough to wear said T-shirt (under a jacket, but likely visible were one to look hard enough) to the airport on the way home. I had booked through Air Canada, but they operate by United in the US, and when I checked my bags an â€S†was written on my boarding pass in red ink by the clerk. As soon as I entered the security area, I was motioned aside to enter a special line and searched and interviewed by different TSA people (even before they saw that my boarding pass had been marked with the dreaded scarlet â€Sâ€. So I must have been tagged some other way from the moment I left the baggage check. Perhaps I was being followed, perhaps I was being watched on CCTV, like a Vegas casino. Perhaps it was the copy of David Talbot’s book â€Brothers†on JFK and RFK that I was carrying in my hand to read for the flight – not kidding). I was then given the full â€can we see your papers? why were you in Seattle? where did you stay?†treatment. I chose not to get snarky, because at this point, I was becoming a little alarmed at being subjected to surveillance in the airport, and tried to be as pleasant as possible. I am now concerned that I have an asterisk the size of Barry Bonds next to my name every time I enter the United States. I hope everyone feels more secure as a result.

All this â€no-fly†list and â€behavior detection†crap is designed for one thing: to intimidate Progressives from flying, thus rendering them less effective as opponents to Regressives (so-called Conservatives).

What’s perhaps more worrying is that the TSA apparently believes behavior detection works. Behavior detection, as described in the McClatchy link, smacks of psychic mind-reading, i.e. magic. But hey, that’s Regressives for you: they’ll believe anything their priests and diviners tell them, no matter how ludicrous.

Does the name on your ticket match the name on your drivers license? It is a problem anywhere you fly if your ticket name doesn’t match your id.

In the military,(got this second-hand, I’ve never personally served) that â€red-xed†order that was waiting for those who were designated, would have initials and signitures on it going all the way up to the General who gave the orders in the first place, right down to the individual who does the profiling.

Would it be reasonable for an American Citizen to expect a similar document should be provided to them after they are profiled, as a â€receipt†of their profiling?

And shouldn’t those same American citizens have the right to depose anyone who laid their initials or signature on that list, to inhibit their individual rights, if only to be profiled?

Because, in essence, these people all bcome â€accusers†when they perform these profiles, and according to our most basic laws back to the magna charta, and included in numerous references in our own constitution, WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO FACE OUR ACCUSERS!!!â€

If those red S’s and X’s don’t represent an accusation, I must have misubderstood the meaning of the word when I learned it as a child.

Like I said, to anyone who might be responsible for putting those lists together, please sign all those documents legibly, so we know who you are.

We will have some questions for you when the COnstitution is once again something more than a GD piece of paper.

This is not a threat, it is just an observation, a look into the ebb and flow of political pendulum inevitability.

If YOU put the names of your fellow Americans on any kind of check-list, and you signed that order or document as an agent of the government that represents those very people, you better have a very good explanation ready.

Because you WILL be required to provide one.

What ever happened to the Fourth Amendment? How is any of this reasonable?

I frankly don’t know how I haven’t been through secondary, since I have a dreaded hyphenated name with even weirder spelling of first, middle and last names and a known identity as a party member. Believe me, I counted my blessings when they hassled the old white lady in front of me this last trip; she’d packed a cooler with all sorts of liquids, gels and creams, not having checked the regulations for carry-on contents. She was given the full search of her bags, all the while whining about to her middle-aged son: â€They’re taking my foot cream!!†I tried not to mutter under my breath about stupid Republicans while witnessing this shakedown. Hey, she asked for it and still she’s not happy; what’s up with that? Doesn’t she feel safer like the rest of us, knowing that she’s been disarmed of her foot cream?

Maybe he knew it was a book because he had actually read it, Marcy! Ya think?

I used to fly all over the world in the Tech biz, logging enough miles to get constant upgrades and â€hi there Mr. Marksb, where you going today?†from the attendants. When I had long hair and jeans and I’d fly in from Asia, I’d get the question-and-search number. But years latter, with short graying hair and wearing black and a sport coat, coming in from Europe, I started getting the same treatment.
Finally I took the customs office-in-charge aside and asked him, what am I doing here that triggers the system to pull me out of line? I understood it when I was coming back from Asia with long hair and a hard-sided overhead projector case, but I’m Mr. Conservative-dressed-in-black now, what gives?
â€Ecstasy. You used to look like someone smuggling heroin from the Golden Triangle, now you look like someone smuggling ecstasy from Europe. Sorry.â€
You can’t win with these guys.

Marcy-
But your name is still associated with the e-ticket. I was asking if that matches your id.
I haven’t had a paper ticket in years, but I always have to make sure the ticketed name matches my ID.
Perhaps you have more stringent security BECAUSE there is a Congressman on board. Security is why Pelosi wanted access to an AF transport, no?
Regardless, I am certain most TSP employees, like other government employees, are Democrats.

â€They were extremely courteous and quite thorough..â€

Like I said, if they can take our names, we can take theirs.
When this is over and we get to peek at the truth, I wonder how many names will be redacted from the records?

Doesn’t matter how courteous they are, (I know, it was the Brits, but it holds even more true on this side of the pond)putting names of US Citizens on lists simply based on their political affiliations reeks of Rovism, like some psycho-partisan skunk stinking up our precious democracy.

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR PUTTING THOSE LISTS TOGETHER?

Simple question, the answer should be easy enough to discover, it is with us every day because they are obviously STILL DOING IT!!

We need to keep a record of those who kept the records, the ones who made up the lists, and trace it back when the balance of power is restored to our Constitution.

That list will no doubt unweave a web of well-connected strands.

I mean seriously, if they’re not keeping an eye on ew, who are they watching? She’s practically bringing the government/Bushco down all by herself, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some Regent Law grad working in the WH/4th branch whose only job is to read TNHew/TPM/DK/GG/FDL/TP/WHW (in that order), and line them up with TSP reports on our blog all-stars. I don’t think you should worry about the obvious security situation in an airport. I would be more concerned about the car parked down the street or the clicks on the phone, or whatever it is these days–and you’re going to figure out and have a better idea about how domestic surveillance works these days before anybody else. Let’s just say it started with the red X. And it’s actually not funny, because they seemingly could go to the next level of the unitary dictator at any time. I for one couldn’t fathom the idea in August/Sept 03 that Bush could possibly get elected, and yet he did. If â€they†somehow snatch â€victory†in 11/08, by whatever means, people like ew and other high profile dissenters could be in front of unAmerican activities committees. I’m sure they were somewhere on the PRM agenda. I don’t think anything of this will happen, but it’s probably worthwhile to remember that it could, and that’s what ew and others are fighting against.

If we spend billions of dollars building up a security network, then those folks will always have to work to keep their jobs. And so they do. But what are their priorities? Are they really interested in writers and scholars, or are they chiefly interested in dissenters (especially lawyers, bankers, doctors and such)?

You should have some new biz cards made up.

I have a buddy who has a stack of â€your own personal jesus†cards, with a little graphic of Buddy Jesus on it. On the bottom it says, â€Someone to hear your prayers. Someone who cares.†He never fails to get a laugh out of me when he pulls one out.

You could have one that says â€Ignorance is Strength†on the front and an image like this on the back:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wi….._Award.jpg

On the serious side, the science of this goes back to the early 80’s.
An article gives an overview,
So says social psychologist Mark Frank, whose revolutionary research on human facial expressions in situations of high stakes deception debunks myths that have permeated police and security training for decades. His work has come to be recognized by security officials in the U.S. and abroad as very useful tool in the identification and interrogation of terrorism suspects.

By applying computer technology to the emotion-driven nature of nonverbal communication, Frank, a professor of communication in the School of Informatics at the University at Buffalo, has devised methods to recognize and accurately read the conscious and unconscious behavioral cues that suggest deceit.

His research already is employed by investigative bodies around the world and, Frank says, â€It can be applied to the training of security checkpoint personnel to help them identify and decode ’hot spots,’ the subtle conversational cues and fleeting flashes of expression that betray buried emotions or suggest lines of additional inquiry.â€

Isn’t that just grand? I feel warm all over, knowing that folks with a two-week TSA training program under their official uniform belt are detecting my behavioral intent by my non-verbal communications in the most frustrating environment in the country–the airport.

I meant to add that I knew some soc researchers at UCSB in the early 80’s that were using video of Nixon speeches to find and document facial micro-movements when he would voice a lie. They put together a â€greatest hits†video of Nixon’s non-verbal ’tells’ that was amazing. Tricky Dick was not a good poker player…

bmaz,
you make-a me laff.
i was hoping for a twist on â€frisk,†though…or â€oogling.â€
â€you oogle, we google. No frisk, no risk.â€
i dunno. needs work. send it to marketing asap.

and marksb–that sealed letter is a good idea. we ALL should have a sealed letter that we take in our suitcases, just because.
if i fly one way, i get the treatment.
otherwise, i’m untouchable. you know, blonde.

CORRECTION:
Ryan Bird, from Milwaukee, was detained in September, 2006. He was told that Freedom of Speech does not apply while inside an airport.

Back in the good old days when I flew, and before 9/11, I always took a Salman Rushdie book along as plane reading. It always brought what was then â€security†up short, but they didn’t know exactly what to make of it.

I think when I drive down to Ohio I will load up the back seat with the complete works of Salman Rushdie.

Back in Civil Rights days I had the delight of driving down to Mississippi to deliver a Black History Library for a couple of Freedom Schools. Those road blocks were worse, largely because most of the officials also belonged to the local Klan. In those days our attitude was â€I dare you†take my copies of Fredrick Douglass out of my car.

People need to adopt the same attitude.

I hesitate to tell this, but I can’t resist. I have a relative by marriage who works for one of the â€outsource†companies connected to Homeland Security (I have no idea what she does.) She gave us a Homeland Security Christmas ornament as a stocking stuffer. (That there are such things is a cause for astonishment. I wonder if government funds were spent to make those things – shiny, brass.. )

We had had luggage searched on the way to the holiday, leaving everything looking as if it had been the play yard of ferrets. So, packing to go home, I very carefully laid the HS ornament on the top of the stuff in one suitcase. That suitcase, of our three, was the only one not searched, it arrived home pristine.

every single card?

you gotta be shittin me …

That for sure would have set off a micro-expression from me.

Sara

I got mugged in Berkeley back in the early 90s. In my bag were Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex (in French). It took me about 100 tries, trying to explain those two books to the cops who responded to our call. I’d have been better off if I had been reading some romance novel.

http://www.matthewgood.org/2007/08/hotlive/

Hot/Live that’s what the US customs officer at Detroit Metro Airport wrote on my customs declaration form as he asked me to follow the blue line.

I’ve been getting on and off of planes since the tender age of 6 months, so I’ve had my fair share of travel stories. This trip actually went pretty smooth until I arrived in Detroit, and so as I was a few feet away from the exit, I was flagged by customs. I guess the phrase “I’m moving back from Lebanon†isn’t too popular.

The customs officials at the end of the blue line checked my luggage after questioning me about the reason I was in Lebanon and other Middle Eastern countries that I had visited during my 4 year stay. They were actually very polite and I wasn’t really bothered until they pulled out my laptop. At first I thought they probably want me to just turn it on to make sure I wasn’t hiding a bomb in it. But then I was asked to put in my password and soon one of the customs officers was going through my personal files and photos. Something that really bothered me, I felt a complete invasion of privacy.

I was questioned behind the reason I had a document saved from a Lebanese newspaper, I then explained my interest in middle east politics and that I used to write for Dose and I blog occasionally. This was followed by the question “Do you write anti American materialâ€. I said I didn’t, that I mostly concentrated on Middle East politics but for some reason one of the officers said that sometimes even Americans wrote anti American material. I really wanted to say that those are probably the ones that are in jail. They then asked for the websites addresses that I blog on (So Matt, you might get a couple of extra fans)I just thought the wording was interesting, I mean asking if I criticized US politics is one thing but to ask about Anti-American material made me feel like they were insulting my intelligence. I mean even if someone was would they really admit it???

And so while cruising through my photos, a water bottling plant layout came up and I had to clarify what it was and explain yet again that I am an environmental engineer after all. In all reality I doubt a person who is planning to commit any terrorist act would be dumb enough to just store the info on their personal laptop.

Now on to the major reason I am writing this… Does anyone know what the phrase (Hot/Live) on the customs form means? At fist I thought hey I might be getting a date out of this whole ordeal but once they started with the questioning I knew it must be something else.

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