Bill Ryan's Other Blog

I believe I was a college freshman when The Iceberg/Freedom of Speech… Just Watch What You Say came out. The Wikipedia Entry says it was 1989 but I’m thinking it might be off a little b/c I was a huge ICE-T fan, but who’s going to quibble over a few months.

One song in particular, titled not unsurprisingly Freedom of Speech, Just Watch What you Say was IMHO, one of the more brilliant jams.  ICE-T is a deep thinker and although I don’t always agree with him, I always respect him (and the things I disagree with him on are few and far between).  When it comes to freedom of speech, he’s about as awesome as Nate Hentoff IMHO.

So here’s what happened. The TSA put up a document that wasn’t classified or even secured.  A few bloggers got a hold of it and posted it online. It contained some ridiculous/outrageous stuff and the TSA got really butthurt over it.  Here’s the first part of Wired’s story on it:

Two bloggers received home visits from Transportation Security Administration agents Tuesday after they published a new TSA directive that revises screening procedures and puts new restrictions on passengers in the wake of a recent bombing attempt by the so-called underwear bomber.

Special agents from the TSA’s Office of Inspection interrogated two U.S. bloggers, one of them an established travel columnist, and served them each with a civil subpoena demanding information on the anonymous source that provided the TSA document.

The document, which the two bloggers published within minutes of each other Dec. 27, was sent by TSA to airlines and airports around the world and described temporary new requirements for screening passengers through Dec. 30, including conducting “pat-downs” of legs and torsos. The document, which was not classified, was posted by numerous bloggers. Information from it was also published on some airline websites.

“They’re saying it’s a security document but it was sent to every airport and airline,” says Steven Frischling, one of the bloggers. “It was sent to Islamabad, to Riyadh and to Nigeria. So they’re looking for information about a security document sent to 10,000-plus people internationally. You can’t have a right to expect privacy after that.”

Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman Suzanne Trevino said in a statement that security directives “are not for public disclosure.”

“TSA’s Office of Inspections is currently investigating how the recent Security Directives were acquired and published by parties who should not have been privy to this information,” the statement said.

You really need the rest to see how ridiculous this whole thing is.  They say power corrupts and absolute power absolutely corrupts.  That seems to be particularly true in law enforcement.  Take your average beat cop.  sure, there are some outrages here and there but by and large, your local cops are rock solid – mine here in Duncan, SC sure are.  If I think about my various encounters with the DEA, I cringe. I was unfortunate enough to be near someone they were looking for (I had never met them, had new idea who they were and had no dealings whatsoever).  It was one of the first times in my life I was really scared, and trust me, i don’t scare easily.  I remember back when I had to deal with a multi-agency raid at a company I was working at.  No violent crimes were even alleged and the owner was a very affluent respected member of the community. Yet the FBI and several other agencies came in, with full body armor, Glocks and Sigs ready for action.  Our legal counsel on staff was calling our corporate law firm when a FBI agent said “everyone step away from your desks”.  The thing was, he had just gotten permission from the FBI Agent who was in charge of everything.  This officer told Joe (a name I’m just making up) to step away from his desk.  Joe identified himself as legal counsel (the nameplate on his door said the same thing) and said Agent So and So just said it was ok.  He said again, put the phone down. Joe repeated himself and asked that Agent So and So be called over to verify. He reminded the agent of his legal right to make this call. At that point, the agent unclipped his holster and grasped his gun.There were so many other abuses it’d warrant a post of itself.

I have had dealings with other federal agents and I can’t think of one time I’ve not seen an abuse of power.  For the record, in the first case with the DEA – after searching me and having the dogs come out and sniff everything, I was completely cleared and allowed to go on my way. This was after 3 hours of detainment of me and about 25 other people – all of which were completely innocent and had nothing to do with the supposed drug dealer.  The company I was at was also completely cleared and one of the prosecutors was ultimately removed for misconduct on another case.  However the $1,000,000.00 dollars and time lost for my old boss was never recouped or returned.

Anytime you say anything that a Federal Agent doesn’t like, watch it.  First they’ll probably accuse you of lying. When you defend yourself, they’ll use the material you used to defend yourself as proof that you disclosed something improperly. And of course, they’ll say you put their life or lives of their family in jeopardy.   Telling the truth about anything  improper agents do ALWAYS means you’re revealing something they’ll take issue with.  They usually get really indignant about the assertion that they’d abuse their power. If you see all of this happening –BANK ON IT, you’re in for a fight.  I have also received ‘anonymous’ information before along the same lines. It’s not uncommon for people who want  a story to get out but are afraid of retaliation to send out the information to people they know will publish it.  I’ll be posting it in the near future and it’ll definitely ruffle some feathers. My point though is that this isn’t uncommon and what’s happened here can happen to a whole lot of people. It’s truly an outrage.

Fortunately, we have plenty of means to publicize such abuses. And such abuses can’t exist with daylight shown on them.  The more people that stand up, the more bloggers that cover such abuses, the less they can get away with it.  Ice-T was right though.  We do have Freedom of Speech, you just really better watch what you say (and whatever you do, don’t ‘compile’ the top three hits on Google. Even though Google’s search results already compiled them, if you do the same  prepared for a lot of BS.  Thank God the bloggers have decided to fight back.  And the best way to do that is to publish all the crap they receive. If the govt is really right, it’ll be self-evident. If it’s a matter of people covering up incompetence and screw ups, it’ll be readily evident too.

I’ll give the local cops and even state police the benefit of the doubt all day long – IMHO, they truly deserve it.  Until Federal Law Enforcement cleans up its act, well, Not so much.

Look at these poor guys.  Read what they went through .  Read the Official BS Line. Read the dramatic language the feds used (do they teach you how to make everything sound so freaking dramatic in Fed school or something?)  Then re-read this:

“They’re saying it’s a security document but it was sent to every airport and airline,” says Steven Frischling, one of the bloggers. “It was sent to Islamabad, to Riyadh and to Nigeria. So they’re looking for information about a security document sent to 10,000-plus people internationally. You can’t have a right to expect privacy after that.”

…..“They were indicating there would be significant ramifications if I didn’t cooperate,”

…”The agents searched through Frischling’s BlackBerry and iPhone and questioned him about a number of phone numbers and messages in the devices. One number listed in his phone under “ICEMOM” was a quick dial to his mother, in case of emergency. The agents misunderstood the acronym and became suspicious that it was code for his anonymous source and asked if his source worked for ICE — the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”

 

You can read the blogs referenced here, here and here.

One last thing.  This is a big screw up right?  Remember that big screw up called 9/11? Anyone want to give me the names of everyone that was fired as a result of it?  I’ll gladly give you $1,000.00 for each one. This is clearly a screw up even by the TSA’s own admission.  After all

Five TSA workers were put on leave pending an internal investigation into how that document got posted

Anyone want to take bets that this will be the last we here of it?  Anyone want to bet it’s PAID LEAVE (It always is when they don’t mention it one way or the other).  Paid leave is called  a freaking vacation last time I looked  but I don’t know for a fact that it’s paid leave so I don’t want to jump to conclusions.  I’m betting right now no one will be fired, no one will be seriously disciplined either. Any takers?

[tags] Transportation Security Administration, TSA,  Christopher Elliott, , Steven Frischling, Suzanne Trevino[/tags]