Opt Out No. 2

They tagged me again this AM for the virtual strip search. And again I opted out. When the agent came to do the pat down, he asked me what had alarmed in the screener. I told him that nothing had alarmed, I had opted out. He asked me why. I told him I felt it was a violation of my right to protection from unreasonable search. He shrugged and tried to tell me that you really couldn't see anything anyway. I explained that I wasn't concerned about them "seeing things", but that I saw it as a violation of my constitutional rights.

This agent was nice guy. He even admitted that some agent's badge goes to their heads. I thanked him for his courtesy and told him I might see him next Monday onmy weekly commute to Houston.

He was a good conversationalist. I'm sure he realized very quickly that I was a weekly commuter to Houston and not likely to try to hijack the plane. The TSA would do better using guys like him to do verbal screenings the way they do in Israel.

And today I read that Rep James Clyburn (D-SC) feels that congress critters deserve special treatment at the airport.

“We’ve had some incidents where TSA authorities think that congresspeople should be treated like everybody else,” he said. “Well, the fact of the matter is, we are held to a higher standard in so many other areas, and I think we need to take a hard look at exactly how the TSA interact with members of Congress.”

It smacks of just more elitism from our congress critters. The PE says give 'em all an enhanced pat down and see how they like it.