Here Comes the TSA Again!

According to this, the TSA is now coming for the books in your carry on!​

Travelers already have to remove laptops from carry-on bags and place them in a separate bin. The new policy would let TSA employees flip through books to see if anything is hidden in their pages.

• - The Hill

Dees Illustration

I am convinced the TSA is just a racket at this point. As most of you know, you can pay a fee before flying to undergo a “pre-check.” It costs $85 and requires an in-person appointment. They verify your fingerprints, ID, etc. And it takes a few weeks to approve. But it helps keep you from getting molested by strangers before taking your flight.

The TSA has prevented zero terrorist attacks. They actually accomplish very little, and it seems it just keeps getting harder and harder to get through airport security with any clothing on at all. And God help you if you are someone like my mother who has prosthetic joints! My mom had double knee replacement, and she flew one time after having the surgery. She presented a doctor’s note stating she had them, she was wanded, and the buzzer went off on her knees as expected. Front and side were OK. But when it buzzed on the back of her knees – as you would assume it would – she was hauled off to a private room and almost strip searched.

My mother would really have no choice but to pay them $85 for the pre-check, otherwise she risks a strip search because they don’t grasp the concept that if the knee replacement sets off the buzzer on the front and side of her knees, it is going to set the buzzer off on the back of her knees, too.

Basically, if they make getting through TSA on the day of your flight as difficult and painful as possible – needlessly – you’ll dish the $85 to skip the damn thing. Parents will pay it to keep the TSA from manhandling and jostling their kids (I will never forget the time the woman in front of me at the airport had her toddler literally ripped from her hands screaming by a TSA agent).
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So yeah, I think the TSA is nothing more than a racket to get you to pay $85 to get through.

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