Posted On: Wednesday - November 12th 2025 5:40PM MST
In Topics: US Police State US Feral Government Guns
NOTE: I'm losing track of all these posts. Just under 7 years ago, during another Feral Gov't shutdown, Peak Stupidity posted Thousands Standing Around without pay.
These guys might really need Good Will. I could see some of them, much more than Air Traffic Controllers, living paycheck-to-paycheck out of necessity or having to find a side job during that now-ending Fed-Gov shutdown.
I was doing some traveling, and these guys seemed in better moods than when they were getting paid on time. I dunno... but let me relate some of my interactions with them as of late.
First, I will have to start with that the whole thing is very obviously unConstitutional based on Amendment IV:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,...Oh, you say, it's seems eminently reasonable for the government to search through every passenger's private property, cause... terra! No, the point is, there must be a specific reason given, to that judge who issues the warrant. I know, it's been 2 1/2 decades now... nobody cares... but Peak Stupidity and the rare Constitutionalist here and there. (Our post on September 11th of '17 was 16 Years of Spreading Democracy - They still hate us for our freedoms(?))
I had to do that. However, I have tried very hard, successfully I guess, to go with "It's just his job."* and go along to get along, as pretty much 99.99% of American travelers do, from my observations. (I haven't seen anyone raise hell there in most of a decade, I think.)
I got to know one guy by name after traveling though there a lot. We talked guns. Yes, this was at the Transportation Security Administration. Some "agent" found one pistol round in someone's luggage and brought it to this manager I know. Since I was right there, we both guessed on the caliber... yeah, .38 special, had to be. Yeah, he's got one of those, as do we. Neither this manager nor I (obviously) really cared that this round had been in someone's bag. It's America. Whaddya' expect?
It was even better another time, later on, when I came around to get my stuff out of the Anal Logic scanner. "Whadda' got today, a Baretta, an AR?" the one guy said, jokingly... (if he only knew..., write I, errr, jokingly.) "Nah, nothing today. The Barrett .50 wouldn't fit in my bag."
It's been a quarter decade now. We don't know for sure who really did it. The Moslems may very well hate us for other reasons, but they really don't have the energy or mojo to do any big terrorism anymore, it seems. Hell, if it were airplanes they were after, the ramps at MSP are half populated with Somalians after all... as the TSA, ALSO half-full of Somalians at MSP, goes on through the motions for our "security". Trays, belt and roller conveyor, imaging and metal detection, raw material in, finished product out, just a bunch of assembly lines producing checked or hand luggage out of raw un-secured luggage. It's just my job 5 days a week...
Nobody cares. Perhaps it's somewhat better that this is the case as compared to the frantic anti-terra panic a quarter century back.
This seems a good time to post in one anecdote from that (attempted) goodbye post of a year ago - I was trying to stick in a bunch of posts I'd already been ready to write:
*****************************************
I was responsible for arranging the Customs & Immigration inspection for a small plane arriving into Victoria, BC, Canada. Before the internet was big, the phone-based system was called CanPass. The lady on the other end sounded nice. I gave her the full names and birth dates of the passengers. Then, the conversation went this way (exact phrasing):
"OK, do you have any tobacco?"
"No."
"Do you have any alcohol?"
"No."
"Do you have any guns?"
"Oh yeah, I have a lot of guns... but I won't bring any to Canada."
You'd think I'd proclaimed full-out Jihad against the City of Victoria there. She went on and on! I made it clear that, no, I wouldn't bring any guns, so what's the problem?
Keep in mind, as per our post Build the Wall! Employ assholes in the Customs Hall!, it's the immigration people that should be tough. I guess this lady was both that and customs together. This went on until "Hey, look, you're running me out of my roaming minutes." (If you don't understand that, you're a younger reader or maybe you're Ted Kaczynski.)
When we arrived in Victoria, there she met us - I assumed it was the same lady - to start searching all over the plane. She was looking back behind a bulkhead where cables and the battery are. Finally, I said, "Listen, we've got guns in America because we're a free country, OK?" "Hey Canada's a free country too!" "Whatever, we gotta go to dinner." That was about it for the evening with Miss Victoria Customs and Immigration.
*****************************************
PS: I read over that post of mine from early '19. I highly recommend it. My attitude wasn't so mellow though... Here's an excerpt:
In earlier discussion on this Feral Gov't Shutdown, ... is it a threat, or a promise?, we brought up the "office-to-pool-hall pipeline idea. The TSA would be a choice example for the best use of that policy. Imagine if we just paid these people to stand around, but NOT AT AIRPORTS. You have to stand up while playing pool, so these people should be acclimated to that new use of their time. What a more pleasant experience air travel would be! Sure, pay these people the 2 billion anyway, it's the same as welfare - what's the diff?
* Johnny Cougar sang "... they callin' it your job, ol hoss, sure don't make it right."
************************************
[UPDATED 11/13:] Added references to post about TSA from '19.
************************************
Comments:
SafeNow
Thursday - November 13th 2025 2:58PM MST
PS
TSA anecdote. When I was in Houston for a family get-together, I was given, as a Christmas gift, one of those page-a-day calendars. You know the type - dog of-the-day, etc. The theme of mine was “Joke of the Day.” When my carry- on went through the conveyor belt, TSA could not discern what the heck the boxed calendar was. At the inspection area I was sent to, the agent saw what it was. I quipped, “I guess I’m really in trouble.” “Why?”, he replied. I replied “I have heard that TSA does not like jokes.” He did’t even smile. No sense of humor. Of course, I actually could have been in trouble, because, by quipping as I did, I was joking with a TSA agent!
TSA anecdote. When I was in Houston for a family get-together, I was given, as a Christmas gift, one of those page-a-day calendars. You know the type - dog of-the-day, etc. The theme of mine was “Joke of the Day.” When my carry- on went through the conveyor belt, TSA could not discern what the heck the boxed calendar was. At the inspection area I was sent to, the agent saw what it was. I quipped, “I guess I’m really in trouble.” “Why?”, he replied. I replied “I have heard that TSA does not like jokes.” He did’t even smile. No sense of humor. Of course, I actually could have been in trouble, because, by quipping as I did, I was joking with a TSA agent!
Moderator
Thursday - November 13th 2025 6:41AM MST
PS: Regarding your 2nd paragraph, Alarmist, I guess the guy wanted to know were the rest of the components were. It gets silly sometimes. Or, did you just discuss calibers and appropriate self-defense weapons with him, as I did?
My friend accidentally left a Glock in his luggage. He got dinged going through the TSA line at a big hub airport. Believe it or not, he still made his flight for the ski trip. However, he did have a big talk and had to get a lawyer (this guy's a doctor) to take care of this afterwards. What I don't like is, fine or not, he should have gotten that gun back. He didn't. I was sitting next to a high-up manager type who worked - probably not even at an airport - for the TSA on a flight one time. I told him this story. At the end, I said: "Ahh, it's OK, he's got plenty more where that came from." Probably about 40 more, and that was THEN.
My friend accidentally left a Glock in his luggage. He got dinged going through the TSA line at a big hub airport. Believe it or not, he still made his flight for the ski trip. However, he did have a big talk and had to get a lawyer (this guy's a doctor) to take care of this afterwards. What I don't like is, fine or not, he should have gotten that gun back. He didn't. I was sitting next to a high-up manager type who worked - probably not even at an airport - for the TSA on a flight one time. I told him this story. At the end, I said: "Ahh, it's OK, he's got plenty more where that came from." Probably about 40 more, and that was THEN.
Moderator
Thursday - November 13th 2025 6:36AM MST
PS: Glad it went quickly, Alarmist, though I guess you had to wait around inside the terminal. At some of the smaller airports the areas outside the TSA boundaries are nicer than inside. For others, it's the opposite. As I wrote in a post I'll have a hard time finding, in some small terminals it's very obvious that you're basically in a prison pen with nicer furnishings.
Well, when I went to find that post, I got to another that ought to be referenced here - I'll put it in the post a little later - https://www.peakstupidity.com/index.php?post=929
"Thousands Standing Around without pay" I'd totally forgotten over the almost 3,400 posts here.
Well, when I went to find that post, I got to another that ought to be referenced here - I'll put it in the post a little later - https://www.peakstupidity.com/index.php?post=929
"Thousands Standing Around without pay" I'd totally forgotten over the almost 3,400 posts here.
The Alarmist
Thursday - November 13th 2025 6:06AM MST
PS
As I made my way through the airport last Thursday to get out of the US before they started cutting flights, my interlocutors in one of my meetings said I might find TSA lines of three hours, so I headed to the airport a couple hours early, to then meet … absolutely nobody in front of me in the TSA line. They were even friendly. Hmmm?
I once went to the range a couple days before flying out of the US. I wore the same cargo pants that I wore on range day for the flight. Unbeknownst to me, one of the ejected 9mm brass landed in the little pocket designed for the older, smaller mobile phones. That made for an interesting discussion.
As I made my way through the airport last Thursday to get out of the US before they started cutting flights, my interlocutors in one of my meetings said I might find TSA lines of three hours, so I headed to the airport a couple hours early, to then meet … absolutely nobody in front of me in the TSA line. They were even friendly. Hmmm?
I once went to the range a couple days before flying out of the US. I wore the same cargo pants that I wore on range day for the flight. Unbeknownst to me, one of the ejected 9mm brass landed in the little pocket designed for the older, smaller mobile phones. That made for an interesting discussion.
You too, though, have reminded me to add something to this post. I'd taken a picture of one of their signs, I think specifically for this post. It goes along with your comment.
* That is, at the smaller airports. London was a real downer for me, if for no other reason than almost all these "agents" were foreigners... no, I mean foreign to Britain, where they were going all through my stuff. Then too, there were other reasons...