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Townhall
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Mind-Blowing
TSA Stupidity and
Political Correctness
by Daniel J. Mitchell
December 5, 2011
I’ve
had some fun mocking the
bureaucrats from the Transportation Security Administration, including
stories
such as:
•
Confiscating a plastic hammer from a
mentally retarded man.
•
Detaining a woman for carrying
breast milk.
•
Hassling a woman for the unexplained
red flag of having sequentially numbered checks.
•
Demanding that a handicapped 4-year
old boy walk through a metal detector without his leg braces.
•
Putting an 8-year old cub scout on
the no-fly list.
Keep
in mind that these are the
geniuses who still fail to catch guns and box cutters – even when using
the
body-scan equipment!
With
this track record of
incompetence, this next story probably won’t be too surprising. Here
are some
excerpts from a report showing a freaky combination of brainless
stupidity and
idiotic political correctness.
Dangerous
Weapon?!?
Vanessa
Gibbs, 17, claims the
Transportation Security Administration stopped her at the security gate
because
of the design of a gun on her handbag. Gibbs said she had no problem
going
through security at Jacksonville International Airport, but rather,
when she
headed home from Virginia. …her preference for the pistol style didn’t
sit well
with TSA agents at the Norfolk airport. Gibbs said she was headed back
home to
Jacksonville from a holiday trip when an agent flagged her purse as a
security
risk. “She was like, ‘This is a federal offense because it’s in the
shape of a
gun,’” Gibbs said. “I’m like, ‘But it’s a design on a purse. How is it
a
federal offense?’” After agents figured out the gun was a fake, Gibbs
said, TSA
told her to check the bag or turn it over. By the time security wrapped
up the
inspection, the pregnant teen missed her flight, and Southwest Airlines
sent
her to Orlando instead, worrying her mother, who was already waiting
for her to
arrive at JIA. …TSA isn’t budging on the handbag, arguing the phony gun
could
be considered a “replica weapon.” The TSA says “replica weapons have
prohibited
since 2002.” It’s a rule that Vanessa feels can’t be applied to a
purse.
“Common sense,” she said. “It’s a purse, not a weapon.”
The
moral of the story, needless to
say, is that we should listen to Steve Chapman and shut down this
counterproductive bureaucracy.
And
then listen to Arnold Kling and
Nick Schulz, so we can allow the private sector to do a better job at
much
lower cost.
Check
out the links at Townhall
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