How safe are those “backskatter” radiation machines, again? Completely safe, of course! But the Department of Homeland Security is just going to do a little check-and-see, just in case thousands and thousands of TSA airport security workers are about to be diagnosed with terrible cancers that will result, we assume, in the biggest lawsuit in history.
The Los Angeles Times reports:
After years of rebuffing health concerns over airport scanners, the Transportation Security Administration plans to conduct new tests on the potential radiation exposure from the machines at more than 100 airports nationwide.
But the TSA does not plan to retest the machines or passengers. Instead, the agency plans to test its airport security officers to see if they are being exposed to dangerous levels of radiation while working with the scanners.
So did the TSA actually admit this? Of course not. Watchdogs noticed that the agency had solicited government contractors for a massive supply of portable dosimeters that employees would wear to measure how much ionizing radiation they were being bombarded by, every work day, while operating or just standing near those deadly backskatter porno-scanners. [Los Angeles Times via Cryptogon]
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When they glow in the dark, they've had too much.
What's more important: military-industrial complex profits or minimum wage workers developing cancer?
Now you don't have to choose! You can have all of that and more — multi-million-dollar fees for the former DHS chief to pimp the product as a guest expert on news programs, baseless arrests for harmless passive protests like t-shirts, and even continued abuse of both TSA staff and passengers via unnecessarily and ineffectively invasive body searches!
You can have all these civil rights abuses for the low, low price of Congress!
Order now.
Ron Paul = Ron Popeil?
Michale Chertofff deserves and ineffective body search, a baseless arrest, and then continued abuse. In any order.
Dosimeter was the Greek god of cancer.
I thought he was the Greek god of square dancing.
That is so awesome.
No, that's Dosidosimeter.
Win, Z. Can I still call you Z?
Sure thing, nut.
Gotta agree: that was a damn good one.
I prefer my porn without the added radioactive tingliness.
This will be a problem if you prefer Japanese porn,,,
But it'll all be worth it if a spider irradiated by the scanners bites a nerdy teenager, giving him the ability to do whatever a spider can.
Or bites a pig.
TSA agent – "I have a giant lump in my ballsack that wasn't there six months ago."
TSA management – "That's prolly just the lump of coal you got for a Christmas bonus."
When you see the TSA agents wearing lead smocks and ducking behind a blast shield as you enter the scanner, it's time to opt for the pat-down.
No wonder the TSA is so nasty
the Transportation Security Administration
I think we should rename this agency to better reflect its actual function.
~
I've called them "Thousands Standing Around." Also, for the traveling public information, the TSA agents at the Lubbock, TX airport are some of the friendliest people I've ever met.
Detroit Metro also, too, even on Thanksgiving.
Austin, Texas as well.
Funny, innit? All the ones I've met have been sweet and charming, often the only nice people I meet on a flight at all.
I haven't been on a plane since the 80's. Guess I just don't need to get anywhere in that big of a hurry.
Testicle Squeezing Agency?
So that's what they mean when they say "bag fee"?
Terribly Suckered Again?
T&A? Those Stupid Assholes?
Michael Chertoff won't earn the big bonuses if the TSA stops buying those scanners. Do we really want that on our collective consciences?
I'd prefer him on a collective farm in the Ukraine in the early1930s.
Actually, this does rather look like Michael Chertoff.
Actually, I *really* want Michael Chertoff on a board. With a towel over his face and water streaming onto the towel.
Well as long as you're not advocating torture …
I'm merely suggesting we enhance their interrogation …
Add cancer to the long list of things that come with defending freedumz
Not cancer, freedom tumours.
Still too negative. How about "freedom nuggets"?
No matter what you call it/them, it's result of freedom frying.
Doesn't McDonalds serve those?
the TSA does not plan to retest the machines or passengers…TSA spokesman Nico Melendez said "We continuously test our technology to ensure it is safe for both passengers and our officers…"
George Orwell, Christopher Hitchens, and HL Mencken are ROTFL up in Heaven over this one…
Cancer wouldn't be so bad if you stood an equal chance of developing a helpful mutation, like Blinky the Three-Eyed Fish.
I think the downside would be comfortably fitting eyewear.
Three boobies, here I come…
What tipped them off? The extra arm that TSA workers used during strip searches?
Mutant TSA agents. Truly a frightening thought.
Do they become ninjas?
How can one tell?
Hairy knuckles.
Giant index finger.
Super human ability to smell hemorrhoid crème tubes larger than 2oz.
Sub human sense of humor.
Well then, they've been mutants for awhile now.
This could all be avoided if the ban against Translucent Human Skin research was lifted.
This is bad news for my zucchini wrapped in tin foil.
Is this a Spinal Tap ref?
Yes!
Isn't every thing?
Yes!
11.
I went through one on Saturday afternoon.
I made the mistake of carrying freezedried food in my hand. Suddenly I had melted vanilla ice cream all over my arms.
Quite embarassing.
Oops.
"The goggles do nothing."
I think they should also consider offering broad spectrum Cooties tests it can’t be healthy constantly having to grope the junk of strangers.
Do you guys know if there's a credible melting man?
–Mike Nelson
HA-HA
-Nelson Muntz
Someone ought to start an airline where there are no lines, no scanners, no TSA goons, and no ionizing radiation… but everyone has to fly naked.
It just might catch on.
I wouldn't be surprised if the logical conclusion of all this… security… was all our current TSA joy, plus the restrained and naked flights. Like some sort of lame S&M thing gone wrong.
Careful there, that could lead to this.
Snark away, but remember, they have to go to that shitty job every day and you don't. Jeez, groping fat ugly cranky people eight hours a day AND risk Radiation Poinsoning to boot? Hold me back.
All for minimum wage…
(Yeah, seriously, some of them may be assholes, but at least I don't have their job.)
A-Fucking-Men!
A friend of mine is a TSA agent. She enjoys the job approximately as much as you'd expect.
I can only imagine.
Why do you think they don't let iguanas be TSA agents, huh?
I always wonder how much that custom made TSA rug costs at every checkpoint.
Was it really necessary? Or just put there to bother me about government spending.
I get the grope every single time.
No, I will never be a Guinea Pig for Michael Chertoffs Goldman Sachs account.
I guess they got those in just before Obummer's ban on government schwag, huh?
No, I'm not really down with this TSA bullshit. However, a Tranny Sexytime Agency is something I believe we could all get behind!
It seems to me you'd have to get behind it.
The TSA don't want to play with you. The TSA wants just to lay with you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtJmVDoY904
Or at least take you home to their place, watching every move on your face.
"…Got to concentrate/ Don't be distractive…" ♫
What we wanted was minimum wage, radiation is the gravy.
Sure, maybe we get cancer, but hey, free radiation therapy, too.
DHS and TSA are two government agencies that really *ought* to be eliminated. Not that you'll ever hear Repiglicunts say so. No, they'd rather get rid of Education.
I think it's pretty obvious they already got rid of Education in their own world.
Their leechcraft would have us crawling on all fours like a beast!
Srsly. In a 21st-century world, they want to privatize education and make it wealth-dependent. At a time when we've already bled away the vast manufacturing base of jobs that would employ those with anything less than a tertiary education.
Yes, this is exactly what they want to do. Problem?
Listen, just because we're gay married doesn't mean you can take that tone with me, young man.
At least they're not testing iced tea on animals.
Or mother-fucking iced tea.
Ray-dee-ation. You hear the most outrageous lies about it.
A small price to pay for Freedom….because it isn't free.
♫ "You gotta pay the price, you gotta sacrifice, for your liberty." ♫
– Up(chuck) With People
The more TSA workers die of cancer, the more jobs open up on a regular basis. Perfect plan.
Back scatter machines are the REAL job-creators!
Any chance in testing them for common sense?
Radiation is people, my friend.
Why do today what you can put off for 10 years? Especially where the safety of people is concerned.
*cha-ching*
k ;)
I'd reply in kind, but fear I would be beaten most severely. Consider yourself winked at.
Yes, dear…
This is actually getting to be fun, in a twisted kinda way.
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