TSA screener terrorizes 3-year-old girl

Imagine taking your family to the airport and watching as Federal agents terrorize your 3-year-old child.

That is exactly what happened to little Mandy Simon.

She was first forced to surrender her teddy bear, and ended up getting flagged for further screening.

As the girl's mother held her, the TSA agent scanned her with a wand, and then proceeded to give the girl a more thorough search. As the screener searched her, the frightened girl screamed for the agent to stop touching her.

The girl's father, Steve Simon, works as a reporter for CW-39 from Houston, Texas, and managed to capture the encounter on his cell phone camera.

In the video, the girl is clearly traumatized as the TSA screener attempts to search her.

But the question remains - what is the TSA doing screening toddlers like this? Do they honestly think the little girl is concealing a bomb in her stuffed toy?

Terrorists have been known to use children in places like Iraq, but Houston does not have a history of bomb-wielding toddlers.

The TSA is charged with providing security on our airlines, but many are questioning their methods.

The Dallas Morning News reported last Monday that:

The TSA recently changed its hand-search policies. Before, the officers would use the back of their hand to check a person; now they are to use their open hand and fingers to go over one's body, including the genital area and breasts.

Mike Cleary, President of the US Airline Pilots Association, issued a statement which read, in part:

"Let's be perfectly clear: the TSA procedures we have outlined above are blatantly unacceptable as a long-term solution. Although an immediate solution cannot be guaranteed, I can promise you that your union will not rest until all U.S. airline pilots have a way to reach their workplace ... the aircraft ... without submitting ourselves to the will of a TSO behind closed doors.

"This situation has already produced a sexual molestation in alarmingly short order. Left unchecked, there's simply no way to predict how far the TSA will overreach in searching and frisking pilots who are, ironically, mere minutes from being in the flight deck.

"As we all know, it makes no difference what a pilot has on his or her person or in their luggage, because they have control of the aircraft throughout the entire flight. The eyewash being dribbled by the TSA in this instance is embarrassingly devoid of common sense, and we will not stand for it."

The agency is also under fire for the use of a scanner that can see through a passengers clothing. As reported by CNN Travel, passengers and pilots alike are up in arms over the scanners.

A group called National Opt Out Day is calling for travellers to opt-out of the screenings on Thanksgiving Day - traditionally the busiest flying day of the year.

After the incident with Mandy Simon, TSA officials said that screeners would undergo "sensitivity training" in order to deal with children better.

Perhaps the TSA should include a course on common sense followed by a course on the Fourth Amendment, which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures.

In the meantime, they should keep their hands off our children and our bodies and instead focus on keeping terrorists off of commercial aircraft.

Ireland lets in the IMF under euro peer pressure

BRUSSELS (AFP) - Ireland agreed to work closely with its international partners on a support programme for its devastated banking sector after talks late Tuesday, but was still resisting pressure for an EU bail-out.

European Union economic and monetary affairs commissioner Olli Rehn said the EU, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund would work on a programme for Ireland "with an accent on restructuring its banking sector."

Rehn said after a meeting of eurozone finance ministers that Dublin had "committed" to come under a bigger umbrella after bond yields from Ireland and other weak euro economies went haywire amid frenzied speculation over recent weeks.

Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan kept a brave face as he insisted afterwards that "no decision" had been taken by Dublin.

"The government did not commit to enter a facility, but there have been serious disturbances" on markets, he said.

"The ECB stood loyally behind Ireland and continues to do so. But there are important structural problems clearly there and reflected in the markets, that have to be identified.

"I'm not going to impose timelines, but this is urgent," he said.

He dismissed opposition calls for a snap general election, saying it was the "last thing Ireland needs at the minute."

Northern Ireland's Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams announced at the weekend he was resigning from British politics to seek office in the Irish parliament and campaign for a different policy response to the crisis.

Tuesday's development came after Prime Minister Brian Cowen insisted to lawmakers in Dublin's Dail that the discussions were about seeing how "irrational" markets could be "taken out of the equation."

Arguing that the bond market was "not normal at the moment," he said Ireland should not become "enslaved" and that preparations were about how Dublin could help "to ensure that markets are taken out of the equation."

Lenihan, who arrived almost two hours late blaming fog at Brussels airport, had stressed that Dublin was "fully funded" until the middle of next year, before coming on the end of serious arm-twisting.

"We will act in a determined and coordinated way if necessary to ensure the stability of the eurozone," said Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, who chairs the group of euro finance ministers.

The outcome offers almost a mirror image of the build-up to a 110-billion-euro bailout of Greece in the spring -- when Athens spent months banging down Europe's door for loans.

This time however it is the money-holders who appear to have been trying to pressure Ireland into accepting aid.

Ireland's public deficit this year is set to pass 30 percent of GDP -- 10 times the permitted EU limit and double last year's Greek deficit -- after it had to pour billions into its crippled banks to keep them afloat.

Experts say Dublin could need about 70 billion euros.

The banking crisis has blown a huge hole in Ireland's public finances, and over recent days raised renewed fears of "contagion" dragging down Portugal and others.

EU president Hermany Van Rompuy began the day with a warning that the 27-nation bloc's very future could be at stake.

"If we don't survive with the eurozone we will not survive with the European Union," Van Rompuy said.

Dutch Finance Minister Jan Kees de Jager had said Ireland's partners would support a country that met the conditions attached to aid, which implies tough demands to restructure its economy as was the case with Greece.

Among other eurozone members in the debt firing line, Portugal has warned it is also at high risk of needing help, given dangers of contagion spreading from Ireland.

But Spain said there was no reason it should be sucked into the storm.

Twenty-four of the EU's 27 states are currently running public deficits way above the EU limits of three percent of output.

Austrian Finance Minister Josef Proell meanwhile said his government would withhold its December installment of 190 million euros in aid to Greece, saying Athens had not met commitments made in return for its bailout.

Keiser Report №95: Markets! Finance! Silver!

Click this link ...... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjIWH7CSP8U

nuclear testing.wmv

Click this link ..... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U8CZAKSsNA

U.S. Pursues Wider Role in Yemen

Americans Move to Bring In Equipment and Operatives and Propose New Bases for Fight Against al Qaeda Affiliate

Reuters image

Adam Entous and Julian E. Barnes
Wall Street Journal

The U.S. is preparing for an expanded campaign against al Qaeda in Yemen, mobilizing military and intelligence resources to enable Yemeni and American strikes and drawing up a longer-term proposal to establish Yemeni bases in remote areas where militants operate.

The developments are part of a U.S. scramble to step up the hunt for members of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the terrorist organization behind a recent failed attempt to blow up two planes over the U.S. using bombs hidden in cargo.

Limited U.S. intelligence experience in Yemen has created "a window of vulnerability" that the U.S. government is "working fast to address," a senior Obama administration official said.

For now, the U.S. gets much of its on-the-ground intelligence from a growing partnership with Saudi Arabia, which shares a border with Yemen and has a fruitful informant network in Yemen's tribal areas.

In the rush to build up capabilities, the Central Intelligence Agency and other agencies are moving in equipment and personnel from other areas, and over the past year have expanded the size of teams in the U.S. analyzing intelligence on AQAP. The emphasis now is on expanding the number of intelligence operatives and analysts in the field.

Read Full Article

Surviving Inflation

The most common topic in the email I receive daily is inflation. I’d say 60% of the emails I get revolve around inflation, the other 30% is security and the remaining 10% about various survival related topics. Crime is probably the main concern in Argentina, with inflation in a very close second place, but you must understand that its been almost 10 years now since our economy collapsed and things have… lets just say, “evolved” into a new reality for us. For several years after the 2001 collapse, here as well, inflation was the main topic, the greatest concern people had. I find this to be interesting in many ways.
First, it clearly shows a growing concern about inflation in USA, and there’s good reasons for that. If you didn’t notice the inflation you just aren’t looking well enough.
This email is a good example, and I’ve received others mentioning the same trick being pulled:

You mentioned to watch for the downsizing of packaging at the grocery. Here in Nashville Tennessee I picked up a bag of sugar along with 70 some odd cans of fruit and vegetables. When I got it home I noticed that it was a 4 LB. bag. Normally these are sold as 5 LB bags.

Robert Nashville TN

That’s where you see what’s really going on, in spite of the official numbers. Statistics don’t mean much if the books are cooked. Why would I bother reading “The Washington Post” or “Wall Street Journal”, when the source used for their articles states source: INDEC. INDEC being in the hands of the Kirchners, who fired the people that did things right long ago, replacing them with pals that simply LIE about the economy. You can lie about lots of things, but you cannot LIE about data recollection, it’s a fatal mistake. You’re not only lying to the people, which should be bad enough, you’re also lying to yourself, destroying the opportunity of knowing what’s really going on with the economy as well as any chance of fixing it.

Information such as the one below, it gives you an idea of how bad things are, but at least in Argentina, we know for a fact that the official inflation is often half, one third or worse than the inflation indicated by private consultants. Keep this on for a few years, and there’s no records, no solid data left to work with to find a solution.

Hello Ferfal,

I just stumbled across this online inflation tracking tool, and I thought you might find it interesting.

Argentina is MUCH worse than the rest of the world! At least for now....

http://bpp.mit.edu/


Keep up the good work!

A-

When you check private sources like the one below, it gets scary and you understand why Argentina will devaluate soon, it must devaluate before the next elections. The graphic shows true inflationary prices per day, week and year. True Inflation in Argentina since 2008 according to MIT ? 100%
Check it out:
http://www.inflacionverdadera.com/

What it all comes down to is prices going up, and you can get by without changing the car that year or buying a new Laptop, but there’s still basic necessities prices and that’s where things get ugly fast:

CapnRick said...
As an Argentine resident with a dollar income accessed via ATMs, I can speak to my own personal experience with the dollar's problems in the international market.

The dollar has done very well against the Arg. peso... a 30% change in the dollar's favor since I moved here in 2008. However, the actual cost of things here in dollar terms have gone thru the roof over the last two years. I have no idea how families like FerFAL's with peso income manage.

Today, I walked out of the Toledo grocery chain store near my home without buying anything. The cold cuts I used to buy for 25 pesos have DOUBLED IN PRICE in the last 2 months. Whole chickens doubled in price about a year ago... but, their price went up 20% in the last few days (5 pesos a kilo 1n 2008... 10 pesos a kilo last week, and 12 pesos today). In dollar terms... 1.65/kilo in 2008, 2.50 a kilo last week and 3.00 a kilo today.

In terms my hungry tummy will understand, I can buy 45 pct less chicken as a year ago with my income staying the same. Damn.

Suerte -CapnRick
November 11, 2010 1:53 PM

Thanks Rick for the comment. (By the way, looking forward to seeing you guys this summer!)
This is a good example of daily life with rampant inflation. You just never know what the following day holds.
Yesterday for example, I went to Coto supermarket to buy groceries, cleaning products, etc. I didn’t buy anything fancy just, food and other house supplies. The toped off cart (small cart by US standards, not one of those big ones) ended up costing 1600 pesos. That’s 410 USD for pasta, cookies, vegetable oil, some frozen vegetables, milk and other dairy products. In January, a 120 gr. can of tuna, small one, cost 6 pesos. Yesterday I paid 10 pesos for it, about 2.5 USD for a tiny can of tuna.

The shopping cart inflation index is the most brutal one. They can say whatever they want on the news and in their financial reports, but when your money keeps buying less and less stuff, that’s what really matters. Its’ no mystery that today, with the same amount of money you used to top it off, you only fill the shopping cart half way through. That’s the explanation for the all too common Argentine joke whenever our president rambles about how great our economy is doing: “Its nice to know the Argentine economy is doing so well, too bad though that we don’t see any of that”.

MODERN DAY HUNT BROTHERS: Buy Physical Silver & Beat the Banks

Click this link ..... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGMu7fMJPfc