"This is getting personal" Topic

I am beginning to think that the TSA is deliberately trying to prevent me from expanding my collection of Thoroughbred ACW ironclad models. After the my last trip to Chicago in which I was able to stop by Games Plus to add to my 1/600 Ironclad collection ( TMP link )I figured it to be a fluke. But this morning while trying to catch my 5:45 a.m. flight back south, TSA decided that the Confederate Navy was still a potential threat even if only at 1/600 scale. I finally was able to convince them otherwise but it took so long to do so I had to run to make my flight.

Is it me they don't like or the ships? It is getting personal.

It is a metal object, so the default answer is, "you can't have it." If you have checked baggage, stick 'em in there, ot mail your ships home.

and where would you be if a terrorist hits them with the deminiaturization ray during the flight?

No "weapons" are permitted to be carried onboard, unless I suspect you are a pilot, or air marshall.

Some TSA agents are taking it a bit too far.

Saw footage of them confiscating a miniature toy gun from the cowboy doll from Toy Story – a true story, I kid you not.

There have been other examples too, along similar lines in the news.

We are truly living in Alice's Wonderland!

REMAIN CALM SIR! (extends taser)

If they applied the same logic to all metal objects I would understand 79th PA. As I normally just do overnight trips I don't have checked bags (especially not at $25 USD bag to check) and I can't mail them since they would then be scrutinized by a force more terrifying than any TSA agent; SWMBO. I generally carry a 6" mag-light in my brief case that would be amore deadly weapon than any of my new purchases but they never say anything about that.

"would be amore deadly weapon than…"

xkcd.com/651

TSA – Thousands Standing Around…

That is brilliant. (the comic)

I once took about 50 WWII 28mm Russians and Germans in my carry on. The supervisor was called to watch as they ran it through the X-ray (they're lead folks) and I was sent on my way without any hassle. Obviously you are on a *list*.

My best story was when I returned from living in Brasil for a couple of years. I had about 30 pounds of painted lead in my carry-on. At the Sao Paulo security check point, they stopped me because of the lead. I showed them the miniatures and talked with the guards about wargaming. They were fascinated and called over all the security guards and their supervisor to look at what I had. Everyone was quite impressed and kept asking me about wargaming and painting.

Nobody could get through security, and I wonder what the folks in line were thinking when it took about 12 security agents to examine this one passenger's bag. Yes, I did shut down the international terminal for about 15 minutes. So if you were stuck in the Sao Paulo international terminal, I appologize.

Well you had Joe Foss who was held up and repeatedly searched while they debated what kind of weapon his Medal of Honor was (deliberate wrong spelling of honour as it's an American name in this case!!).

TNE2300 that would be more funny if it wasn't the type of stupid thing that I would say.

Well they could get even more personal. Just pray they don't decide all that lead warrants a cavity search.

I put all my toys in the plastic bin (along with my laptop and toothpaste) so that they can play with them. I haven't had any problems since I started doing that.

My wife, travelling through Detroit airport changing planes, was held up by the TSA genius who asked her probing questions about a crucifix (plastic, glow-in-the-dark, one each) and a pyx (small metal container) filled with consecrated communion wafers which she was transporting. The genius "requested" her to dump the communion wafers onto the examining table. My wife tried to explain to this Mensa candidate what the wafers were with little penetrating his force-field defended intellect. Luckily another TSA agent ran to her aid, convincing the brainiac that the requested actions would be a "bad thing". Mind you, she was attired casually in her black clerical garb, complete with a large crucifix around her neck, so you can easily understand how they might be misunderstanding that she might be eager to kill herself in service to Allah.

Another of my wife's friends in the clergy was travelling through another airport in his full priest outfit when the TSA agent, apparently to protect us from the fanatical Episcopalian suicide squads rampaging throughout our beleaguered country, chose to thoroughly delve and rummage in the priest's junk. His _personal_ _biological_ junk. The junk that he carried in his pants his entire life. In front of the priest's wife. And his kids.
Makes me feel safer, how about you?

It's all very simple. They put normal average everyday people through the ringer for four reasons.

1. Most people are law abiding citizens and they won't find anything and won't complain when they do this. This means they can appear to be diligent and hard noosed and won't have the average person complain who just wants to get on their flight.

2. They won't be accused of racial profiling if they ask someone in sandals a kaftan and aturban screaming Alluah Akbar!

3. This way they have the best chance of NOT finding anything dangerous and therefore wont have to fill out reports and possible get killed themselves.

4. they won't get sued by touchy minorities who feel they are being discriminated against.

My own experience has been rather benign when going on aircraft. But I always make hard eye-contact with the TSA personnel and smirk. It REALLY infuriates them.

Considering the obnoxious holes they have to put up with every day, smirking and whining, I think TSA does a pretty good job.

The same people that complain that they are too thorough when inspecting for possible bombs are the first to complain that they're too soft when a bomb gets through, and some nutter on a plane is caught in the act of setting it off, or actually succeeds.

You're not far off the mark Tuscaloosa. I have to deal with TSA multiple times nearly everyweek for my job and apart from my incidents in Chicago with Thoroughbred ships I can not complain about their courtesy and professionalism they generally show in doing their jobs. (Note: I've just shelled out for the TSA Pre-check)

I haven't flown on a commercial aircraft since 2007. I refuse to submit to the thugs and sexual perverts posing as federal security agents. Their entire organization is designed to get the civilian population used to constant security measures, to being asked "your papers please" and be submissive to all manner of authorities.

No one who values their liberties should ever putup with such a system. It needs to be dismantled and eliminated completely. In it's place, let every airline decide what level of security they are willing to employ The public can then choose which airline they feel safest on, and the market forces will thus come into play and set the standards. The airlines have the right to put into place whatever standards THEY want. It's their company, after all.

However, the federal government has no business establishing, let alone running, such a monstrous affair as the TSA. These union-organized thugs and sexual predators are already beginning to show up at train stations, bus stations and even occasional highway rest stops. It's past time for all of it to end.

Oh my. And I thought I was paranoid!

It ain't paranoid if it's true.

Perhaps if the airlines followed Israel's lead and used profiling things would be more acceptable. But, that won't happen as long as the multi-culti zampolits are running the show.

As it stands, I travel by train or bus rather than use the airlines. The monetary loss to them is insignificant, but I have found that between my home and, say, Washington DC, that using the bus to get to Boston and then the train to DC is almost always as fast as the airlines, what with all the security delays, baggage delays, transport delays, etc, and a fair bit less expensive, too.

And thank goodness I live in the USA where all people are treated equally. Israeli does a very good job at profiling by targeting anyone who is a non-Jewish Israeli citizen. Israel is already a nation where the "civilian population used to constant security measures, to being asked "your papers please" and be submissive to all manner of authorities."

I find it disappointing that you refer to the TSA agents as thugs and sexual predators. You can criticize the system, which I would understand, but those type of comments on people who are just trying to do their job is sad.

Sorry that this thread as denigrated into this, so I will end my comments.

"I refuse to submit to the thugs and sexual perverts posing as federal security agents."

TK, I don't know you personally, or what your physical appearance is like, but if you're like the vast majority of wargamers I know, there is absolutely no one trying to join TSA just for the privilege of running their hands over your svelte and lithe body, or drool over your shapely and enticing outline in the scanner.

Quite frankly, it's probably a lot more unpleasant for them than it is for you.