Crony Capitalism Drives Airport Security

by Wendy McElroy

There is yet another reason not to fly into or within the US. ?Nazi-style detention pods? ? that's what opponents of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) have called the new ?exit pods? being tested at the Syracuse (NY) airport. But the pods are not primarily a rape of civil rights. Their import is equally ominous but more subtle. Their main purpose seems to be profit rather than the flexing of arbitrary power, although the two are closely related.

A major change is occurring in one aspect of airport security. The change? The TSA will no longer be monitoring exit lanes at one-third of American airports; the TSA withdrawal is likely to extend to all airports over time. Exit lanes are the means by which passengers who have completed their travel leave the airport terminal. TSA agents had been policing the lanes to prevent passengers from walking the 'wrong' way and re-entering the terminal. Now that task is left to airport security because, as TSA deputy administrator John Halinski explains, ?We firmly believe that exit-lane monitoring is not a screening function, but rather an issue of access control.? Apparently, Halinski believes the 'S' in TSA stands for ?Screening? because ?Security? definitely includes access control.

If the exit pods at Syracuse are an indication of how airport security will handle the job, then leaving a terminal may well become slower, more frustrating and a bit more degrading. The pods resemble revolving doors into which people walk one at a time. A robotic voice 'welcomes' the person as a glass door seals behind him; there is a video camera and intercom in each pod; when a red light turns green, the forward glass door slides open and releases the person into the wild. It is not clear what happens to those in wheelchairs or with stacks of luggage. It is not clear whether parents can take children into the pods with them.

Exit monitoring at airports is nothing new. But the older methods are constant flow; that is, passengers shuffle by a security agent or they enter an area that seals without requiring individual passengers to halt in place. Some airports use a large version of a turnstile or sensors that detect if someone is walking in the 'wrong' direction. By contrast, the Syracuse exit pods trap individuals, one by one, in an air-locked system with many moving parts, and expensive accessories. A complicated untested technology that is doomed to constant repair is replacing simple tried-and-true ones. Why?

While other cry ?civil liberties violation!,? I bemoan ?crony capitalism.? Both may be true but the latter is the more likely motive force. In other words, who got the contract for the expensive pods, their repair and their inevitable update? If there are civil liberty issues here, then they are 1) authorities are utterly indifferent to the rights of passengers when the prospect of profit arises, and 2) the dehumanizing drive continues to make automatic obedience a habit. But civil liberties seem to be a secondary target.

Airport security claims the exalted revolving doors will save money by reducing the need for agents. As supporting evidence, they point to the TSA's rationale for withdrawing its agents from exit lanes: to save money. Neither agency's explanation makes sense.

The airport wants to replace low-wage guards with an elaborate exit system. The entire overhaul of security is estimated to require $49.7 million. The described construction encompasses more than the exit area, but that area is a main focus if not the main focus. Let's assume that half of the expense, or $24.85 million, will be directed toward the exit area. If a guard's wage has been accurately reported as $11/hour, then the cost of constructing the pods and exit area would be equal to 2,259,090 man hours. For one guard posted 24 hours a day, the replaced man hours translate into 94,128 days or 13,446.9 weeks for a total of 258.5 years. If four exit guards were necessary (Syracuse is a relatively small airport), then the pods would replace 64.6 years worth of collective labor.

Of course, the projected price tag does not include problems encountered in construction, the pods' ongoing maintenance, the need for replacement, or the monthly bump up in electricity. These expenses are lost in the airport's rush to assure the public that construction will not raise taxes. It will be financed instead by an ?airport passenger facility charge? added on to every ticket; in short, a tax-funded corporation will impose its own corporate tax upon 'customers' in order to construct facilities that violate their rights and dignity.

The economics of the pod construction make sense only in two contexts. First, the airport wants to avoid or divest itself of unionized employees; unions have been a source of conflict in all areas of airport and airline operations. Second, crony capitalism. This is the faux capitalism by which profits do not result from productivity but from political connections, which often include bribes or kickbacks. The Syracuse Hancock International Airport official ?sneak preview? of the security overhaul listed 17 local firms that will profit richly from the construction. Who do the firms know? With what financial incentives did they 'purchase' their contracts?

TSA's economic explanation of withdrawing from exit areas makes even less sense. Halinski claimed the savings would amount to $88.1 million. He may be correct but it is difficult to believe that savings played any part in the decision to withdraw personnel. The TSA is famous for wasting tax money.

Consider just one recent example. In 2007, the TSA purchased hundreds and hundreds of full body scanners; some estimates go well over 1,000. The machines caused a public furor because they produced graphically nude images of scanned passengers and were associated with health risks. In early 2013, the TSA abandoned the full-body machines and offered them for sale to prisons and jails. For example, the former TSA scanners were offered to West Michigan county jails to scan prisoners for contraband.

But TSA's frugality in 'recycling' is not praiseworthy. Dar Leaf the Barry County (Michigan) Sheriff explained. The machines cost the government $160,000 apiece but TSA is offering them at 7 percent of that value; the base cost to law enforcement is $7,500 with the transfer and setup fees, the transportation and training costs driving the total to about $15,000. The TSA is clearly not pinching pennies. Why should it?

The corporate profits from the full-body scanners have already been banked. The former Department of Homeland Security commissar Michael Chertoff was one of the most vocal advocates of the machine; his security consulting firm Chertoff Group just happened to include OSI System, one of two licensed manufacturers of full-body scanners. Nevertheless, Chertoff claimed to be an unbiased expert, and OSI received hundreds of millions in crony contracts. When the scam was exposed and the machines were being pulled for being an affront to dignity and health, the government seemed indifferent to the blatant money grab. A headline in Daily Tech read ?Despite Allegations of Fraud, TSA Lets Scanner Maker Keep Nearly $300M?. It was all about profit, not protection, civil rights be damned, if they are noticed at all.

What explains the TSA's withdrawal of agents? An educated guess is that the agency wants to swell the ranks of personnel available to conduct prescreening. The Secure Flight Program has been in place for years but it seems to be ramping up. For example, prescreening used to apply only to passengers entering the States; now it applies to domestic travel. Even before you leave home for the airport, TSA will conduct a pre-crime assessment of your personal and professional records. The information accessed includes employment records, tax I.D. (it is not clear if the IRS is cooperating), travel history, car registration, credit card info, any police data, and property records. A bounty of other public information is available including gun ownership and some health records but, like the link to the IRS, it is not clear which data will be used.

[Editor's Note: You can get a jump start on avoiding all of this by clicking here.]

What is clear: the program will consume a massive amount of man hours. By outsourcing the monitoring of exits, TSA has beefed up its Secure Flight personnel without increasing its budget for hiring. And it can offer the public- pleasing reason of wanting to save money.

I applaud anyone who protests any act of authority these days but the anti-TSA crowd is overreacting to the civil liberties aspect of the Syracuse exit pods and under-reacting to the crony capitalism one. Sometimes the ongoing thuggery at American airports is all about ?follow the money.? Again, of course, the two are intimately entangled.
_
Wendy McElroy is a regular contributor to the Dollar Vigilante, and a renowned individualist anarchist and individualist feminist. She was a co-founder along with Carl Watner and George H. Smith of The Voluntaryist in 1982, and is the author/editor of twelve books, the latest of which is "The Art of Being Free". Follow her work at www.wendymcelroy.com.

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When Homeland Security Theater Goes Off-Script

by William Norman Grigg

While police in Watertown, Massachusetts closed in on the boat in which 19-year-old terrorist suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev had concealed himself, FBI investigators in Chicago were snapping handcuffs on 18-year-old Abdella Ahmed Tounisi as he attempted to board an airplane bound for Istanbul. He intended to travel to Syria to fight on behalf an Islamic rebel group that seeks to overthrow the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

There is reason to believe that the FBI had advance knowledge of the Boston Marathon bombing plot. On the other hand, we know that Tounisi was a pure product of the FBI's terrorist factory: He was the latest in a long procession of socially alienated teenage Muslim males who have been lured into an FBI-orchestrated plot by the Bureau's roving troupe of ?terrorism facilitators.?

What makes the terrorism charges against Tounisi more remarkable is the fact that he is accused of seeking to enlist in the service of a terrorist group that is presently receiving material aid from Washington.

Tounisi had been targeted by the FBI last fall after a friend named Abdel Daoud was snared in one of the Bureau's prefabricated terror plots.

The indictment against Daoud claims that he had ?attempted, without lawful authority, to use a weapon of mass destruction? ? in this case, a car bomb ? in a terrorist attack against a Chicago-area nightclub. In familiar fashion, the Bureau's informant/provocateurs sketched out the plot and provided the targeted patsy with all of the material necessities ? including the dummy bomb.

Daoud playedhis scripted role to perfection ? that is, he expressed entirely justifiable outrage over the U.S. Government's relentless campaign to kill Muslims overseas, while allowing himself to be seduced by agents of that same malevolent government into committing a proseuctable act.

The affidavit filed by the FBI claimed that in a conversation with an informant Doud said he wanted the bombing to ?send the message that the United States should `stop abusing people overseas.'? Like millions of Americans who see Muslims as an undifferentiated mass of hostility, Daoud reportedly saw Americans as anti-Muslim automatons, rather than as ?regular people.?

?They're like ? more like robots, even the decent, nice people, most people in this country,? Daoud reportedly told the FBI provocateur. From Daoud's perspective, this applied even to those who ?hate the president? (who, let it not be forgotten, is killing Muslim civilians through drone strikes practically every day) and who opposed ?the two wars.? This is because most Americans are still ?for the war on terrorism,? insisted Daoud.

As the FBI carefully reeled in Daoud, it made a play for Tounisi as well, but he was savvy enough to suspect that the operation was a law enforcement sting. Rather than using what influence it had to encourage this wayward young man onto the path of probity, the Bureau redoubled its effort to entice him into a prosecutable act: It set up a website intended to recruit fighters for the Syrian rebel group Jabhat al-Nusrah (JAN), which used to be called al Qaeda in Iraq. After finding the website, Tounisi made contact with a purported recruiter for the group, who was yet another of the FBI?s seemingly inexhaustible supply of terrorism facilitators. It was the FBI?s asset who made arrangements for Tounisi to travel to Syria, by way of Turkey, to join the U.S.-supported terrorist group.

The FBI, whose chief occupation since 2002 has been the manufacture of ersatz terrorism plots, induced Tounisi into an act described as providing ?material aid? to a foreign terrorist group. If he is convicted, he will be found guilty of carrying out the Obama administration's official policy without official permission. He is not the only American presently facing the prospect of imprisonment on this charge. The administration has filed felony charges against a US Army Veteran from Arizona named Eric Harroun, who traveled to Syria to join the fight against Assad.

Harroun, who used his Facebook page to describe his role in the conflict, is charged with using a weapon of mass destruction ? namely, a rocket-propelled grenade launcher ? while fighting on behalf of JAN.

JAN is the dominant element of the rebel ?coalition? being supported by the US and NATO in its insurgency against the admittedly loathsome regime of Bashar al-Assad. JAN has demonstrated its worthiness as a recipient of taxpayer-extracted material support by carrying out undisguised acts of terrorism against civilians. Of particular interest in light of the Boston bombing is the growing role played by Chechen jihadists in the U.S.-backed JAN. Chechen Jidhadists were accused of carrying out the recent abduction of two Syrian Orthodox Bishops earlier this week.

As with Tousnisi, Harroun is accused of giving ?material support? to a foreign terrorist group; as in the case of Daoud, he is charged with using a ?weapon of mass destruction? ? a rocket-propelled grenade launcher ? ?without legal authority.?

The relevant section of Title 18 of the US Code specifies that the term "weapon of mass destruction" applies to the following "destructive devices": "[A]ny incendiary, explosive, or poison gas -- bomb, grenade, rocket having a propellant charge of more than four ounces, missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce, mine, or ... any type of weapon (other than a shotgun or a shotgun shell which the Attorney General finds is generally recognized as particularly suitable for sporting purposes) by whatever name known which will, or which may be readily converted to, expel a projectile by the action of an explosive or other propellant, and which has any barrel with a bore of more than one-half inch in diameter...."

John Mueller, who holds the Woody Hayes Chair on National Security Studies at Ohio State University, points out that under federal statutes dealing with WMDs "not only is a hand grenade a weapon of mass destruction ... so is a maliciously designed child's rocket even if it doesn't have a warhead. On the other hand, although a missile-propelled firecracker would be considered a weapon of mass destruction if its designers had wanted to think of it as a weapon, it would not be so considered if it had previously been designed for use as a weapon and then redesigned for pyrotechnic use or if it was surplus and had been sold, loaned, or given to you (under certain circumstances) by the Secretary of the Army."

The WMD designation would likewise apply to "all artillery, and virtually every muzzle-loading military long arm for that matter," continues Schneider.

For the Regime and its acolytes, ?terrorism? is committed when private individuals, singly or in groups, emulate the criminal violence of the State without receiving official permission. That principle was explained ? with admirable candor ? by Bill Clinton during an interview published in the December 2009 issue of Foreign Policy magazine. Clinton defined terrorism as "killing and robbery and coercion by people who do not have state authority and go beyond national borders." (Emphasis added.)

By reverse-engineering this definition we learn that "killing and robbery and coercion" carried out with "state authority" isn't terrorism; it's public policy. We can also infer that the "war on terror" is not meant to bring an end to such violence, but rather intended to eliminate challenges to the State?s monopoly on criminal violence.

Accordingly, an act of politically motivated armed violence carried out by ?non-state actors? can be described as an act of WMD-involved terrorism if it is carried out without what the Regime calls ?legal authority.? On the other hand, exactly the same acts can be consecrated as ?official policy? when they are committed by ?non-state actors? who operated on behalf of the Regime.

Three days before the Boston Marathon Bombing, the foreign policy establishment celebrated the opening of the Washington office of the National Council of Resistance in Iran. This is the political front group for the so-called People?s Mujahadeen (or MeK), a Washington-backed Islamo-terrorist group that has carried out bombings and assassinations in Iran during the past decade. During the 1970s, the group staged several terrorist attacks that left U.S. citizens wounded or dead. It was part of the revolutionary coalition that brought Khomeni to power in 1979, but was forced to flee to Iraq following a purge. During the ten-year Iran-Iraq war, the MeK carried out attacks against Iran on behalf of Saddam Hussein?s regime.

Created in 1965 as part of a Soviet-sponsored international terrorist network that waged wars of "national liberation" throughout the developing world, the MeK was listed as a terrorist organization from 1997 until last September, when it was removed from the State Department?s terrorism roster following a high-pressure campaign that included scores of prominent elected officials and veterans of the National Security ?community.?

Several members of Congress, including House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-Michigan), received significant cash donations from MeK?s supporters as part of the de-listing campaign. Other paid supporters of the MeK included Newt Gingrich, former FBI Director Louis Freeh, former Attorney General Michael Mukasey (who supervised prosecution of federal ?material support? cases on much flimsier evidence), retired General Hugh Shelton, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and retired General James Jones, former National Security Adviser to Barack Obama.

Every U.S. official who lobbied on behalf of the MeK committed the federal offense of providing ?material support? to a listed terrorist group. Under the Anwar al-Awlaki precedent, each of them was liable to summary execution by drone strike. Indeed, under the Abdel al-Awlaki codicil to that precedent, each of their children was likewise a fair target for a drone strike because of what White House mouthpiece Robert Gibbs would describe as the lethal irresponsibility of their parents.

As with the JAN in Syria, the Iranian MeK is considered a valuable asset in Washington?s program to foment warfare throughout the Middle East ? by providing luridly unreliable but politically useful ?intelligence? about the Iranian nuclear program, and carrying out assassinations and other acts of officially sanctioned terrorism within the country. One measure of the MeK?s value to the Regime is found in the fact that the office for the group?s political front group is located less than one hundred yards from the White House.

According to press accounts, Dzhokar Tsarnaev (communicating through a dense haze of painkillers and other pharmaceuticals) admitted to planting the Boston Marathon bombs and told investigators that he and his brother -- like Tounisi, Daoud, and dozens of other young men their age who had been shepherded into FBI-orchestrated false flag operations ? were aggrieved over the U.S. government?s unremitting state terrorism against Muslim populations abroad.

The fact that the FBI had previous contact with Tamerlan Tsarnaev, as well as ?multiple? warnings about his potential involvement in terrorism, would suggest culpable incompetence on the part of the Bureau ? if it weren?t for the fact that the bombing so perfectly fits the template from which scores of FBI-directed plots have been struck. This, when coupled with the fact that authorities were conducting a bombing ?drill? on the day of the marathon, suggests that something other than official incompetence is involved.

If the Boston Marathon bombing plot was a case of ?lone wolf? terrorism rather than an episode of Homeland Security Theater that went off-script, it would be an anomaly ? albeit a fortunate one for those who presume to rule us, given that they profit from the bloody misfortune of the population they supposedly protect.
_
William Norman Grigg publishes the Pro Libertate blog and hosts the Pro Libertate radio program.

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Ron Paul: Government Security Is Just Another Kind of Violence

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The senseless and horrific killings last week in Newtown, Connecticut reminded us that a determined individual or group of individuals can cause great harm no matter what laws are in place. Connecticut already has restrictive gun laws relative to other states, including restrictions on fully automatic, so-called ?assault? rifles and gun-free zones.

Predictably, the political left responded to the tragedy with emotional calls for increased gun control. This is understandable, but misguided. The impulse to have government ?do something? to protect us in the wake national tragedies is reflexive and often well intentioned. Many Americans believe that if we simply pass the right laws, future horrors like the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting can be prevented. But this impulse ignores the self evident truth that criminals don't obey laws.

The political right, unfortunately, has fallen into the same trap in its calls for quick legislative solutions to gun violence. If only we put armed police or armed teachers in schools, we?re told, would-be school shooters will be dissuaded or stopped.

While I certainly agree that more guns equals less crime and that private gun ownership prevents many shootings, I don?t agree that conservatives and libertarians should view government legislation, especially at the federal level, as the solution to violence. Real change can happen only when we commit ourselves to rebuilding civil society in America, meaning a society based on family, religion, civic and social institutions, and peaceful cooperation through markets. We cannot reverse decades of moral and intellectual decline by snapping our fingers and passing laws.

Let?s not forget that our own government policies often undermine civil society, cheapen life, and encourage immorality. The president and other government officials denounce school violence, yet still advocate for endless undeclared wars abroad and easy abortion at home. U.S. drone strikes kill thousands, but nobody in America holds vigils or devotes much news coverage to those victims, many of which are children, albeit, of a different color.

Obviously I don?t want to conflate complex issues of foreign policy and war with the Sandy Hook shooting, but it is important to make the broader point that our federal government has zero moral authority to legislate against violence.

Furthermore, do we really want to live in a world of police checkpoints, surveillance cameras, metal detectors, X-ray scanners, and warrantless physical searches? We see this culture in our airports: witness the shabby spectacle of once proud, happy Americans shuffling through long lines while uniformed TSA agents bark orders. This is the world of government provided "security," a world far too many Americans now seem to accept or even endorse. School shootings, no matter how horrific, do not justify creating an Orwellian surveillance state in America.

Do we really believe government can provide total security? Do we want to involuntarily commit every disaffected, disturbed, or alienated person who fantasizes about violence? Or can we accept that liberty is more important than the illusion of state-provided security? Government cannot create a world without risks, nor would we really wish to live in such a fictional place. Only a totalitarian society would even claim absolute safety as a worthy ideal, because it would require total state control over its citizens? lives. We shouldn?t settle for substituting one type of violence for another. Government role is to protect liberty, not to pursue unobtainable safety.

Our freedoms as Americans preceded gun control laws, the TSA, or the Department of Homeland Security. Freedom is defined by the ability of citizens to live without government interference, not by safety. It is easy to clamor for government security when terrible things happen; but liberty is given true meaning when we support it without exception, and we will be safer for it.

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Social Security Ponzi Scheme Coming To An End

Chris | InformationLiberation

Socialist security, possibly the world's largest wealth redistribution scheme in history is finally now coming to an end. Like a scam chain letter, the first people who "sent in a dollar" got a hundred back in return, but the last pay in and get nothing. Such is the case now with socialist security reports the AP, "People retiring today are part of the first generation of workers who have paid more in Social Security taxes during their careers than they will receive in benefits after they retire. It?s a historic shift that will only get worse for future retirees."

Unfortunately, unlike a scam pyramid scheme chain letter, citizens are not allowed to opt out, so everyone from now on will be paying in with the guarantee they will be losing money, and getting absolutely no "security." Rather than a "social safety net," it's a ring of jail bars locking everyone into perpetual debt slavery. Such a situation cannot continue for very long, and as the AP notes, it will only get worse as more and more of the baby boomers retire.

?For the early generations, it was an incredibly good deal,? said Andrew Biggs, a former deputy Social Security commissioner who is now a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. ?The government gave you free money and getting free money is popular.?

If you retired in 1960, you could expect to get back seven times more in benefits than you paid in Social Security taxes, and more if you were a low-income worker, as long you made it to age 78 for men and 81 for women.

As recently as 1985, workers at every income level could retire and expect to get more in benefits than they paid in Social Security taxes, though they didn?t do quite as well as their parents and grandparents.

Not anymore.

A married couple retiring last year after both spouses earned average lifetime wages paid about $598,000 in Social Security taxes during their careers. They can expect to collect about $556,000 in benefits, if the man lives to 82 and the woman lives to 85, according to a 2011 study by the Urban Institute, a Washington think tank.

As a young person myself, I'm ecstatic to see this socialist ponzi scheme fail. While I feel for people who "paid into it" their whole lives and will now get nothing, the fact of the matter is the money was stolen from them, and stealing from future generations won't make things any better. Taxes are theft, all of them, the sooner people accept it, the sooner the healing process can begin.
_
Chris runs the website InformationLiberation.com, you can read more of his writings here. Follow infolib on twitter here.

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Congratulations Chris !
You are now officially a neo-con stooge .

You are quoting a fellow of The American Enterprise Institute, the home-dungeon of intellectual heavyweights like Richard Perle and Dick Cheneys wife ..

Thanks.

By those standards, I'm a stooge of some 40000 people/organizations I've quoted over the last 7 years running this site, maybe you could add them all up and tell me how I'm a stooge of them all (and every single person associated with them).

If you think the socialist security system is wonderful, just say it, I'd love to hear you defend this bankrupt socialist scam.

Sad post Chris, why don't you focus on the main problem facing our economy which is corporate welfare not social welfare. Your AP quote also doesn't account for inflation as well as the extreme increase in the cost of medical care in your "give a dollar, expect 100 dollars back" examples. This just reeks of right wing bias and I expect more from this site.

Lets use Ron Paul as a great example of what to do with SS instead of the neo con stooges who just want to end social welfare to have more money for corporate welfare. Dr. Paul's solution involves a public option to pay into SS, which is a great start towards fixing the social safety net instead of just cutting it lose.

After that the only way to "fix" SS is to fix our medical industry, which is one of the primary reasons the cost of living for retirees has increased so drastically over the last 50 years causing them to need so much more back from SS. Without a end to the "for profit" medical industry, we will continue to price out the middle class from affording the costs to stay healthy as they retire. I know socialized medicine is a boogeyman term here, but other developed countries do it just fine and are in much better shape than we are with our system.

The Folks complaining about this article are more than likely Boomers who have no problem at all with their kids and grand kids furniture being burnt to keep those checks coming as long as they still have a finger to point. They got theirs stolen and now they enable the thieves to steal from their kids knowing there is nothing in it for them. America lost EVERYTHING under the leadership of the Boomers...the "entitlement" generation. Their policies are all based on a time horizon that has the end of the world and obligations to future generations? coinciding with their death. ..the WORST generation EVER!.............. I just wanted to add to the discussion that when the social security program first started,the actual number issued was not supposed to be used as identification by law.
Today it is.
We literally have a national ID number,and its being issued to our children practically automatically at birth.

My concerns for social security, besides the obvious fiscal issues,are that it promotes government dependency at the cost of individual liberty.

It does this on many levels.

And to top it all off,there is no where in the Constitution authorizing the federal government to institute such a program.Nowhere.

America will be great again when Americans fully accept that to have liberty,they might have to have less government "safety nets" and actually be more responsible for themselves,and instead of relying on a nanny state to save up for their retirement for them- do it themselves.

But I know,I know,thats scary.

And its sad how cowardly and dependent we've become.

As a Boomer who is going to be 56 next month, let me back up what is being stated in this posting with a real life example. After my husband passed away in '04 my family said I should go to the happy little folks at the Social Security office and apply for his SS. I knew this was BS, since as a nurse turned writer who does a lot of research, there are bills in various forms of development which will change what my age group would be eligible to receive. Since my goal in life is to be financially independent, I treated this as a candid interview project. After talking with a few dedicated government wage slaves, I did manage to find at least one person there who had possibly awakened to what SS really is, a scam to slip Americans into dependent socialism.
If you doubt me, prove me wrong. Your best bet is look at history.
But back to our visit with the SS office wage slave. This person told me to apply 6 months before my 62nd birthday if, the age limit had not been moved up to 70 by then and, if SS still existed.
As a researcher and writer who is well aware of the plans the Illuminati has in store for this country, I agree with what Chris has written.
D.M. Simonds
ScribeCaveDotCom
The choice is yours. To Anon 98150, the "main problem facing our economy" is not simply corporate welfare nor social welfare, it's all welfare, from corporate welfare to the military industrial complex to welfare to make dependent government slaves who will defend the state enslaving them just so long as they get a check of loot for themselves, it's all done under the same principle and it's all entirely criminal.

The example of give a dollar get a hundred back no longer applies, but it did apply to the first people who were part of this ponzi scheme, read the story of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ida_May_Fuller who "paid in" (had confiscated) $24.75, then got a wealth transfer of $22,888.92 given to her. That's almost a thousand to one return.

Ron Paul's "solution" will never be implemented as the people running the system are crooked criminals who do not want the welfare system to change, it's true if they cut the wars they could keep the scam going a bit longer, but that wouldn't change much, the fact of the matter is the ponzi scheme is coming to an end now and as with all ponzi schemes when the money stops coming in it must collapse.

As SS functions now it's a scheme to rob poor young people to pay for rich old people, why is that something which should be "saved"? If the state cut all spending even then it shouldn't go to social security, just stop actively stealing from people through taxation and let people keep the money which is rightly theirs, that's a much better "solution" to this problem than let's keep current confiscation levels the same and hope the criminals in congress who did not earn it spend the money more wisely.

"Like a scam chain letter, the first people who "sent in a dollar" got a hundred back in return, but the last pay in and get nothing. "

Sort of like the Youngevity products Tangy Tangerine multi level marketing ponzi scheme, huh?

I do not agree with this whole article. The banksters created this ponzi scheme, and until an economic order based on Logos is put it place, I thank God that there has been and will be for a while this safety net that has allowed millions of people to survive.

Jeannon, this sort of misplaced sympathy is giving some 70 years olds a couple extra dollars to live on and enriching a few score of bureaucrats at the expense of robbing tens of millions of their freedoms and economic potentials in the prime of their lives.

The first generation in the system knew retirement would now be easier so could go spend much of what was already saved on vacations or whatever, the next generation didn't bother to save enough b/c of course they factored the gov't money into retirement. Additionally they started taking other forms of gov't social welfare in home loans, loans for their kids schooling, etc... The 3rd generation took gov't by the tens of thousands starting at 18 and kept borrowing in one form or another until they were 30.

The result of such "social welfare" is a generation that is underwater on homes that won't sell, can't afford to pay student loan payments that they can't escape, and have to fear losing their jobs in the terrible economy the previous decades of spend now pay later has caused....all the while any money they do make has portions taken out to give some 60 and 70 year olds a nicer tv in the retirement home.

Kill social security (in phases if need be), cut gov't house/school loans, and free the markets that haven't seen freedom in my lifetime; it will do more to help the poor than all the "social welfare" I've ever seen.

The SS trust is unindentured. Tighten up your Contract with SS. SIN in Canada. Remember, yourSS/SIN# Is the same # as your Individual Master File at the IMF (International Monetary Fund). Quit bitchin, assert your rights.

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Police Arrest Man For Selling Booze to Minor -- Security Video Shows The Opposite

A POLICE STING nabbed a Brooklyn bodega worker for selling booze to a minor ? even though a security video shows the clerk refusing to do so, the Daily News has learned.

Before he realized the video would acquit him, Ismael Duran pleaded guilty to avoid spending time behind bars.

But now a bodega industry group is pressing the Brooklyn district attorney?s office to vacate the plea ? and to investigate the police officers involved.

?This kind of illegal activity is not going to fly,? said Fernando Mateo, spokesman for the Bodega Association of the United States.

?If we didn?t have the video, this guy would be screwed.?

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CISPA, "National Security," and the NSA's Ability to Read Your Emails

BY TREVOR TIMM, Electronic Frontier Foundation

This week the House of Representatives is debating CISPA, the dangerous 'cybersecurity' bill that threatens to decimate Internet users' privacy in the name of security. EFF and a wide variety of other groups have been protesting the law's provisions giving companies the power to read users' emails and other communications and hand them to the government without any judicial oversight whatsoever--essentially a giant 'cybersecurity' exception to all existing privacy laws.

We've already shown how the bill's definition of 'cyber threat information' can lead the companies and government to surveil citizens for a host of reasons beyond critical cybersecurity threats. But we want to focus on one vital portion of the bill that is not getting enough attention: what the government can do with your private information once companies hand it over.

Even though CISPA is styled as a 'cybersecurity' bill, it explicitly allows the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies like the National Security Agency (NSA) to use your information for 'national security' purposes--expanding the bill far beyond its purported goal.?Bill sponser Mike Rogers introduced a package of amendments yesterday, but did not remove "national security" as one of the purposes for which information can be used.

The Erosion of Civil Liberties

In the past decade, the amorphous phrase "national security" has invaded many arenas of government action, and has been used to justify much activity that did not involve legitimate terrorist threats. The most obvious (and odious) example is the unfortunately named USA-PATRIOT Act, a law that was sold to the American public as essential to combating terrorism, but which has overwhelmingly been applied to ordinary American citizens never even suspected of terrorism.

In just one of many examples, from 2003-2006, the FBI issued more than 192,000 National Security Letters to get Americans' business, phone or Internet records without a warrant. These invasive letters--which come with a gag order on the recipient so they can't even admit they received one--have been used to gather information about untold number of ordinary citizens, including journalists. Exactly one of those cases ended in a terrorism conviction--and he would have been convicted without the NSL evidence. The ACLU has catalogued how many other PATRIOT Act provisions have been similarly abused. EFF is suing for information about one provision, known as Section 215, which Senators have warned is being secretly interpreted to invade privacy in a way that "most Americans would be stunned" to learn about.

"Information sharing"-- CISPA's mantra--has also created privacy nightmares for everyday Americans in the name of national security. The federal government routinely shares its massive national security databases with local law enforcement agencies with predictable results. An investigation by PBS Frontline and the Washington Post's Dana Priest showed that "many states have yet to use their vast and growing anti-terror apparatus to capture any terrorists; instead the government has built a massive database that collects, stores and analyzes information on thousands of U.S. citizens and residents, many of whom have not been accused of any wrongdoing."

Despite the ample evidence of these expansive "national security" powers being used on ordinary citizens, the government has only continued down the same path. Just last month, the National Counterterrorism Center drastically changed its rules so it can now copy entire data bases from other federal government agencies and keep information on citizens for up to five years--even if they're completely innocent.

Wrongdoing and Abuse Go Unchecked

Of course, with such unchecked power, abuse is inevitable. In 2010, EFF learned through Freedom of Information Act requests indications that the FBI--one of the many agencies that might receive private communications via CISPA--may have committed upwards of 40,000 possible intelligence violations in the nine years since 9/11--many of which were done under the PATRIOT Act. In addition, we've found evidence of the FBI "lying in declarations to courts, using improper evidence to obtain grand jury subpoenas, and accessing password-protected files without a warrant."

Incredibly, it recently emerged the FBI may have not only condoned this type of behavior, but encouraged it. Wired recently published an FBI memo on agent training that said, "Under certain circumstances, the FBI has the ability to bend or suspend the law and impinge on freedoms of others" and cited various wiretapping laws in national security investigations. (emphasis ours)

Increased powers of the National Security Agency

CISPA's author Rep. Mike Rogers has tried to stave off criticism of that CISPA would lead to government abuse by insisting that the bill allows citizens to sue the government if they misuse their information. But this provides very little comfort. Any such lawsuit will be difficult, if not impossible, to bring. The government can attempt to use the same "national security" exception in CISPA that allows them to use the information for other purposes to escape liability.

First, the statute of limitations for such a lawsuit is two years from the date of the actual violation.? It's not at all clear how an individual would know of such misuse if it were kept inside the government. Given that the National Security Agency is notoriously secretive--its employees even used to refer to it as "No Such Agency"--they may attempt to prevent users from finding out exactly how this information was ever used. And a provision in CISPA that provides an exemption to the Freedom of Information Act for all private information given to it by companies for anything cybersecurity related doesn't help.

Even if a user knew the government was misusing his or her information, litigation would be difficult, expensive, and time consuming given if classified information or national security is involved, the government may invoke the "state secrets privilege."

EFF has been involved for years in a lawsuit over Fourth Amendment and statutory violations stemming from another abuse of the government's claimed 'national security' powers--the NSA's warrantless wiretapping program. Given the NSA may be a recipient of "cyber threat information" in CISPA, they stand to gain more power to spy on Americans despite laws that would otherwise prevent them from doing so.

Despite six years of litigation, the government continues to maintain that the "state secrets" privilege prevents lawsuits over the warrantless wiretapping program from being heard, arguing that even if the allegations are true, the suit should be dismissed because of--you guessed it--national security concerns. The same state secrets privilege has been invoked in other cases involving the CIA's extraordinary rendition program and their authority to target Americans in drone strikes overseas with no judicial safeguards.

CISPA will create yet another tool for the government to expand its already massive national security apparatus, and in turn, erode ordinary citizens' rights, while giving them virtually no recourse if their civil liberties are violated. The House of Representatives is beginning debates on CISPSA tomorrow, with a vote coming no later than Friday.? Join EFF in opposing CISPA by calling, emailing, and tweeting at your Representatives.

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CISPA Legislation Is Disguised?Fascism

CISPA the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act if signed into law will allow??the military and NSA warrant-less spying on Americans? confidential electronic Communications; any transmitted private information circumventing the fourth amendment. CISPA will allow any self-protected cyber entity to share with the Feds any person?s private information that might allegedly relate to a cyber threat or crime. Considering the U.S. Government?s current business relationship with telephone and Internet companies, it should be expected the feds would use CISPA to gain unprecedented access to lawful Americans? private electronic communications. Almost every week news media reports corrupt police arrested for selling drugs, taking bribes and perjury. It is foreseeable that broad provisions in CISPA that call for private businesses / cyber entities to share with Spy Agencies confidential information will open the door for corrupt government and police to sell a corporations? confidential information to its competitors, foreign governments and others. CISPA provides insufficient safeguards to control disposition of (shared) confidential corporate / cyber entity information, including confidential information shared by spy agencies with private entities derived from spying on Americans.

The recently House Passed Cyber Security Bill overrides the Fourth Amendment. Government may use against Americans in Criminal, Civil and Administrative courts (any information) derived from CISPA warrant-less spying.

CISPA will open the door for U.S. Government spy agencies such as NSA; the FBI; government asset forfeiture contractors, any private entity (to take out of context) any innocent?hastily written email, fax or phone call to allege a crime or violation was committed to cause a person?s arrest, assess fines and or civilly forfeit a business or property. There are more than 350 laws and violations that can subject property to government asset forfeiture. Government civil asset forfeiture requires only a civil preponderance of evidence for police to forfeit property, little more than hearsay.

CISPA (warrant-less electronic surveillance) will enable the U.S. Justice Department to bypass the Fourth Amendment, use information extracted from CISPA electronic surveillance) of Americans? Web Server Records, Internet Activity, transmitted emails, faxes, and phone calls to issue subpoenas in hopes of finding evidence or to prosecute Citizens for any alleged crime or violation.

If the current CISPA is signed into law it is problematic federal, state and local law enforcement agencies and private government contractors will want access to prior Bush II NSA and other government illegally obtained electronic records to secure evidence to arrest Americans; civilly forfeit their homes, businesses and other assets under Title 18USC and other laws. Of obvious concern, what happens to fair justice in America if police become dependent on ?Asset Forfeiture? to help pay their salaries and budget operating costs?

Note: the passed ?Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000? (effectively eliminated) the ?five year statue of limitations? for Government Civil Asset Forfeiture of property: the statute now runs five years (from the date) police allege they ?learned? an asset became subject to forfeiture.

If CISPA takes affect, allows (no warrant) electronic government surveillance of Americans, it is expected CISPA will be used by government not only to thwart cyber threats, but to aggressively prosecute Americans and businesses for any alleged crime: U.S. Government spy and police agencies; quasi government contractors for profit, will relentlessly sift through Citizen and businesses? (government retained Internet data), emails and phone communications) to discover possible crimes or civil violations.

A corrupt U.S. Government Administration too easily use CISPA no-warrant-seized emails, faxes, Internet data and phone call information) to target, blackmail and extort its political opposition; target any Citizen, corporation and others in the manner Hitler used his Nazi passed legislation that permitted no-warrant Nazi police searches and seizure of Citizens and businesses or to extort support for the Nazi fascist government. Hitler Nazi Laws made it possible for the Nazis to strong-arm German parliament to pass Hitler?s 1933 Discriminatory Decrees that suspended the Constitutional Freedoms of German Citizens. History shows how that turned out.

CISPA warrant-less electronic surveillance) has the potential of turning America into a Fascist Police State.

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ISPs Will Start Acting As Hollywood's Private Online Security Guards By July

by Mike Masnick

Last July, we wrote about how the major ISPs had agreed to a "voluntary" "six strikes" plan (really five strikes, but everyone calls it six...) to start acting as Hollywood's private online security guards. And, by "voluntary" we mean without any input from the actual stake holders (customers) and with significant pressure being applied by the Obama administration. Since then, nothing has been heard, but the RIAA's Cary Sherman has now said that the ISPs involved will roll out their plans by July of this year, a year after the agreement went into place.

Sherman says that the plan had always been to give them a year to deal with the technical aspects of setting up the plan:

"Each isp has to develop their infrastructure for automating the system," Sherman said. They need this "for establishing the database so they can keep track of repeat infringers, so they know that this is the first notice or the third notice. Every ISP has to do it differently depending on the architecture of its particular network. Some are nearing completion and others are a little further from completion."

Funny how, now that the plan is in place, the RIAA has no problem admitting that it required significant infrastructure changes. Somehow I doubt the RIAA is paying for this... meaning that you and I are paying for it with higher fees.

Of course, the real question is what this means for the non-major ISPs who have not agreed to take part in this anti-consumer plan. Will the RIAA and MPAA now start assuming that this is a requirement, despite it not being in the law? That's what they've been doing with content filtering on user-generated content sites now. Multiple lawsuits have pointed out that because YouTube and others have installed upload filters, everyone should have to. I'd imagine it won't be long until they start making the argument that ISPs that don't implement such a plan are "inducing" infringement somehow.

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Goldman Protesters Are Almost Outnumbered by Security Guards in New Jersey

By Charles Mead and Elise Young

Protesters assembling today outside a Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) building in New Jersey were met by almost as many security guards and police officers as ?Occupy Wall Street? demonstrators sought to single out the bank.

About 50 people gathered at a Goldman Sachs building surrounded by metal barricades in Jersey City, where 30 to 40 officers and guards were waiting. The investment bank?s employees watched from windows as the crowd chanted ?We are the 99 percent? before breaking into discussion groups.

?Goldman Sachs has too many people in government, and too much influence,? said Pat Meany, 53, who arrived on his bicycle and wore clothes painted with fluorescent colors and peace symbols. ?It seems like they?re looking out for America?s rich. It?s not for the good of all Americans.?

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Social Security disability on verge of insolvency

Social Security disability on verge of insolvency - informationliberationinformationliberation
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How America Can Be Saved: A Lecture by Hans-Hermann Hoppe(more)Article posted Aug 21 2011, 9:01 PMCategory: EconomySource: Associated PressPrint
Social Security disability on verge of insolvencyBy STEPHEN OHLEMACHER

Verge? It's been running on printed money for years.WASHINGTON (AP) ? Laid-off workers and aging baby boomers are flooding Social Security's disability program with benefit claims, pushing the financially strapped system toward the brink of insolvency.

Applications are up nearly 50 percent over a decade ago as people with disabilities lose their jobs and can't find new ones in an economy that has shed nearly 7 million jobs.

The stampede for benefits is adding to a growing backlog of applicants ? many wait two years or more before their cases are resolved ? and worsening the financial problems of a program that's been running in the red for years.

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