Read the Book

What a way to start the morning! I’m engrossed in reading the international news and that’s when Boo, the cat, decides to leap up to the window screen, just inches away from me and to let me know how hungry she is…well, that got my heart started.

The news isn’t what I had hoped for. “Wars Are Declared Illegal – World Leaders Arrested” In fact, the news is just about more of the same violence we have become accustomed to reading about, and that’s the sad part; we are accustomed to it. We don’t wake up expecting good news at all. Is that why so many Americans don’t even bother to keep themselves informed?

Some news…
Critics Say TSA Must Catch Up With Technology
WASHINGTON-But Homeland Security wants to shift resources to hiring and training more personnel.

Faces, Too, Are Searched at U.S. Airports
Officials want to increase training for a new group of passenger screeners who look for suspicious behavior.

"There are infinite ways to find things to use as weapons and infinite ways to hide them. But if you can identify the individual, it is by far the better way to find the threat." KIP HAWLEY, director of the Transportation Security Administration, on using behavior observation techniques to spot security threats.

I don’t know about you, but the thought of government employees deciding who looks suspicious is scary. This is the same government that has brought us one disaster after another. (Want a list of those disasters? Read the newspaper.) A government that has increased in size by leaps and bounds…and they want to hire even more.

Think about it…what is “suspicious behavior”? And is there any data to support the idea that this wacko idea will even work? Any proven successes? Were the latest terrorism suspects in Great Britain arrested because they exhibited “suspicious behavior”? No. And I know that after spending most of the day in airports, missing connections and being treated rudely, even the best of us will exhibit suspicious behavior.

But, if I look at this positively…if TSA continues to increase the size of their payroll, there will come a time when we will all work for them and then, who will we be looking for? We can simply watch each other and file daily reports. I know you have heard it before, but this really is reminiscent of the novel, 1984 by Orwell. I think I will read it again.