Expect it to get worse now that the police have decided that a crowded train was a good place to risk a shootout in Texas.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
kolechovski Just one more reason people hate flying. I swear, it's only a matter of time before these guys show up on trains, and that will demolish rail travel. http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/florida-teen-detained-tsa-design-her-purse-221835034.html
Just one more reason people hate flying. I swear, it's only a matter of time before these guys show up on trains, and that will demolish rail travel.
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/florida-teen-detained-tsa-design-her-purse-221835034.html
You're a little behind the times, they've already showed up on Amtrak (and Greyhound buses) and at least Amtrak fought back. For awhile, border agents were routinely stopping the Lake Shore Limited in up-state New York, would screen passengers on the train, mainly to "search" for illegal immigrants.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/30/nyregion/30border.html?hp
One would think the Sunset Limited would be more obvious choice to search for illegals but searching for illegals is a different topic for a different forum. At any rate, border patrol would stop the in the middle of night and delay the train for hours as they would wake up passengers as they went from seat to seat, compartment to compartment, eliminating illegals immigrants from Amtrak. That brought ire of Amtrak whose passengers were being harassed and whose trains were being delayed together with CSX (and i suppose Norfolk Southern) whose lines were tied up by the Lake Shore Limited sitting in a station for hours while being searched and then the resulting delay caused the LSL to miss its "slot" in the schedule.
If I'm not mistaken, the issue ended up getting resolved after an Amtrak VP rode the Lake Shore Limited... after arguing with the Border Patrol agents who stopped the train in I believe Rochester, the VP told the crew to close the doors and start the train with the agents on board. (I wonder if the conductors asked the agents for their tickets?) After that incident, I believe the Border Patrol made a few more sporadic 'inspections" and then quietly disappeared from the Lake Shore Limited earlier this year.
And now I think about my earlier comment. If the Republicans want to kill Amtrak once and for all, they'll simply bring along the TSA, and it'll die faster than any spending cuts will kill it. Then, they can funnel more money into airlines who can charge much higher rates, and they can order more money to be spent on worse congested highways, and they can pocket good amounts for themselves in the much higher taxes that will supposedly be needed to pay for these things. I wouldn't see this scenerio as impossible at all.
Good grief.
I think the TSA should steal a line from Seinfeld for its motto. "You want to get nuts? Let's get nuts!"
"No soup for you!" - Yev Kassem (from Seinfeld)
You know, I LOVE flying, but I HATE airports! The TSA is the least of my concerns, I've never had any problem with them. It's everything and everybody else in the airports that drives me nuts. Don't get me started...
As long as people tolerate it, it will just keep getting worse.
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