What's Next?*!#*?#!
 

Washington Times
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
EDITORIAL: Guns on a plane

After the September 11 attacks, commercial airline pilots were allowed to carry guns if they completed a federal-safety program. No longer would unarmed pilots be defenseless as remorseless hijackers seized control of aircraft and rammed them into buildings.

Now President Obama is quietly ending the federal firearms program, risking public safety on airlines in the name of an anti-gun ideology.

The Obama administration this past week diverted some $2 million from the pilot training program to hire more supervisory staff, who will engage in field inspections of pilots.

This looks like completely unnecessary harassment of the pilots. The 12,000 Federal Flight Deck Officers, the pilots who have been approved to carry guns, are reported to have the best behavior of any federal law enforcement agency. There are no cases where any of them has improperly brandished or used a gun. There are just a few cases where officers have improperly used their IDs.

Fewer than one percent of the officers have any administrative actions brought against them and, we are told, virtually all of those cases “are trumped up.”

Take a case against one flight officer who had visited the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles within the last few weeks. While there, the pilot noticed that federal law enforcement officers can, with the approval of a superior, obtain a license plate that cannot be traced, a key safety feature for law enforcement personnel. So the pilot asked if, as a member of the federal program, he was eligible. The DMV staffer checked and said “no.” The next day administrative actions were brought against the pilot for “misrepresenting himself.” These are the kinds of cases that President Obama wants to investigate.

Since Mr. Obama's election, pilots have told us that the approval process for letting pilots carry guns on planes slowed significantly. Last week the problem went from bad to worse. Federal Flight Deck Officers - the pilots who have been approved to carry guns - indicate that the approval process has stalled out.

Pilots cannot openly speak about the changing policies for fear of retaliation from the Transportation Security Administration. Pilots who act in any way that causes a “loss of confidence” in the armed pilot program risk criminal prosecution as well as their removal from the program. Despite these threats, pilots in the Federal Flight Deck Officers program have raised real concerns in multiple interviews.

Arming pilots after Sept. 11 was nothing new. Until the early 1960s, American commercial passenger pilots on any flight carrying U.S. mail were required to carry handguns. Indeed, U.S. pilots were still allowed to carry guns until as recently as 1987. There are no records that any of these pilots (either military or commercial) ever causing any significant problems.

Screening of airplane passengers is hardly perfect. While armed marshals are helpful, the program covers less than 3 percent of the flights out of Washington D.C.'s three airports and even fewer across the country. Sky marshals are costly and quit more often than other law-enforcement officers.

Armed pilots are a cost-effective backup layer of security. Terrorists can only enter the cockpit through one narrow entrance, and armed pilots have some time to prepare themselves as hijackers penetrate the strengthened cockpit doors. With pilots, we have people who are willing to take on the burden of protecting the planes for free. About 70 percent of the pilots at major American carriers have military backgrounds.

Frankly, as a matter of pure politics, we cannot understand what the administration is thinking. Nearly 40 House Democrats are in districts were the NRA is more popular than House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. We can't find any independent poll in which the public is demanding that pilots disarm. Why does this move make sense?

Only anti-gun extremists and terrorist recruits are worried about armed pilots. So why is the Obama administration catering to this tiny lobby at the expense of public safety?

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Millions for tribute! But, not one penny for defence!

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USMC-03
I'm so angry I don't know what to do with myself. I definately need to find something to do with this rage that is intensifying daily within me.
What...is...happening...to our country?

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I am afraid that as Obama's term ages we are going to see more and more policy and rules limiting the use of firearms. Our best hope right now is the seats in the House and Senate that will come up for re-election in 2010. We need to get people into those seats that will defend our RIGHTS to firearm ownerships. I think that Obama will be a one term blow out if he continues on his current path.

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By your signature quote you've read Orwell. He knew what was happening even before is really got started in earnest...

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Yeah...George Orwell and Ayn Rand.
Seers

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Obama seems to be undoing every thing that is rational on the War on Terror. We're not to call them "enemy combatants" anymore, we are poised to let some of them return to Afghanistan, and now we want to disarm pilots. He also wants our wounded service men and women to go through their own insurance companies for treatment. What's wrong with him? TJ

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He is simply disarming the American public so that in the future totalitarian government can easily take over and run the show. That is the goal of more than a few of our politicians. Unfortnunately for the democratic party and it's members they easily hide within their ranks.

None of this has anything at all with protecting our citizens or any other country's citizens (namely Mexico.) Of this make no mistake. There are a few who honestly believe that gun control is a good thing and those people do not personally offend me. However, the likes of Schummer, Obama, Biden, Franks, Feinstein, and etc all know better. They are all too intelligent to not see this. Just like with Barney Franks telling the Bush administration that Freddie Mac and Fannie May were sound businesses over 7 years ago purposely to cause our economic collapse to more easily facillitate his/their programs, they are also doing the same thing with our right to bear arms with faulty/false crime data. It is nothing more than a scheme ran by power hungry politicians at our direct expense.

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I'd say unbelieveable if not for the fact that sadly, it is so believeable with this administration. :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:



Art

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Oh boy oh boy, I suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure do feel a lot safer now with Barry in charge, don't you guys?:rolleyes::rolleyes:

He's making it easier for the ragheads to come over here and kill us, but yet he thinks we should give up our guns?! WTF is this whackadoo smoking?! Let some raghead show up around my house and I'll show you how to take care of the problem.:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

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This is not about pilot or passenger safety but about propagating an ideology backed by ignorance. This reminds me to wear my FBO shirt when I go outside later. :mad:

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The ragheads are the least of our problems. The most they can do is kill a few here and there. A corrupt government has the potential to kill millions. That is why we need our 2nd ammendment. Not for crime reduction like everyone thinks.

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That's why the 2nd was put into the Bill of Rights. The Founders never expected the Constitution to still be in effect for this long. They expected that the new gov't would become corrupt and oppressive long before this and that we'd be forced to rise up and change it.

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That's because you are a soldier. You have paid the price for freedom and watched others pay an even bigger price. To see our country and all that it has stood for be dismantled is something that anyone who has paid that price takes personally. As the saying goes:

"To those who have fought for it, freedom has a taste the protected will never know."

You aren't alone.

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No, you're not alone by any means.

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False according to, not just the administration, but TSA officials- which cited the fact that they just opened a brand new training facility. Pilot's Union says absolutely false as well.

Fox: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/firs...n-program-end/

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If you're right, then that's great.

I'm starting to get the feeling that Barry's people are leaking stories like this to either keep people occupied while they slip other things under the radar, or they're leaking these stories to gage the peoples' reaction to certain ideas.

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ugh...hoodwinked by an editorial! After looking at it again, I don't see any quotes or citations to anyone with authority. Lesson (re)learned here! *forehead slap*

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That doesn't mean that Barry wasn't trying to float the idea for real. He may have put it out, and then when the negative reaction came back, sends one of his minions to say that it's not true.

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That's a strong possibility, bcj. I keep saying, "NOTHING will surprise me anymore"...but yet, I still end up reading things and dropping my jaw on a daily basis. Maybe he and his cohorts are trying to drive us all insane so we just won't care!

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That could very well be true.

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Though I would agree in principle, Obama doesn't seem to be too concerned with that if you look at his short time in office so far. How many nominees have been tanked, he has reversed on his veteran's health care changes now, etc. He isn't really into the whole vetting process from what I can tell.

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I think he's realized that if he pisses enough people off, then he won't be sitting in the White House anymore.