Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Linguistics And The TSA

My nth anti-TSA column is up at the Guardian.
Today's lesson in vulgar Americanisms is "camel toe", a slang term meaning "the front half of a woman's genitalia, or the shape thereof". To properly use it in a sentence, you can say, "Those tight trousers give her such camel toe, when you talk to her, you hear echoes" or "the Transportation Security Administration demands to see or feel the camel toe of every female airline passenger in America, in case she's smuggling weapons there."
The one-year anniversary of the TSA's mandatory molestation policy is next month.

3 Comments:

Anonymous Alan McBride said...

The fictitious HR man at TSA is still concerned with your welfare:

Dear Madam,

Due to our HR Program “Operation Bootstrap” which is to increase our knowledge about potential job applicants, I've been instructed by CIA and HS to read and report on what you write in your blogs and Guardian columns.
After consultation, it is their consensus that you've a personal anxiety about TSA security which exacerbates your intellectual objections to certain security measures. It is their belief that we can use our top secret computer program “Revelation III”, with its extraordinary algorithms to predict human behavior, to construct an “intelligence model” of a hypothetical flight by you. We are convinced that our projections will convince you that you can easily deal with any minor inconvenience caused by our security measures. This software is so powerful that a complete uncensored publication is precluded. However, we've been allowed to partially reveal the computer generated de-briefing conversation between myself (Person A) and special CIA agent Person B. (I can neither confirm nor deny that “Blogger Bob” is Person B.)

$$$$$$$$

Date: Jan. 12, 2014
Time: 0600

A: I see Ms. Abel is back in the US. Remember the case Bob?
B: “Jihad” Jenny or something, but I just remember the name.
A: It was something of a personal embarrassment to me. She's a blogger who applied for work at TSA despite reservations about the intrusive nature of some of our security measures from a libertarian point of view. I think she was wanting to do some domestic flying herself, so I thought if I “smoothed the way” a little with CIA that her domestic flight would go off without a hitch—but you fellows at CIA had a little bureaucratic SNAFU.
B: How so?
A: Rendition to Afghanistan. We had her psychologically prepared for a scanner and so she stepped right into the C130 cargo bay and off she went.
B: Probably mistaken identity, is someone making a big deal out of it? It's no reflection on you and it's a new administration.
A: This blogger is, well, still a little miffed—the CIA traded her to an Afghan warlord for information about something and it took her nearly three years to get back here.
B: If we don't obtain intelligence the terrorists will win. You think she'll go straight to President Palin or something? The public acts like we should be perfect or something and you know how these feminists stick together. Could she go to the AG with a legal squawk?
A: No, not Nancy Grace—maybe State.
B: Glen Beck?
A: Perhaps, they both had a collection of incandescent bulbs before the “Change America Needs” program consigned fluorescent bulbs to socialist internment camps only.
B: How about this: President Palin invites the blogger to the State of the Union festivities and has her stand in recognition as a civilian soldier in the WOT?
A: Good idea, and the President could use her as an example of why the US will never refudiate the fourth amendment. Her situation will be fully rectified if she promptly renews her job application.

$$$$$

So, you betcha, everything has a happy ending; but since our software engineers are currently on loan to Dept of Labor and Treasury to help create jobs and prosperity, it may be awhile before our super computer can be used to relieve any more of your concerns about domestic travel.

Yours for a secure future,
Your friends and TSA and CIA

10:55 AM  
Blogger Jennifer Abel said...

Ha! You know, Alan, I'm only half-joking when I say "I wonder how much longer I'll be allowed to write posts like this."

12:58 PM  
Blogger Dan said...

I'd call you my heroine, but that sounds too much like "heroin", and I'm pretty sure you're not an opiate of any sort. In any event, I really appreciate your constant posts about the assholery of the TSA. Wish I followed you when I still lived in CT>

4:14 PM  

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