I have been reluctant to post too much on the TSA molestations. I have been willing to try to defend the administration from time to time just to present the other side of issues. I do not jump to damning conclusions about Presidents and their administrations, neither quickly blasting Bush or Obama when many others have done so. Granted, I may certainly have blasted their decisions after a bit of thought.  Yet, I have just seen something that goes beyond what I can tolerate. I don’t even think that violating Godwin’s Law would end this discussion because it may well be the most apt context. FYI Godwin’s Law states that “As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.” Perhaps, I should be citing Stalinist Russia or Maoist China instead. Certainly Orwell’s 1984 is appropriate. “Appropriate to what?,” you ask.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign. Starting this week, over 200 Walmart stores will play this video at select checkout lanes. In the weeks to come, nearly 600 stores will show the video featuring Secretary Napolitano reminding shoppers to contact local law enforcement to report suspicious activity. Taken in conjunction with the new TSA searches, it sort of feels like 1984, Orwell style.

“It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away. A nervous tic, an unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself–anything that carried with it the suggestion of abnormality, of having something to hide. In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face…; was itself a punishable offense. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: facecrime…”
– George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 5