Am I really the first one to post this? Alex Jones Detained By TSA I have to say, these goons played right into Mr. Jones' hands. Now Infowars has great stuff to talk about. It would have only been better had he been arrested, but somebody was smart enough to call that off. I try to keep a skeptical mind about Alex Jones and Infowars, and indeed -- the guy is a piece of work. But I do believe in a couple hundred years, history will see him as something of a Robin Hood character.
Alex Jones is a good example of a broken clock that's right twice a day. The "OMG it's an Illuminati plot!" Chicken Little routine is patently absurd, but he's right about TSA and fortunately, we have user-generated video of innumerable instances of abuse to prove it and back him up. Jones is also in the fortunate position of having less to lose than other principled objectors like Rand Paul. Paul, for as pissed as I'm sure he was when TSA detained him and spun their yarn about him being "unruly" or "disruptive" or "belligerent" or whatever other barb they slung at him, had to play it safe to avoid driving his political career into a brick wall at 90mph. Jones can afford to be much more of an inconvenience to TSA and, even if he doesn't get swift or severe results, he might at least wear them down to the point that they start making more mistakes that open them up for a real legislative or judicial beatdown.
I want to see the video, as we know the likelihood of TSA producing a Video is slim to none. That or if they do I bet its doctored which wouldn't surprise me at all.
The photos in the article show Alex pointing his finger and getting into it with people. I suspect he was pretty aggressive, if not belligerent. He certainly is in a better position than Rand Paul, who had to be the bigger man about the whole thing. Though that one rep from Texas who slapped the screener's hand away from his junk did get, I think, moderately feisty. Still, though, he did what we all say we wish more people were doing. He even did it over shoes, which is a battle that wouldn't be worth fighting for us regular folks.
I kinda do wish people would stop focusing on the shoe thing. Not that it isn't legitimate in its own right, but people are more likely to see it as petty - witness the comments on the linked page. There were more pro-TSA/anti-Jones comments than usual but most of them were "Just take off your shoes like the rest of us." I'd rather people focus on the scoping and groping - massive bad PR over that will make it harder for TSA to spin it as "LOL @ people pissed over shoes. Bitch more, pax."
I agree, about the shoes. He was probably looking for a fight and took the one he could get. His photographer was johnny on the spot, too -- we don't normally see such good photos of a checkpoint conflict. They were ready and waiting to get into it with the TSA. There is the part of the story, though, where the WTMD dinged on him, and he suspected they set it off, which we know, per Bill Forester, that they do whenever they want to screw with somebody. That's one more abuse I believe needs more publicity.
He claims others were going through the WTDM with shoes on. Without evidence he doesn't have much to fight with. TSA was already using the WTMD so no complaint about WBI is possible. I think he pick a bad day for a fight.
Alex Jones may be a bit of a crackpot, but it doesn't hurt that a major paper like the UK Daily Times is giving this event some legs: UK Daily Mail: Controversial radio host and conspiracy theorist 'detained by TSA agents because he refused to take his shoes off'
I think he was making a point about the Precheck, pre-12 and 75+ farce. Different rules for different groups is fundamentally flawed and clearly unconstitutional, i.e. "equal treatment under the law" and those other outdated ideals.