Don’t Forget To Check Your Liberties Along With Your Luggage

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When will it end?  The Transportation Security Administration, the organization that mans the airport security checkpoints, appears to be just throwing new regulations and procedures at us, the American public, with the usual national security excuse.  Seriously, the conduct that the TSA now considers Standard Operating Procedure is so offensive, it was difficult to think of a title for this post that wasn’t equally outrageous.  Remember those new enhanced scanners that I wrote about several months ago?  They’re rolling out nationwide, and contrary to what I thought would happen back in January, the controversy just seems to be spreading.

In fact, I think we’re at the point where the snowball effect is starting to kick in; when I was originally trying to write this earlier this week, the outcry was largely limited to the blogosphere and other internet communities.  Now, however, it’s hit the mainstream media, and it doesn’t show any sign of slowing down any time soon.  Given that they are subjected to the scanners much more frequently than you or I, the airline pilots have a slightly different, and perhaps slightly stronger, argument than the general public.  However, the peoples’ argument is just as strong, and just as insidious.  Just how big?  Read on, my friend, read on…

F.C.C. Gets Serious About Broadband

Though it may certainly seem that way, healthcare reform is not the only game in Washington, D.C. this week.  While that certainly is big news, and I will be writing a good amount on it this week, there are other things going on.  For one, today the Federal Communications Commission presented its plan for the future of broadband internet, wireless spectrum assignments, and so on.  All of this sounds very prosaic; after all, why would anyone except a network executive at a corporation such as AT&T or Verizon care about how much of the wireless spectrum is used by a given company?  However, there are some interesting parts of the newly-released proposal.  Chief among them, there is a major plan in the works that if the F.C.C. gets its way, internet speeds around the country will be approximately 25 times what they are today by 2020.

According to CNN, while the U.S. did develop the internet, we are now the subject of much ridicule for our slow internet speeds.  The article states that the U.S. is 18th worldwide for connection speeds with an average of 3.9 megabits/second, compared with 14.6 in South Korea.  Of course, most people don’t even know what their speed is, which is part of the problem.  After all, the fact that speed-wise our internet fails on its own will not magically get us faster internet; we must pressure the Internet Service Providers to increase the speed.  Further, part of the plan is to increase access to high-speed internet to 90% of Americans, some of whom live in areas where there are no incentives currently for the companies to go.  As FCC Commissioner Michael Copps says in the CNN article: “This is not something that is nice for us to do, it is everyone’s right.”

How the Postal Service Stole Christmas

Well, Thanksgiving is next week, so it is only fitting we start thinking about Christmas.  Heck, I heard Christmas music in Target two weeks before Halloween, for God’s sake.  This post is a bit lighter than what I usually write about, but among the twists and turns of the healthcare debate, the pending decision on Afghanistan, and the whole Iran issue among other things, some levity can be welcome.  Unfortunately, while the subject is lighter than usual, the story itself is somewhat sad.

As a kid, did you ever write a letter to Santa at the North Pole?  I cannot remember that far back, but I am fairly certain I did.  Well, from today on, millions of kids around the world will no longer have that opportunity, as NPR is reporting the United States Postal Service has cancelled the popular program for this year, and presumably next year as well.  One random bit of trivia that I did not know before reading the article: there is actually a town called North Pole, Alaska, which is where all of the letters addressed to the North Pole had gone.  Obviously, this news is devastating to the people who live up there, as they have capitalized on their town’s name and the Christmas holiday.  According to the article, responding to the letters was a major event in the small town.

Apparently, this decision is a direct result from last year’s discovery of a registered sex offender volunteering in the giant Operation Santa program, which is similar to the program that is getting the axe, but different in that the letters do not go to the North Pole.  I certainly understand the Postal Service’s reasoning for the change.  After all, who in their right mind would want a registered sex offender responding to a child’s letter to Santa?  However, the incident last year happened in Maryland, and was completely unrelated to the North Pole program.

That seems to suggest there is another reason behind this cancellation.  It is pretty much common knowledge that the Postal Service is hurting for cash, with e-mail replacing most of the letter-sending business and UPS, FedEx, and the like taking much of the shipping business.  The Postal Service is a unique entity in the government: as a government corporation, it must make a profit.  I have not found any specific figures on it, but sending letters from all over to a remote small town in Alaska must be almost prohibitively expensive, even with the usual need to buy stamps for the letters.  Unfortunately, if it is a matter of cutting costs, I cannot think of an alternative, given that the American people are resistant to another bailout, especially for a business many consider an afterthought at best.  While cutting the program is sad, it has a lesser impact on the business is done than the proposal to eliminate another day of mail delivery.

That being said, if there is anyone who can help save the program, it is former Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska.  In the run-up to last year’s election, part of the background on Sarah Palin that was introduced to the American public was that she had given her state a large budget surplus.  If cost is the issue, why not use some of that surplus to save the program?  Sarah Palin is still very popular in the public eye; her book, which was released earlier this week, is apparently selling quite well.  If she were to come out in favor of the program, and if her supporters were to mobilize to save it, it might just make a difference.

Swine Flu is Now a National Emergency: Don’t Panic

Well, somehow I had a feeling this was coming.  A little over an hour ago, it was announced that President Obama had signed an order declaring H1N1 Flu, more often referred to as swine flu, as a national emergency.  Now, I know many of you may be tempted to run out and get the vaccine right now after hearing that opener, but at the very least, wait until you are done reading this post.

Just because it has been declared a national emergency does not mean it is the end of the world.  In fact, “national emergency” has been overused to the point that if a real emergency strikes, we may not be completely ready.  For instance, for nearly every hurricane each year, the term “state of emergency” is tossed around.  Calling Hurricane Katrina a national emergency is appropriate; on the other hand, calling a hurricane that threatens Florida but does relatively little damage is not.  Though the numbers look bad, I do not think swine flu is quite bad enough to be a national emergency.

The New York Times article linked above states that swine flu is in 46 states and has killed 1,000 people in the U.S. so far, 100 of whom are children.  These numbers seem dire, but to be honest, I almost forget swine flu is still around from time to time.  We have had a few cases of swine flu here on campus, but we are at the point where normal seasonal illnesses are more of an issue.

All the federal declaration of an emergency does is allow the government to circumvent certain federal restrictions that would hinder a rapid response to it.  For example, this would relax the requirement that prohibits pharmacies from vaccinating children.  This move would allow faster, easier distribution of the vaccine to one of the at-risk groups, who otherwise would have had to get it at a doctor’s office or in school.  Logistically,  it makes sense to declare swine flu as a national emergency, but we really need a new system for things like this.  Otherwise, we may render the term “national emergency” as irrelevant as the color-coded terrorism alert system developed after 9/11.