From Congressman Blackburn, a Republican serving Tennessee's 7th district. Interestingly enough, as TSA officials like to routinely point out, their agency's acronym stands for Transportation Security Administration, not the Airport Security Administration.
Not that they do the latter well...
This fact has extended the TSA's reach has far beyond the confines of our nation's airports. Many of my constituents discovered this first hand this past fall as those familiar blue uniforms and badges appeared on Tennessee highways. In October Tennessee became the first state to conduct a statewide Department of Homeland Security Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) team operation which randomly inspected Tennessee truck drivers and cars.
VIPR teams which count TSOs among their ranks, conduct searches and screenings at train stations, subways, ferry terminals and every other mass transit location around the country. In fact, as the Los Angeles Times has detailed, VIPR teams conducted 9,300 unannounced checkpoints and other search operations in the last year alone. The very thought of federal employees with zero law enforcement training roaming across our nation's transportation infrastructure with the hope of randomly thwarting a domestic terrorist attack makes about as much sense as EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson's Environmental Justice tour.
Good read on how the TSA is warping to stop us at anytime, anywhere in the name of fighting terrorism. I am reminded of the scene from Red October where the first mate is talking to the captain about he will drive state to state in his RV without papers. Those days are disappearing in America.