Liberty For All!

Better Red than dead. Wait, that doesn’t work for this situation, even though the first can often lead to the second more speedily than is usual. Better dead than Red. Nope, not that one either.

Better Red and dead. That just about sums it up for the New York Civil Liberties Union.

The New York Civil Liberties Union today filed suit against the city to keep police from searching the bags of passengers entering the subway, organization lawyers said.

The suit, which filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, will claimed that the two-week old policy violates constitutional guarantees of equal protection and prohibitions against unlawful searches and seizures, while doing almost nothing to shield the city from terrorism.

Is the NYPD requiring that passengers make a choice between submitting their baggage for inspection or paying a fine/going to jail? And while the effectiveness against terrorism of the random search is arguable, why should the city be sued because the NYCLU believes that the tactic is ineffective?

It argues that the measure also allows the possibility for racial profiling, even though officers are ordered to randomly screen passengers.

I’m at a loss for this one. So, by the NYCLU’s logic, if the NYPD search criteria--searching every fifth passenger with a tote—allegedly allows for the possibility of racial profiling then, it’s a given that
• every fifth passenger is Arab or black (as ridiculous as that sounds),
• every Arab or black is more likely to carry a tote than others are, and
• each one of those carry-ons that the Arabs/blacks are carrying is more likely to contain an explosive device.

Tell me again, which one of these organizations is doing almost nothing to protect NYC from terrorism and is racially profiling?

(Thanks to LaShawn)