Re: Are Air Travelers Criminal Suspects?

You didn't think they were doing this for safety did you?

regards,
-Lance

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http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/body-scanner-ceo-obama-india/

Body scanner CEO accompanied Obama to India

By Daniel Tencer
Sunday, November 21st, 2010 -- 1:06 pm
Ex-Homeland Security secretary's company lobbies for body scanner maker

The CEO of one of the two companies licensed to sell full body  
scanners to the TSA accompanied President Barack Obama to India  
earlier this month, a clear sign of the deep ties between Washington  
politicians and the companies pushing to have body scanners installed  
at all US airports.

Deepak Chopra, chairman and CEO of OSI Systems and no relation to the  
New Age spiritualist, was one of a number of CEOs who traveled with  
the president on his three-day trip to India, which focused primarily  
on expanding business ties between the US and the emerging Asian power.

"I am honored to be selected to play a role in this very important  
cause," Chopra said in a statement ahead of the trip. "Currently the  
trade between US and India is only one tenth of the amount of trade  
between US and China. There is substantial opportunity to improve the  
trade relations with India for mutual economic gain."

Chopra's company manufactures the Rapiscan brand of body scanners,  
currently being deployed across US airports. He joined the CEOs of  
such companies as GE, PepsiCo and United Technologies on the trip.

The president announced commercial deals worth some $10 billion during  
the trip, which he said would add some 50,000 jobs to the US economy.  
India decided earlier this year to implement body scanners at its  
airports, in the wake of the 2008 Mumbai attacks. (An early experiment  
with body scanners was quickly scuttled in 2007 due to privacy  
concerns.)

That a manufacturer of body scanners accompanied the US president on a  
foreign trip shows the extent of the ties between the industry and the  
US government. With anger growing at the intrusive news screening  
procedures, many observers have focused attention on Michael Chertoff,  
the former Homeland Security secretary whose consultancy, the Chertoff  
Group, counts OSI as a client.

The original orders for body scanners were made in 2005, during the  
Bush administration when Chertoff was still head of Homeland Security.  
Chertoff stepped up his lobbying for body scanners late last year  
after the attempted Christmas Day bombing.

"Mr. Chertoff should not be allowed to abuse the trust the public has  
placed in him as a former public servant to privately gain from the  
sale of full-body scanners under the pretense that the scanners would  
have detected '[the alleged Christmas Day bomber's] explosive," Kate  
Hanni, founder of FlyersRights.org, told the Washington Post.

"Airport security has always been compromised by corporate interests,"  
wrote James Ridgeway at Mother Jones. "When it comes to high-tech  
screening methods, the TSA has a dismal record of enriching private  
corporations with failed technologies, and there are signs that the  
latest miracle device may just bring more of the same."

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