It's neither our government keeping us safe, nor a gross abuse of authority. It's merely a set of TSA agents who are ignorant of the rules, trying too hard to do what they think is right.

It's unfortunate.

The agents should be let go for their ineptitude, and the police officer should be reprimanded if he actually did threaten to arrest a woman who clearly was not being confrontational or posing a danger.

That is grotesque. It could almost be a piece of performance art. Oh, wait. Right. That is what it is.

I particularly like the scenes of the pregnant woman stewing in the glass booth as grown men dress themselves in a public place.

Looks like a gas chamber?

You know they're dumb when you've missed the plane and they still want the Milk x-rayed or dumped.

I would call it petty theft...

Supposed account from the victim:

http://www.menwithfoilhats.com/2010/11/x-ray-nation-tsa-glass-box-mother-over-stored-breast-milk/

If it was for revenge, these were evil people... TSA needs to implement better training...

This is horrible, I don't even know what to say, and how much that must have traumatized this woman. I think I would have wanted to say, yes please take me to jail ...my lawyer will LOVE this case, but she had a child at home waiting for her...so messed up!

The terrorists have won.

A High school diploma is not required for TSA employment as a Transportation Safety Officer trained to reach out and touch and/or virtually strip travelers.

I would fire everyone of those TSA agents. They do not know the rules they are supposed to adhere to, sorry you're incompetent, you're gone.

I'm curious to know how people's reactions would change if the woman had been wearing a hijab or was showing herself to be a Muslim in some way.

There is a simple solution. We all boycott flying and the corporations that run the airlines and airports would soon lobby for the law to be changed.

She had a third option - not flying.

This woman was obviously causing trouble at the security checkpoint.

When President Palin takes office, the "Special Inspection Areas" will no longer be temporary, passengers like this will no longer be able to mount frivolous protests the way this woman does, and our planes will finally be safe.

The terrorists have won? No! Michael Chertoff has won.

I used to have to go through TSA checkpoints everyday to get to work, and there are some serious assholes working with them. A lot of them abused every gram of power they have. Wackenhut Security was contracted, and they are significantly better. I guess some privatization of government duty(?) works.

Utter and inexcusable insanity. I am writing to my Representative.

So has that Asshat been fired yet? Because he obviously broke the law.
And the TSA owes her the cost of her ticket at least.

"When President Palin takes office...?"

Hahaha! Thanks, I needed that laugh.

Also, where were all you twits/Palin supporters during Bush + Cheney's administration when 4th amendment violations were the status quo? Oh right, like Palin, you don't know what the Constitution is.

What's worrying is, cases like this are the ones we're hearing about, but under the surface there must be thousands more which never come to light and never find any form of just outcome.

People need to snap right out of their complacency and start fighting for their liberty. This means all over the work, not just the USA. If we don't fight for the liberties our grandfathers etc went to war to protect then we deserve to lose them.

It's unacceptable to keep tolerating this and other types of injustices in the name of "keeping the country safe". It makes the country a laughing stock, especially to the terrorists this is supposed to protect against.

For shame.

President Palin? over my voting dead body.

TSA is behaving like the Gestapo. Let's see some checks and balances here! This is ridiculous.

I dont get why they call her pregnant. If you are breast feeding - you had the baby.

As a pediatrician and parent, I know that breastfeeding women are harassed all the time all over the US - simply for wanting to feed their babies. And I find a mother being kept from getting back to her nursing baby a complete travesty.
Breast milk and security at airports became an issue long before the enhanced security efforts - it became an issue with the ban on liquids.
What I don't understand here is her being called a "pregnant woman" - if she's lactating she's probably not pregnant, right? She's a nursing mother. Unless she's pregnant and lactating?
In fact the video calling her a "pregnant woman" over and over again is a bit odd.

This is a flagrant case of harassment, pure and simple. That poor woman was humilitated and psychologically abused for no reason. She was in the right and those TSA agents knew it. There's definitely something wrong with people's attitudes when it's reached the point that they cannot tell the difference between safety guidelines and stupidity. I'm in Canada and cannot expect a US representative to listen, but I'll strongly recommend to all my American family and friends to do so.

There is no reason for this to have occurred in the first place and no excuse for the bad behavior of the TSA personnel or the police officer. I sincerely hope that the young woman sues the TSA for all of the costs she incurred due to their gross incompetence as well as court fees, not to mention filing formal, written complaints to the TSA, the National Transportation Safety Board, the Department of Homeland Security and the police department in question. It is truly shameful that the citizens of the United States of America are being treated in such a manner and having their basic civil rights breached. This is wrong and we all know it!

When are we going to demand that our elected representatives start repealing the unconstitutional travesty which was misnamed the 'Patriot Act'? When are we going to stand up and say "Enough!"? Or have we truly become sheeple, who will allow any breach of our rights under the constitution and accept any and all indignities, inconveniences and expenses just because we get a false sense of security that something is being done to combat terrorism on US soil?

WAKE UP, PEOPLE! STAND UP FOR YOUR RIGHTS AND MAKE YOUR REPRESENTATIVES AWARE THAT WE ARE NOT GOING TO STAND FOR THIS ANY LONGER! You can start by going to http://www.house.gov and http://www.senate.gov and looking up the contact information of your Congressperson and Senators.

@Jennifer: the woman wouldn't have needed the "third option" if the TSA had followed their own guidelines. Besides, this could just as easily have been an international flight. Should she have taken a trnsatlantic cruise in that case? Five days at sea instaed of six hours, but I suppose it gets you there.

A person should not have to miss a flight because they are lactating. Lactating is a normal bodily function of mothers who are breastfeeding.

There is also at least one case of the TSA giving an invasive pat-don to a menstruating woman simply because she was menstruating (http://www.boingboing.net/2010/11/24/menstruating-woman-s.html).

Then there's the cases of people with medical conditions being subjected to extra and unnecessary scrutiny.

The real message seems to be "don't fly unless you are a healthy male or a healthy female whose body is not doing anything particular of females of our species at the moment."

I see nothing wrong here! She could have been a terrorist!
She was probably being rude to the nice TSA agents...

You all need to go about your business and never question authority.
GOD BLESS AMERICA! THE GREATEST COUNTRY ON EARTH!!!

Sounds like your typical restaurant management and staff, just with way more power. Scary.

Dave Frankel you CREEP! How many 'terrorists' did the TSA catch so far? Exactly, NONE! Jealous of Sarah?
I hope someone's foot makes contact with your a** for several days..

Every agent involved should be fired.It was not a case of not having the facts,they were being vindictive and spiteful.And worse,knew that they would get away with it.That is the problem.

Here's what I think: while this is all very stupid and rather insane, I do sort of think this woman made it worse for herself. Having breastfed two kids for four years each, no lie, I know that a bit of breast milk in a baggis is not the end-all, be-all, and not worth this hassle. There is always more where that came from, and by the time she gets home, she'll need to give her kid a feeding anyway (I mean, her own body will need to get rid of the milk). I wonder if she caused this problem by being snippy. I agree that the TSA agents are generally morons and abuse their power, but knowing that, don't argue with them! Just go along to get along and complain later. It's not worth missing a flight or all of this aggravation. I wonder why they (TSA) makes such a big deal about milk when they don't seem to actually care a whit about what's in our bags. A TSA agent in Philly wasn't even looking, I swear, as our bags passed thru Xray. They make us all jump through ridiculous hoops in a halfazzed attemt to find the same problem that was already tried years before...and they don't seem to think ahead. The isolated security booth here is very troubling, though. I assume this woman (and she does not look pregnant to me; I don't get that, but whatever) was LOCKED in, which is horrifying. That should not happen. We need people with brains at security checkpoints and moms need not to be harrassed by dumb men who don't get it.

The TSA owes her a lot more than the cost of a ticket.

Oh yeah, and the terrorists have indeed truly won. Look at what our country has been reduced to. Look at the money we spend for this illusion of security. Look at how we treat our own citizens. Our own mothers are treated with less respect than Guantanamo inmates.

Land of the free, home of the brave. How I miss you.

That is totally uncalled for. She knew the guidelines better than they did and they continued to harass her. I hope she sued the pants off of them.

The question is, "How much safer is this really making the country?". If you're dealing with terrorists that will blow themselves up to kill others, I highly doubt that a random x-ray is going to stop them. The TSA needs o stop being part of the problem with air travel. This is just over the top! Let's just x-ray and strip search everyone if you really want to be sure they are not carying anything harmful onto the plane... Dumb dumb dumb! It's like pouring alcohol into gaping wound...

I applaud you for taking up this cause, because your celebrity will go a long way toward making change. Watching that woman held in a glass cell, with no water, and not even a chair to sit down, breaks my heart.

And yet, I am afraid to do anything. Afraid speaking out will put my name on a secret watch list, guarantee me patdowns, and treatment like this woman. I am scared into staying quiet, and it breaks my spirit to know that this is the person I have become - afraid to speak up to my own government, for fear of retribution.

The behavior of these TSA agents is clearly and reprehensibly retaliatory, but if this woman thought she'd catch her plane after arriving at the airport 20 minutes before departure, she was sorely mistaken. It's clear that she came into the situation with her emotions already riding high. It's still no excuse for how she was treated, but the subtitles are clearly trying to make us sympathetic to her plight. Missing her flight isn't something I can muster sympathy for, not when she arrived that late.

Kafka would be proud.

It's only a matter of time until someone smuggles an explosive up their rectum (this has already happened in other countries with women who have other more roomy areas to smuggle objects.) This is simply a short delaying process as no one is going to go for the full body cavity search when the time comes.

And for those blaming Obama for the porno-scanners, you either have Alzheimers or you, like the TSA agents mentioned in one of the above comments, did not finish high school. Porno-scanners were being developed when Bush was in office.

PS if you wear a skirt to fly in and are patted down, they go under the skirt to feel your legs and genitals. So do us all a favor when that happens. Yell: Say my name, bitch! Say my name! Oh, and about half an inch higher. That's it, baby. Oh yeah!

How was this video obtained?

Was it released by the TSA and someone else added the text, to tell their side of the story, or can a Freedom of Information Act be made this fast to get its release? Or was this an older incident that predates the current new screening guidelines that has been reuploaded now?

I'm not suggesting that this changes the nature of the discussion, but it's an interesting question.

HS degres ARE required and not all agents are idiots like the ones in this video. They're merely low-paid employees whose bosses are the ones to be blamed. When the manager has to read their own rules and then still refuses to follow them it's indicative that the higher echelons of authority in this organization feel at liberty to do whatever they want and have their underlings do it too.

To the post that chides her for being late...really? I saw dozens of other people being passed through after she was held in the glass enclosure. She dared to touch her own belongings and was being "punished" by the blue-shirted thugs in the TSA unis. Don't blame their managers; their own actions on this video show them abusing their power long before the incompetent in the shirt and tie showed up.
The terrorists really have won. As seen in the above comments, we are more than happy to turn over our rights for "security". Ben Franklin was correct.

This is horrendous. How can people like that even go to sleep at night?

@Jay, there has been more than enough time to obtain the video via a FOIA request and that was indeed how it was obtained.

For more information and my interview with the mother: http://www.sustainablemothering.com/2010/11/26/just-when-you-thought-it-was-safe-to-travel-with-breast-milk-the-tsa-targets-mothers/

That mother was not preparing to commit suicide and murder. This is what is so stupid in how they are doing this. It is possible by asking questions and reading facial and body language to spot someone setting out to commit suicide/murder.
It isn't young families going to Disneyland or grandma's house that intend to blow themselves up.

There is not enough being said about the suicide aspect of this. There is focus on liquids and nail files. It should be the person that is looked at.

Call it profiling...

This is our country, and it's ending one minute at a time.

This is insanity and needs to stop. The TSA agents appear to be on a power trip, as well as lacking brains. And the police officer? Totally unprofessional and unthinking.

Note: Yes is entirely possible to be both pregnant and lactating. As the mother of five children, all of whom I breastfed, I have personally been both pregnant and lactating more than once. I'm surprised the pediatrician did not know this.

This video with its awkward commentary isn't a very impressive case against the TSA. Who filmed it, anyway? It does seem like a piece of performance art.

As a commenter said above, one bag of breast milk isn't worth this hassle. Besides, unless the breast milk is frozen, it won't be in a fit shape to feed the child with by the time the woman arrives home.

Phony.

There's not enough information here to make any kind of informed comment. The time is not continous, there's no audio, and there's no way to verify that the text describing the incident is accurate.

The whole situation seems a bit off... she's trying to bring breast milk as carry-on, but she doesn't have a baby with her... oh, the baby's at HOME? How long is her flight? Is the milk going to be okay without refrigeration for that long? The milk will be exposed to more radiation in the plane than it will be in the x-ray, anyway... why not just put it in checked baggage? Her baby has to have THIS milk? Have they run out of milk at home? Is she still producing milk (in which case, she'll have produced more milk by the time she's landed... which will also have been exposed to radiation)? Why is THIS milk so important?

I'm not saying TSA agents can't be jerks... I'm sure they can (although I've flown recently, and found them to be consistently good intentioned and professional). But I don't think this video clip makes the case one way or the other.

This is the kind of "news item" that gets circulated as is, without any kind of critical analysis, to stir up outrage. I'm disappointed to find it propogated here.

By the way, one of the points this video makes is that the woman wasn't allowed to touch her own possesions... this isn't new... well over ten years ago, I was traveling out of Chicago O'Hare, and I had a Swiss Army knife in my bag. The security people inserted themselves between my bag and me, and backed me up against a wall, as they questioned me.

Thank you all for your support. My brother in law compiled the video for me to speed up TSA footage I received of my very long screening process at PHX. There were a couple errors in his effort to put together the footage as quickly as possible. Here is the updated video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XhnZlmLGK8.
I was not pregnant at the time (I got pregnant six weeks later), my son was 7mo at the time, and I arrived an hour before my flight (not 20 min)...but TSA erased almost 30 minutes of the second half of my screening. Also, it clarifies that I had filed a complaint against TSA the week before for not knowing the breast milk screening rules and their actions on February 1 were retalitory because of that complaint.
It was a terrible experience but have so appreciated the kind words and support. I will do my best to give them a good fight.
Thank you. Stacey

Ebert: That's worse than I thought, if such a thing is possible. I have reposted the page with the updated video, here:

http://j.mp/e96B3X

I do wonder if they would have treated her differently if her child was traveling with her. Then they might have not let her scan the breast milk. It was wrong that the way they did treat her. I get why they have to do what they do to make us fly safe but what I don't like are the people themselves. They don't have the training. It is the same people before 9/11 but with maybe an hour more training if that.

Commenters like Jennifer and Dave Frankel scare me more than the TSA or the terrorists.

Living in the UK, I've always wanted to visit the US until now. If this is how your public services treat you, then there is something fundamentally wrong.

Go get 'em, Stacey! This is gross negligence. This is not our government keeping us safe whatsoever. This is harassment and intimidation. I'm crossing my fingers for you, missy! Good luck and peace be with you and your 7 month old!

Whatever the passenger's motivation, the point here is that she was expecting TSA to adhere to its own rules. If TSA is not aware of its own rules, they could waste their time pestering this woman or another innocent passenger, while a truly dangerous passenger gets through. When people's lives are at stake, and when you have rules to ensure everyone's safety, then you STICK to those rules. You don't enforce them based on how you're feeling at the moment.

This is an upsetting video from any point of view. It should even be upsetting to the Palin lover above.

@tanja:

Yes, keep your mouth shut and do whatever the authority figure tells you to do. You haven't done anything wrong, so you have nothing to worry about, right?

Your attitude is just as, if not more, frightening to me than the actions of ill-informed low-paid workers on a power trip. I don't want to be harassed so that the bigoted/scared/whathaveyou lady in line behind me feels better thanks to some dog and pony show that actually decreases our actual safety. The overreach of authority since 9/11 is disgusting and we must continue to fight against a police state.

Further, who are you to tell a mother what milk she can and can't keep? It's not of your concern and it certainly is not an issue that made her "bring it on herself." Especially when she had a print out of the actual rules that TSA is to abide by! Following the rules is akin to asking for it according to you. That ain't a world I want to live in where anyone with a uniform is given unmitigated power to make me do whatever they say. Sounds like 1984 or North Korea to me.

She should have dumped the breast milk and boarded the plane. The forty-five minute detention was her own fault, not the TSA's.

Di wrote:

This video with its awkward commentary isn't a very impressive case against the TSA. Who filmed it, anyway? It does seem like a piece of performance art.

You can't be this stupid, can you? The "film" was shot by the TSA's surveillance cameras. Read the articles before you comment.

@Kathy T It sounds as if you are not that familiar with the concept of a woman pumping and saving milk for a nursing baby. The baby wasn't with her because she was traveling for work, hence the need to pump and save the milk. The TSA's web site actually explicitly states that the baby does not have to be with the mother, which makes sense. The milk can be kept cool in special containers for several hours.

Why is this milk so important? Well, we don't know the details, but maybe she has to go to work the next day and it's the milk for the baby to eat when she is working then. Most women don't have an unlimited supply of breast milk, especially when pumping, and especially with a baby >6 months old, so whatever is pumped ends up being very precious. No one wants to go through all of that effort and have to discard it. Again, we don't know in this situation, but while many women manage to freeze and store a backup supply, not everyone has a lot of extra. It's not like you can just go to the store and get some more.

It is crazy to me that as recently as February of this year there was such confusion over this issue. I remember researching the rules in early '09, and they were in place for a while before that. Breast milk is clearly identified as a medical liquid which is to be inspected separately, just like baby food and many other things. I'm not sure why anyone would care to x-ray it in the first place - the concern isn't that it conceals a weapon somehow (nail clippers in the bottle perhaps?) but that it could be a liquid component of an explosive. So it needs to be tested for that, which it ultimately was in this case, but sending it through the x-ray wouldn't have answered that question.

I don't think this has anything to do w/ National Security or violating rights. It's a bad incident of harassment, YES! But it's not nation-wide, this was a personal vendetta by a group of unprofessional idiots, and YES I do believe a law suit is in order, against TSA, the airport, AND the police! That police officer also needs his behavior corrected. It's NOT OK to treat people this way! We wonder why some children think bullying is OK? These adults were behaving like adolescents at their worse!

Go get 'em, Stacey! This is gross negligence. This is not our government keeping us safe whatsoever. This is harassment and intimidation. I'm crossing my fingers for you, missy! Good luck and peace be with you and your 7 month old!

a couple of you missed the point when mentioning that she was snippy and overreacted about not having her breast milk screened. Obviously she did her homework ahead of time (which is what TSA advises us to do) - so that we are prepared with special circumstances or know the guidelines. She had printed out the guidelines in preparation knowing that she did not want the milk screened. why is she to blame by doing something that she had researched and knew she had the right to opt for? Yeah, she can breast fed the baby when she gets home, but that' s not the point. Why offer us guidelines only to change them as they sit fit? I agree, this is a total abuse of power.

Outrageous....I mean, can't we sue them??

Dear "Afraid to leave your name":

You're the reason this sort of crap continues unchecked. Enjoy living in your self-perpetuated hell.

Love,

Julee

I plan to fly over the holidays out of O'Hare (are you reading, potential redneck-behaving TSA 'agents'?)

I hope I don't encounter such a scene, because... *gasp*

I will dare to question it.

Can't help it. My mother raised me right.

Strange that not one other passenger received a special screening of all those who passed through at that time. Also, the containers they forced her to place her milk in, were they sterile? Granted, they provided them (and if they were on hand, why not 30 minutes earlier) but what if the child became ill because of something in those containers? This whole thing stinks. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

trrish,

Based on your note and a couple of comments here, I seem to be delusional. I took Dave Frankel's post to be deeply ironical, not something to be taken seriously.

As for "Jennifer", while her question offers a sad commentary on the biases some people hold dear, it seems a valid one: How many people would lose their sense of outrage if they perceived the victim to be Muslim?

My anger is not dependent on the nationality or religious beliefs of the woman involved, but there are too many so-called humans out there who are more than willing to make such distinctions.

Such is the world we find ourselves in.

@Stacey Armato, I did some brief internet research and haven't found anything that says breast milk is effected by the small dose of radiation emitted by the scanners. Can you point me to a source that says otherwise?

Hey, we all remember these losers from junior high school; they are the ones who beat us up, threw our books in the mud, tripped us while we ran between classes and any other evil thing they could think of. Only difference is, they used to sit in the principal’s office for it, now the government pays them to do it! You can just see the lack of intellect and the power that has gone to their all too small heads. I am not flying again and as this continues more will be like me, it just won’t be worth it.

Talk about taking candy from a baby, they are taking life depending food from a baby! They are hassling a poor mother that just wants safe milk for her baby. Shame on every one of them! Shame on them! Bunch of big shot nobodies, throwing their weight around onto the helpless. Hope she sues them.

Stacey Armato was not harassed or bullied. She was constructively kidnapped. That TSA manager and the line supervisors need to be fired for retaliating against someone who knows the TSA regs better than TSA employees. The entire episode is emblematic of what is wrong with and at the TSA. Time for POTUS to get involved on this one.

I can find no justification, legal or moral, that excuses the behavior of TSA employees in this instance, nor many of the numerous other such reports now flooding the media.

The fact that we, as humans and Americans, submit to this infringement, this erosion of our civil liberties, is cause for dismay. Perceived safety at the expense of freedom is a chimera; even if we all locked ourselves away in concrete bunkers, forever shriven from the rest of the human race we would never be completely safe.

I suspect that many of our founding mothers and fathers would be shamed by our current need for peace at any cost. Such a cost has never been worth what we pay as individuals or as a society. Life is risk. You may deny it or ignore it, but you can't evade the fact: Life is bet that, regardless of how long it takes any of us to cash in our chips, we all lose eventually. If we're going to lose regardless, it all comes down to how we play the game.
- - - - -
But it is utter stupidity to expect people that are underpaid, under-trained, and disrespected, to do their jobs well while asked to be 100% certain in their task, every working hour of every day, all while knowing that if people die... they will be held partially responsible.

We're asking human beings to suppress their ego yet retain their humanity. And we're surprised to find that doesn't always work? I don't know what the official job description reads like for a TSA position, but based on sheer common sense I'll pass, thank you.
- - - - -
Anyone who has ever felt the power of Rodin's "The Caryatid Who has Fallen under the Weight of Her Stone" knows what I mean: It's true that our poor caraytid has been crushed by the weight of failure. But we can see that she never gave up, and her struggle is glorious simply because it exists.

We do not need to bow to terror. If we live our lives as ourselves, preserving our freedoms against the tyranny of fear, we can do more than simply survive; we can triumph.

It looks like there has to be at least one Soviet Union in the world at any given time, so when the Russian version lost its grip, the US had to step in to fill the vacuum.

Stacey was considered to be a Domestic Extremist based on her written complaint against TSA for non compliance of breast milk screening rules. She was red flagged before her screening, and they imprisoned her in an glass booth. ...I smell gassss.....
Her brother in law will be audited, and the Feds have hacked into the private business of every outside party connected to this case because they all are now considered by our DHS to be Domestic Extremists!

The TSA agent who gave Stacey a pat-down does not meet my criteria for being a woman. That agent would need to lower those trousers and prove-to-me what gender lies beneath before dreaming of any petting!

Um doesn't anyone notice that that Phoenix PD officer tells her to go along with the TSA? Why no outrage over that? Why is it all about the TSA? And is it safe to let breast milk get warm while traveling?

That would have been a great time to attempt to bring contraband on a plane. She's in the "secure box" and several of the TSA agents are completely distracted by her. It looks like a training video for how to distract TSA agents. Is our airport learning?

First -- Stacy, you are impressive. I would probably have started down the same path, but I would have lost my cool in the box and fallen apart. You have my utmost respect.

Second -- for those who question her about the breast milk -- that's not really the issue here, but I'll help you out. Us women who have careers AND babies, we have to do some unusual things. We pump our breast milk during the day. Pumping is nowhere near as efficient as real feeding, but we do what we can. The milk we pump on Tuesday, feeds the baby on Wednesday. Or if traveling, the milk we pump while gone for two days, will feed the baby the next time we're gone two days. If you throw it away, there is no milk for the next time you are going to be away from the baby. Yes, she was headed home to feed the baby the "fresh stuff", but she still needed the pumped stuff for the next day. I suspect she was carrying the pumped stuff in a common cooler bag, so temperature probably wasn't an issue.

Third -- the police officer's reaction was almost as bothersome as the TSAs.

I just wanted to leave a comment in case TSA is reading this. I back up this woman 100%. You were wrong, unprofessional, uneducated about your own laws and... well, idiots. Everyone I have talked to about this also backs her up 100%.

My husband and I no longer fly because of stuff like this. Everytime we get on the plane, we feel as if we have been molested. Shame on you.

God when we look away as our fellow men and women are abused its only a short time until these nazis get to doing far worse things!

This is indeed a gross abuse of authority. But what is more frightening is that this level of person is also operation heavy radiological equipment. Imagine the potential for human error. Imagine the operator's ineptitude. And radiation is somehow fine if the government tells you that it is--even when radiological experts and scientists at Columbia and UC say otherwise.
A billion dollars of taxpayer money is going into paying for these things. This does not strike me as representative governance.

This story is outrageous, infuriating, and downright terrifying. As someone pointed out upthread, EVERY one of those officers involved should be charged with kidnapping.

This story has generated a lot of talk on the TSA blog, at http://blog.tsa.gov/. "Blogger Bob", the resident TSA gopher/blogger, has now promised he will address this story on a future posting.

If you're really outraged by this story, visit the above TSA website and post your comment so that Blogger Bob knows that people aren't going to let this rest without an explanation.

And Stacey? Wow. I bow to you. I would have LOST IT in the glass box...first, just for the outrageousness of it - and second, because I am severely claustrophobic. I had a slight panic attack just watching it.

Roger, I saw this video in the Daily Beast website. Thanks for giving it publicity! I sent emails to both my senators and my congressman, directing their attention to this appalling incident. I hope many other people do the same. How often is this happening around the country? What would have happened if that video had not been made public?

The terrorists are those in the uniforms who have helped break down the moral fibre of society by bullying law abiding decent people into hating authority figures and turning society on its head. Little respect is left for people like those who are TSA , police or politicians due to them over stepping the mark time after time and the very cause is down to those in authority being abusive.

Positively a case of abuse of power, coupled by harrasment. And I'm totally creeped out that this male supervisor (who we know nothing about) photographed her breast milk and took her personal information. Eeeek!!! I'd be scared out of my mind.

What we're starting to see here in Vancouver is a new twist on achieving justice in situations where power abuses have been perpetrated by authorities.

The poverty pimp lawyers that work in the impoverished downtown Eastside have been successfully launching small claims actions against individual police officers on behalf of residents who have been abused.

This makes the individual accountable and allows the victim more transparency when requesting documents, etc. This is now preferred as opposed to using the police complaints process which is rather opaque and doesn't achieve justice for the individual.

Perhaps this is an accessible means of deterring TSA officers from abusing said individuals.

We must demand long prison sentences for any TSA officer that violates the civil rights of a citizen or breaks the law. This has gone too far.

Ms. Armato gave an interview recently (after the TSA blogged about her incident). IHer account is quite a bit different than the propaganda offered by Blogger Bob at the TSA blog.

http://tiny.cc/oim7a

This same thing happened to me this Tuesday at the New Orleans airport. I was forced to put my breastmilk through the x-ray machine and denied the alternate screening for medical liquids: http://www.anktangle.com/2011/01/tsa-x-rayed-my-breastmilk.html

Suppose it wasn't breast milk, but some explosive liquid? the TSA agents would have been heroes. just because she said it was breast milk doesn't mean we should believe her.

You guys have posted this video ignorantly. This TSO did exactly what she should have done.

ACTUALLY, she didn't go far enough. When the woman touched her property without going through the complete screening both she and her property should have been rescreened (back through the metal detector and/or x-ray)

Here is what is going on here. The woman is trying to create a major incident, and TSA knows it. She begins by freaking out and drawing attention, being insultive, and uncooperative. At that point the TSO is SUPPOSE to stop screening and notify a supervisor. She did that immediately, and the supervisor notified a LEO. Why a LEO? She wasn't trying to cooperate and no one was going to screen her, she could be arrested for creating a subversion at the checkpoint. When you go to the airport you don't make the rules, they are already made.

TSA POLICY FOR SCREENING UNOPENED LIQUIDS IS THAT THEY WILL GIVE YOU A PAT DOWN, INSPECT THE LIQUID, GO THROUGH YOUR BAGS AND TEST ALL OF YOUR STUFF. THEY WILL NOT OPEN IT THOUGH.

This is the same procedure for people with SSSS on their boarding passes.

This is not a unique case, this is standard operating procedure and it was done perfectly. This happens everyday with every mother carrying baby liquids. Same thing happens with medicine.

The reason for the wait time is she needed a manager to supervise the pat down because of the extreme attention she put on herself.

Next time cooperate you are not a special person! You have to do the same thing as everyone else!

@ holyhell - A sample of the milk could have been tested for explosive residue, through swabs or puffers or whatever other means. Why does the TSA have (and publicize) provisions for medical liquids and alternate screenings if they refuse to follow or even acknowledge them?

TSA has expanded their x-ray tyranny of virtual strip-searches of the American people beyond airports and borders. The federal agency has recently been funded for a massive expansion of checkpoints. In the last year alone 9,000 have been operating. TSA continues to ignore the numerous reports of radiation from these scanners causing cancer in humans. Homeland Security now has backscatter x-rays mounted on vans to carry out their plans to randomly scan vehicles, passengers and homes. VIPR teams (Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response) are ready to search Americans on highways, at bus depots, train stations, sports stadiums, and numerous other public locations.

The American people are being systematically subjected to, and desensitized by, warrantless searches and the most egregious and unnecessary forms of personal humiliation by an organization whose raison d’etre is inscribed at the TSA Air Marshall Training Center: DOMINATE, INTIMIDATE, CONTROL. This constitutionally unwarranted practice is a classic B.F. Skinner-style operation of “behavior modification” on the People of the United States of America. But much more deeply than the control of outward behavior, it casts a spell over us, to break down our internal sense of popular sovereignty and to make us believe on a subliminal level that we are subject to government restrictions and the imposition of Martial Law as practiced by the Bush and Obama administrations.

Could the DHS contract for 450 million rounds of hollow point bullets mean TSA agents are poised to be armed?

The paramilitary force may soon be operating their new bulletproof roadside checkpoints armed with hollow points!

They have ordered enough rounds to wage war against ‘troublesome American people’ (this is a domestic agency) for seven years.

This troubles we who remain troublesome.

People, people. Tear yourself away from the feel good side show for a spell. The circus without a tent is rolling into your town. If you want to go anywhere, they have a *scan for that! ( I just had the personal enjoyment of a TSA pat down- my only reaction is that I was the only one in sight who opted out of the x-ray over bombardment of the dermis scanner - so many people in line- so many sheep- so much cancer inducement.)

New rules for traveling brought to you by your local DHS technology: *Laser Scanner Reads People At Molecular Level

Rule #1) Do not set your mitts on any currency…- unless lockup appeals to you, the residue on your fingers can and will implicate you (criminal)

#2) Do not travel outside your county line. –checkpoints have a nasty way of “discovering your aggressive hormones” making you a danger to society (criminal)

#3)” Food freedom terrorists”: You had better not make any plans to attend any large gatherings or events, unless re-education camp sounds like fun…-and, they won’t let you in without their vaccine cocktail.

http://www.infowars.com/new-cia-scanner-to-be-rolled-out-soon-by-tsa-can-surveil-you-on-a-molecular-level/

http://www.naturalnews.com/036452_laser_scanner_molecular.html

Primate down. Way down. Looks like Primate Janet won’t be moving up one notch …to Cardinal. Another grave loss for *SCU.

What could possibly have gone wrong?

-The discrimination lawsuit, which names Janet Napolitano, the Homeland Security secretary, as the sole defendant:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/22/us/immigration-agency-accused-of-unfairness-to-men.html

So what does T$A-DH$ Janet do? -She goes to war against her own people.

http://pjmedia.com/jchristianadams/2012/08/10/janet-napolitano%E2%80%99s-dhs-commences-witch-hunt-against-whistleblowers-on-amnesty/

*SCU: Janet Napolitano, Leon Panetta, Dee Dee Meyers, Jerry Brown, and the entire jesu-justice league…

Trouble in the house.