Quote of the day—Gem Micheo

The OIG made several recommendations to the agency to attempt to fix the program. At this point we believe the program is beyond repair as it is completely mismanaged and it has eroded the workforce and public confidence. This program has only served to further scare the American public about government surveillance programs.

Gem Micheo
December 1, 2020
Air Marshal National Council
Inspector General Investigation “TSA did not properly plan, implement, and manage its Quiet Skies Program.”
[I’ve been saying the government was going about the prevention of terrorism of air travel for about 20 years now. Here is one of my first web articles on it.

A good rule of thumb is that if the government attempts to do something the free market could do the government will fail. The failure also has a good chance of being spectacular.

One of my two favorite examples are:

  1. For about 70 years the USSR attempted to increase domestic food production. The food lines persisted and continuous mass hunger, if not starvation was only avoided because of the black market distribution of the produce from private gardens.
  2. For those same 70 years the U.S. government attempted to decrease domestic food production to increase prices for farmers who frequently suffered economic stress because of a glut, and hence low prices, of crops. They also failed. Compare price of wheat today to that of 60 years ago and take into account inflation, the price of fuel, the price of fertilizer, labor, and equipment:image

The TSA has the correct letters in its acronym. They are just in the wrong order and stand for the wrong words. It should be A Security Theater.—Joe]

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7 thoughts on “Quote of the day—Gem Micheo

  1. “A good rule of thumb is that if the government attempts to do something the free market could do the government will fail.”

    You’ve paraphrased what my mother said from when I was small. She was an immigrant from Norway, put into first grade in Brooklyn at 6 and told to learn English.

    I’d describe her as a Social Liberal (20 years ago) and Fiscal Conservative. Her steadfast belief was that if you give the Government something to do, it will be slower, less efficient and massively more expensive than leaving it to the private sector.

    She was also completely against the dual language stuff that started in NY in the 60’s and 70’s. Her feeling was that if you wanted to live and work in the United States you needed to learn and speak English.

    Jeff B.

    • I’ve come to see “Bilingual Education” as racist. You will note that it hasn’t been introduced for any other European language. Thy’re on their own to learn English, either in school before they leave the old country, or on their own after they come here.
      As my Grandfather was told repeatedly after he emigrated here in 1922, “You’re in America now, Speak English!

  2. On the contrary – TSA is quite useful at its intended purposes: Expansion of government jobs, extending the reach of the security/surveillance state, and most importantly, promoting and assisting in getting Americans used to, and accepting of, warrantless, suspicionless searches.

    You don’t really think it ever really had anything to do with public safety, do you?

  3. I used to do drug testing for TSA agents. Biggest group of unemployables I’ve ever met. The only smart ones were in it for the college pay benefits.

  4. No no no no! Let’s fix these quotes;

    “This program has served brilliantly to further scare the American public about government surveillance programs.”

    “A good rule of thumb is that if the government attempts to ruin something the free market could do, the government will succeed. The success also has a good chance of being spectacular.”

    When are we going to get our minds right on this? So long as we refer to government successes, even repeated, spectacular successes spanning many generations, as failures, we are utterly incapable of understanding the fundamental nature of the problem, much less are we capable of addressing it.

    And once again, until this begins to sink in;
    In the act of referring to these successes as failures, we are defending the perpetrators. We are saying, “Oh, they didn’t mean to kill three hundred million people– They meant well. They’re just a little….slow, is all.”

    You’re giving them the “not guilty by reason of severe incompetence” defense. Please stop it. Their ring leaders, their perpetrators, know exactly what they’re doing, they’re very intelligent, and they’ll keep doing it no matter how much you attempt to “correct” them.

    Your attempts to “correct” them will be seen by them as proof that they have you exactly where they want you (in confusion and frustration – the best places you can put an enemy).

    A Marxist, or any brand or flavor of authoritarian, is motivated by one, primary goal; he sees a relatively content, productive, prosperous people and it drives him crazy, and so he seeks to do something about it.. He MUST do something about it! Secondarily, if he can become wealthy in the process, by making you less wealthy, that’s a bonus, mainly for his ego’s sake, for having gotten one over on his enemies, but he will seek the mass destruction and death even if it means poverty and death for him as well. In the “glory” of the destruction (causing intimidation, theft, stagnation, frustration, decline, et al), he feels alive. To be “forced” to simply leave you alone, then, is to deprive him of the only purpose for his existence. He’ll feel it as a most egregious injustice. As long as he’s alive he’ll be plotting ways, no matter how pathetically small or seemingly insignificant, if necessary, to impede or irritate you in any way possible.

    And THAT is the nature of the beast that’s waging war against us. Either you can see it or you’ve chosen not to see it.

    You can’t allow it in your heart, you can’t allow it in your home, you can’t allow it in your neighborhood, you can’t allow it in your nation and you can’t allow it in the world, or it will simply re-grow and take over again, but you can’t possibly kill it either. It’s far more clever, has sharper senses, and it’s more powerful than you, it knows exactly how to get to you, to push your buttons, to manipulate you to its will, and it will never, ever stop.

    And THAT, my brothers and sisters, is the mind-destroying, soul-destroying, all-destroying bitch of the nature of the world, from start to finish. And it is sold to us as love, beauty and light itself! But it can be overcome.

    Given those criteria, what are your options?

    Yep; Bible;
    “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them”

    “Come out of Babylon! Come out of her, lest ye partake of her plagues” (Babylon is a mindset and doctrine here, dummy, not a physical address)

    “I come not to bring peace to the world, but a sword…” (said the “Prince of Peace”)

    But you’re at a disadvantage because you don’t really understand those things. You’ve heard them before, as I have, horribly misrepresented, and so rejected them as either gibberish, superstition, or the crutches of the weak and the hypocrites. But that’s part of what has to be overcome. Oh, it’s a bitch all right.

    • And for our friends who speak Spanish,
      TSA Teatro de la Securidad Del Absurdo.
      Worthless Security Theater.

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