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No one has explained to me how this is still legal. This "law" has persisted until Bush, Obama, Trump and now Biden. Why does no one on both sides of the aisle

No one has explained to me how this is still legal. This "law" has persisted until Bush, Obama, Trump and now Biden. Why does no one on both sides of the aisle have the courage to stop this? Can no one mount a legal challenge against this?

vkou 5y ago
> Why does no one on both sides of the aisle have the courage to stop this? Because the other side of the aisle will crap on you for doing it, and why burn political capital on a minor problem, when you have more pressing issues, like waging a war, digging through fallout of the largest economic disaster since the Great Depression, getting a crappy single-payer healthcare system through, filling three supreme court seats, dealing with a global pandemic, or keeping the wealthy and powerful happy. The only people who actually ground their elections on this kind of platform are anti-authoritarian contrarians, which have a rolling average of two seats in Congress and one in the Senate. Constituents, frankly, don't care about this.
- mrguyorama 5y ago
  Constituents ABSOLUTELY care about these things and other very important issues. The problem is, nobody cares about these things MORE than "stopping abortion", "muh guns", "fuck taxes", "status quo" that most incumbents scream about. We have a two party system that discourages caring about anything.
  - handrous 5y ago
    The US won't get significantly better unless our electoral system is fixed. That won't happen unless one of the two viable parties makes that a major policy goal... so, never.
whywhywhywhy 5y ago
Because once these things are in place they’re there forever. The government and its institutions will never hand back power they have been granted. Remember the patriot act when the next round of powers come in because of covid.
- chickenpotpie 5y ago
  “ The government and its institutions will never hand back power they have been granted.” Completely false, there are countless instances of government giving up a power it previously had. Previous presidential administration rolled back environmental regulations, Covid regulations across the country have greatly lightened up since last year, there’s no draft going on right now…
willcipriano 5y ago
The elderly men and women who run the country want it that way. After a few decades of the same people in office year after year, what other explanation holds water?
- robbedpeter 5y ago
  It's time for guillotines, or to make it more American, "Freedom Choppers." Things have gone too far, by all appearances, for the self corrective constitutional mechanisms to repair the situation. Otherwise, welcome to the new normal. Enjoy your cake.
- lambertsimnel 5y ago
  There is another plausible explanation: the policy exists because of incentives arising from the government's structures, rather than the wishes of policymakers. Conceivably, other people in the same system might also leave the policy in place, while the same people in a different system might change the policy.
macksd 5y ago
There actually was a legal challenge against this, and right before a deadline to respond the TSA clarified it's current policy: https://www.aclu.org/cases/bierfeldt-v-napolitano?redirect=cpredirect/39922 https://www.aclu.org/cases/bierfeldt-v-napolitano?redirect=c... So if it happens, you can go to court for your individual case and possibly win, which according to this comment happens all the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28635430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28635430 So more is needed, obviously. It seems to me that the status quo is that you're effectively guilty until proven innocent, and the people accusing you don't have much of an incentive to stop.

vkou 5y ago

> Why does no one on both sides of the aisle have the courage to stop this? Because the other side of the aisle will crap on you for doing it, and why burn political capital on a minor problem, when you have more pressing issues, like waging a war, digging through fallout of the largest economic disaster since the Great Depression, getting a crappy single-payer healthcare system through, filling three supreme court seats, dealing with a global pandemic, or keeping the wealthy and powerful happy. The only people who actually ground their elections on this kind of platform are anti-authoritarian contrarians, which have a rolling average of two seats in Congress and one in the Senate. Constituents, frankly, don't care about this.

mrguyorama 5y ago
Constituents ABSOLUTELY care about these things and other very important issues. The problem is, nobody cares about these things MORE than "stopping abortion", "muh guns", "fuck taxes", "status quo" that most incumbents scream about. We have a two party system that discourages caring about anything.
- handrous 5y ago
  The US won't get significantly better unless our electoral system is fixed. That won't happen unless one of the two viable parties makes that a major policy goal... so, never.

whywhywhywhy 5y ago

Because once these things are in place they’re there forever. The government and its institutions will never hand back power they have been granted. Remember the patriot act when the next round of powers come in because of covid.

chickenpotpie 5y ago
“ The government and its institutions will never hand back power they have been granted.” Completely false, there are countless instances of government giving up a power it previously had. Previous presidential administration rolled back environmental regulations, Covid regulations across the country have greatly lightened up since last year, there’s no draft going on right now…

willcipriano 5y ago

The elderly men and women who run the country want it that way. After a few decades of the same people in office year after year, what other explanation holds water?

robbedpeter 5y ago
It's time for guillotines, or to make it more American, "Freedom Choppers." Things have gone too far, by all appearances, for the self corrective constitutional mechanisms to repair the situation. Otherwise, welcome to the new normal. Enjoy your cake.
lambertsimnel 5y ago
There is another plausible explanation: the policy exists because of incentives arising from the government's structures, rather than the wishes of policymakers. Conceivably, other people in the same system might also leave the policy in place, while the same people in a different system might change the policy.

macksd 5y ago

There actually was a legal challenge against this, and right before a deadline to respond the TSA clarified it's current policy: https://www.aclu.org/cases/bierfeldt-v-napolitano?redirect=cpredirect/39922 https://www.aclu.org/cases/bierfeldt-v-napolitano?redirect=c... So if it happens, you can go to court for your individual case and possibly win, which according to this comment happens all the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28635430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28635430 So more is needed, obviously. It seems to me that the status quo is that you're effectively guilty until proven innocent, and the people accusing you don't have much of an incentive to stop.