As Stephen Littau noted, November 24th (Wednesday) is the busiest travel date in the country and it’s also National Opt Out Day.  To assist Opt Out Day participants, and all air travelers after Wednesday, the Opt Out Alliance is providing free “Know Your Rights” travelers cards. I spoke with one of the key people at [...]

By now, readers of this blog are well aware of the new search regime being enacted by the TSA: digital strip searches coupled with “enhanced” pat downs that include fondling of the genitalia. This has prompted more public outcry about the TSA than I have ever witnessed, everything from “If you touch my junk, I’ll [...]

With the Thanksgiving holiday coming up (and busiest travel day of the year), a group of concerned citizens is calling November 24th “National Opt-Out Day.” Wednesday, November 24, 2010 is NATIONAL OPT-OUT DAY! It’s the day ordinary citizens stand up for their rights, stand up for liberty, and protest the federal government’s desire to virtually [...]

“Nobody likes the 4th amendment being violated when going through the security line, but the truth of the matter is we are going to have to do it.”-Former. Asst. TSA administrator Mo McGowan So when the friendly TSA agents pull you out of the line for a groping or full body nudie scan as you [...]

To paraphrase the sign on Ron Paul’s desk, don’t break into someone’s email account that’s the government’s job: A former University of Tennessee student who was convicted of hacking into Sarah Palin’s e-mail during the 2008 presidential election has been sentenced to a year and a day in custody. A federal judge recommended Friday that [...]

Anthony Graber, the man who was charged for violating Maryland’s wiretapping law for recording on his motorcycle helmet cam and posting a video to YouTube of an undercover cop who pulled a gun on him during a traffic stop will not spend the next 16 years of his life in prison. Hartford County Circuit Judge [...]

As cameras have become more available to individuals and government alike, viral videos of cops behaving badly have become quite pervasive on the internet. This short video by The Cato Institute provides a few recent examples of this relatively new phenomenon and explains why recording the actions of police and government officials for all the [...]

@ezraklein Downside of #topsecretamerica: It’s watching everything you do. Upside: It doesn’t know what it’s seeing. I believe that’s intended to be reassuring. What I’m not sure Ezra understands is that this is probably WORSE, because it’s less likely to be indiscriminately applied. Rather, it’s far more likely to be abused for political or personal [...]

Re: Rand Paul Under Attack from the Left for his ‘Lunch Counter Libertarianism’ This is why politics sucks. When you actually consider what the significance of Paul’s very nuanced view on this is and then juxtapose over what his potential duties as Senator would be, you quickly come to the correct conclusion that this matter [...]

Now that Dr. Rand Paul easily dispatched the big government establishment Republican candidate Trey Grayson in the Kentucky senate primary, the Left is already on the attack. Rachel Maddow had Dr. Paul on her show regarding some comments he made concerning the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The issue: the notion that the federal government should [...]

In libertarian circles, the abortion issue is a thorny one, for the same reason as in the general political spectrum: it depends on a priori beliefs outside those of a political philosophy. It comes down to two different potential mutually exclusive beliefs: The intrinsic “human-ness” of a fetus begins at conception, or viability, or wherever [...]

The Bill of Rights provides citizens basic protections against unlawful searches and seizures via the Fourth Amendment, protections against self incrimination via the Fifth Amendment, and the right to an attorney via the Sixth Amendment. On a theoretical level, most people probably know this but what does this mean on a practical level? If the [...]

Tonight’s Obamacare vote was a victory for the Democratic Party. That much cannot be questioned. Was it just a victory over heathen Republicans who have yet to see the light? No. It was so much more… It was a victory over ethics: “When the deal goes down… All this talk about rules… we make ‘em [...]

I have to think that’s the only acceptable reaction to this: The Transportation Security Administration is spreading airport body-scanner technology across the country. A TSA official said Friday that units will be fielded next week in Chicago, and in the coming months at Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; San Jose, Calif.; Columbus, Ohio; San Diego; Charlotte, N.C.; [...]

From The Associated Press: Crystal Mangum, 31, was arrested late Wednesday on charges including assaulting her boyfriend, Durham police said in a press release. Durham County jail records indicate she also was charged with identity theft, communicating threats, damage to property, resisting an officer and misdemeanor child abuse. A judge ordered that she remain in [...]

This has been making the rounds, and I’d be remiss not to post it here considering how much time I spend in the air.

From Jonah Goldberg, re: airline security: Anyone who flies regularly will tell you, the hellishness of airline travel is not primarily derived from the outrage of lost privacy, it’s derived from the outrage of inefficient, time-consuming idiocy. I would gladly trade the privacy invasion that would come with those body scanners in Total Recall in [...]

In January 2008 I wrote a post calling for the repeal of the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984. As I mentioned in the post, many thousands of lives are being sacrificed because of the moral hang-ups of certain individuals who think its icky to sell organs to people who need them. How dare they. [...]

On Monday morning around 5:30 a.m. in Springfield, Virginia, Eric Williamson was making coffee (in the privacy of his own home) in the buff. Unbeknownst to Williamson, a woman and her 7 year old son could see him in all his glory as they took a shortcut through his front yard. The woman, horrified that [...]

Two Hundred Twenty Two years ago in Philadelphia, the Constitution Convention in Philadelphia completed it’s work. At the close of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia on September 18, 1787, a Mrs. Powel anxiously awaited the results, and as Benjamin Franklin emerged from the long task now finished, asked him directly: “Well Doctor, what have we [...]