NUGENT: Sinister security

OPINION:

The heavy, disjointed and shaky hand of Fedzilla has fumbled squarely on a Sacramento area pilot for videotaping obvious airport security problems and then putting the videos on YouTube. It’s almost as if this brazen upstart thinks there is a “we the people” component to this experiment in self-government. Tsk tsk.

Blowing the whistle on these vulnerabilities that everyone at the airport - the Transportation Security Agency (TSA) included - knew were there has cost the pilot his government-issued handgun and potentially, his concealed carry handgun permit. Who knows what criminal charges he will face for this dastardly, pro-American deed? What a not-so-grand way to close out 2010.

America is rife with insane security weaknesses. Take, for example, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. Every time I see her mug on the television I see America’s biggest and most glaring security weakness.

Putting Ms. Napolitano in charge of Homeland Security is analogous to putting a tax cheat in charge of the Department of Treasury or a closet racist in charge of the Department of Justice.

No doubt airline security is critically important, as religious voodoo monsters have targeted airlines to kill innocent people to make their god giddy with delight. Trying to stop these religious voodoo nut jobs is job No. 1 for the U.S. government, which is why Fedzilla searches silver-haired grandmas in wheelchairs and takes pictures of naked children. Go figure.

But is videotaping an obvious security vulnerability any more of a crime than reporting on airport security vulnerabilities? I think not, kemosabe.

All of us have read numerous articles or heard about the ugly and overt failings of the TSA. Should the reporters who wrote about these security vulnerabilities and the newspapers and Internet sites who published them also be investigated and potentially charged with a crime for divulging security vulnerabilities?

Any American with a vidcam can video obvious security vulnerabilities at our schools, shopping malls, airports, government buildings, critical infrastructures, neighborhoods, the local meat market, etc., and then place the footage on YouTube. Is Ms. Napolitano prepared to investigate and charge every American with a crime who is armed with a video camera and dares to use it to expose the soft underbelly of America?

If this isn’t a First Amendment issue, I don’t know what would be.

Maybe Fedzilla wants to create and issue a new special permit to own and operate a video camera. How about Fedzilla mandating video camera training and issuing special permits to carry a video camera outside of your home? Finally, those Americans who want to post their videos on the Internet would first be required to submit their videos to Fedzilla for Federal Communications Commission review and approval. How about it, America? Sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?

Of course, law-abiding Americans of good will and character want America secure. Of course our collective radars should be on red alert at all times to identify and report suspicious behavior to law enforcement. A darned good 50-year-old professional pilot with no criminal record, an unblemished flying record, a concealed carry handgun permit and armed with a video camera is not a threat - he’s an asset.

What we must fight against is ultimately turning America into a police state where people willingly and gladly surrender their freedoms for the illusion of security. Call me a Motor City Madman, but my concern is that’s exactly what Fedzilla ultimately wants - compliant subjects instead of defiant citizens.

Guard your freedoms with a vengeance America. They’re comin’ to git ya one at a time.

Ted Nugent is an American rock ’n’ roll, sporting and political activist icon. He is the author of “Ted, White and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto” and “God, Guns & Rock ’N’ Roll” (Regnery Publishing).