The "Walter Murphy" Story Takes Off:
We still don't know why the name "Walter Murphy" was put on the No-Fly list. But meanwhile the story has raced around the blogosphere in the last 24 hours, drawing links from hundreds of blogs and spiking Balkinization's traffic today to about 40,000 hits by 3pm. As you might have guessed, most of the blogs that link to the story have simply assumed it is true that the name was put on the list to punish Professor Murphy for his speech.
UPDATE: Ryan Singel, a reporter who has written extensively and critically on the No-Fly list for Wired News (see past stories here, here, and here), is highly skeptical about the story. From a post at Wired's Threat Level blog:
UPDATE: Ryan Singel, a reporter who has written extensively and critically on the No-Fly list for Wired News (see past stories here, here, and here), is highly skeptical about the story. From a post at Wired's Threat Level blog:
[I]t's 99.9 percent sure the good professor isn't on any government watchlist for giving a speech. I have no idea why the counterperson would say that individuals are put on the list for joining anti-war protests, but that's just not true. . . .That's very helpful to know.
Woe be it for this blog to defend the country's foolish watchlist system, but after having spent more than four years reporting on watchlists, filing Freedom of Information Act requests, and talking with persons flagged by the lists, I have never seen a single case of a person being put on the list for activities protected by the First Amendment. Feel free to drop any proof you might have via email or in the comments. . . .
I'm open to any evidence that the government has watchlisted American citizens for exercising their Constitutional rights, but I've never seen it.
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Yes, we might have guessed. But why? It is those who are prompted to take the matter up, larger numbers don't believe it and aren't inclined to say anthing about it? Because it plays as an anti-Bush thing and wouldn't be as significant with a Dem in the White House? Or it a non-partisan anti-government thing? Because conspiracy or malice is an inherently more appealing explanation for many than is mere incompetence? One is more of a story (to punish Professor Murphy for his speech), the other (incompetence) doesn't grab attention?
Not surprisingly, it is unsurprising.
"Dr. Robert J. Johnson, a surgeon and a former lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, was told in 2006 he was on the list, although he had had no problem in flying the month before. Johnson was running as a Democrat against U.S. Representative John McHugh, a Republican. Johnson wondered whether he was on the list because of his opposition to the Iraq War. He stated, "This could just be a government screw-up, but I don't know, and they won't tell me."[10] Later, a 60 Minutes report brought together 12 men named Robert Johnson, all of whom had experienced problems in airports with being pulled aside and interrogated. The report suggested that the individual whose name was intended to be on the list was most likely the Robert Johnson who had been convicted of plotting to bomb a movie theater and a Hindu temple in Toronto.["
The very idea that we have a secret list of people that is revealed to the suspects when ever they fly is so stupendeously stupid and contrary to the democratic an open traditons of this country that there is no reason not to assume anything but the worst.
It use to be that we could generally dismiss such outrageous claims, but no more.
Why has Cindy Sheehan not been put on that list? Or Jane Fonda? Or Ted Rall?
Most of us in the real world know that government is full of people who have good intentions but could screw up a free lunch. Doesn't anyone think that this sort of political backhandedness would have been caught and put out in the mainstream press? I mean, think of everyone who would have to keep quiet for this to work. This is the same country that couldn't keep oral sex between a President and an intern a secret.
Begin with the premise that a 'fact' is any assertion that supports a Higher Truth....
He might be a good law scholar, but he's not overall important enough for the government to hold anti-administration views against him. All that would do would be to create a martyr.
I might not be "informed" about him, but neither is the overwhelming, vast majority of the American public. He's just not as important as he wants us to think.
I think you were originally correct in thinking this was a case of false identification. Much has been written about the faults of the No-Fly lists as well as how to rectify the problem. Even those who are staunch supporters of liberty have proposed faults based on the methodology of the list and the technology used--not arguments that people are being listed for being critical of the government.
I think the two best examples are Professor K.A. Taipale of NY Law School and Jeff Jonas of IBM Entity Analytics. Both have written and presented extensively on issues of the problems with the list and both have focused on the technological and methodology flaws.
Examples include this presentation of Taipale's
And this article written by Jeff Jonas and Paul Rosenzweig
And how does one prove the specific reason that someone was put on a secret list, whose criteria for inclusion are secret?
How do you prove that this W. Murphy was put on the list in the first place? I guess if he is the only W. Murphy in the world right now, he might be able to prove it, assumming that you could get your hands on the no-fly list in the first place. But I would think it more likely that if there were a W. Murphy on the list, that it is some IRA suspect or terrorist than the law prof by that name. Unless, this W. Murphy is an IRA operative....
Yes, I can understand why a lot of people want this Prof Walter Murphy to have been put on the no-fly list for political reasons. After all, it would reinforce their views about the evil nature of the Bush Administration.
Now, if it turns out that N. Pelosi is now on the list, after her escapades the last week or so in the Middle East, then maybe I can believe that W. Murphy got there for the same reasons.
Excuse me, Mr. Singel (if that is your real name), but apparently you failed to notice that we are currently living under a fascist regime, the likes of which the world hasn't seen since the 1930's. Your inability to notice this makes me skeptical of your ability to notice when the government watchlists American citizens for exercising their Constitutional right.
Now the clerk could well be a cretin, and perhaps Prof. Murphy is too credulous. But I don't think that the obvious conclusion is that Prof. Murphy is a paranoid egomaniac. I personally would generally assume that people who work at airports are more knowledgeable as to how and why security decisions are made than I am (which is not to say that I couldn't be convinced that something an airport employee told me on that subject was wrong).
So, we have a self-important law prof finding out from a clueless airline ticket agent that his name is on the no=fly list. And because the ticket agent believes that it might be because Murphy was an outspoken critic of the Administration, it is now gospel truth. Somehow the brain dead ticket agent becomes omniscient.
And note that both Murphy and the ticket agent assummed that just because Murphy's name might be on the list, that it is the same W. Murphy, etc. I think most of us here would assume just the opposite - most likely someone else with the same name.
That says a great deal about the American public, especially about the younger part of it, those under 50. You've been dumbed down to the point where you think ignorance is acceptable.
It also says a great deal that many think Professor Murphy has an inflated sense of self-importance because he takes umbrage at being told he is on a non-fly list and that it might be for political reasons. I don't care what the reason is; it's outrageous that he was told he could not fly. If you're going to ban people deemed to be security risks from exercising their right to travel, get it right or don't do it at all. Most people here seem to think it's no big deal if someone is banned because of a mistake. It's actually a travesty. And Murphy's case is far from unique. It's happened to lots and lots of people.
How did you determine that this ticket agent was brain-dead? I mean, that's a pretty harsh judgment on somebody you only have a 2nd hand snippet of info on.
Mr. Murphy was NOT banned from flying. It takes some extra scrutiny to determine why he was on the list, and then he gets on an airplane.
Your argument that we should do it right or not at all is specious. We don't get murder trials all right either. Does that mean we should not throw people in jail for murder b/c some might get innocently caught up in it?
I still marvel that there are some who believe Mr. Murphy is some intellectual giant. He's such a giant that he seems to believe some ticket counter agent has control over and knowledge of how people get on the no-fly list. Is someone so gullible really who we want to hold up as a model of intellectual prowess?
1. Efficient
2. Effective
Thought not.
But I do love how youse pile on to a veteran of the Marine Corps when he says something not so complementary about the current regulation. Even more amusing is to hear the cheers of the crowd for a politically correct, ineffective, bureaucratic regime.
Why don't you come up with a perfect solution? I'm sure TSA would appreciate a better solution to resolve a problem for which there is only the admittedly flawed process now in place.
Seriously, how would a better system work? You're not proposing no security checks, I assume.
"cheer(ing)...for a politically correct, ineffective, bureaucratic regime"?
Yes, but what do you think it says about the ignorance of someone who thought that Murphy was actually banned from flying? Is that acceptable?
It's not outrageous at all and it's certainly not Bush's fault.
Yet, hyperbole and hyperventilation is quite common amongst those few here who are convinced that the Bush "regime" has inconvenienced a prof., well-known seemingly only within his own academic circles, on purpose or because of the incidental negatives of a security program (which arguably is not THE most effective or efficient).
Further, these sui disant guardians of free-speech neglect to consider that there are few (if any) documented examples of purposeful inclusion on the no-fly list for Administration dissenters like Prof. Murphy, while a media which would be positively ecstatic at the opportunity to report such incidents shockingly does not do so. Then again, I am sure all media have "agreed" to hold back in light of the Administration's "offer they couldn't refuse."
The counter clerk told the customer
what the customer wanted to hear, in
order to shut him up and move him on.
Why Murphy is on the list, I don't know.
But the clerk was just trying to get
through his day with minimum problems.
Haven't any of you commenters ever been
a bartender or retail clerk?
Wait a second... I thought that everyone working themselves into a lather over this were working on the assumption that the system was efficient and effective, and thus the problem? If it didn't work properly, then how could this guy get "banned" because of his political views?
Also, anyone whose chief witness is a ticket-agent for a commercial airline can't be too much of a legal genius, at least not in a real courtroom. For pete's sake, these are near bottom-rung employees of an industry that has embraced incompetence and inefficiency as virtue.
A cheap shot and off the mark, too. He was banned from flying. His name was on a no-fly list and he was told he could not fly. Oh, I know he eventually managed to persuade the airline authorities that he should be allowed to board the flight despite the presence of his name on the list--I read his statement as reproduced on Jack Balkin's blog beofore posting here, unlike many commenters here--but that he was able to do so is beside the point. Were whether Murphy was eventually allowed to board the flight the point, he wouldn't still be complaining.
The point is that travel has become at the very least a hassle for many persons who do not present a security risk because their names have been placed on the no-fly list, which, among its other faults, fails to distinguish between people having the same names. A considerable number of persons who do not pose such a risk have actually been prevented from flying or at least delayed in flying, perhaps because they are not as persuasive or forceful as Murphy or because they lack his credentials. Once one's name is on the list, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to get off it.
It is disappointing, if not surprising, that so many commenters here make light of a program that severely inhibits the exercise of a fundamental freedom, travel, and yet so dubiously serves security interests, and even more so that they try to ridicule, or at least belittle, a distinguished professor who dared to protest that deeply flawed program's application to him.
Hyperbolic nonsense. Saying that he was "banned from flying" when he was allowed to get on the plane is as silly as saying that people who have had hip replacement surgery are "banned from flying" because they regularly fail metal detector tests.
False positives on the No-Fly List are not "banned" from flying. They just get flagged until the TSA can ascertain that they are false positives.
It's "beside the point" that he was not actually banned from flying?
Again: Do you even know how the No-Fly List works? Perhaps if you weren't ignorant about the process you wouldn't have to base your outrage on the flippant, carelessly worded remarks of a counter clerk at the airport. (Not acceptable imo.)
Death to the New World Order!
Life in prison for Cheney, Bush 43, Rumsfeld, Clinton 1 and *his* lieutenants, Bush 41 and his, etc.
See "911: the Road to Tyranny" at the Internet Archive.