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Comment by decktech | Hacker News Reader

Is this a joke? I was searched by the TSA the last time I took Amtrak. They just plopped down a table in the middle of Penn Station and went to town.

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I'm pretty sure that was the NYPD. Unlike the TSA searches, you can refuse to comply with those.

It is plausible that it was the TSA's "VIPR".

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/08/10/vipr-a10.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/06/us/tsa-expands-duties-beyo...

(Side note, who the hell comes up with these names, and why hasn't somebody with some experience with marketing and PR talked to them?)

>marketing and PR

Oh, they have it. You're just not the TSA's customer.

Are they trying to pitch a new line of action figures for the G.I. Joes to fight to Hasbro? "VIPR" is just plain silly.

A name that clearly shows the abbreviation came first

Given the actual behavior of the government, I think it's a perfectly reasonable hypothesis that some of our "elected" officials have actually just decided to play supervillain.

No, it was the TSA - but Amtrak has dictated exactly how they must behave in stations, and you rarely hear a peep from them.

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Rail's handling of TSA should be a model

http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/06/opinion/don-phillips-tsa-vipr-...

Rail has the advantage that they can just shut down commerce across the country for a few days if the government does anything they don't like, and they have the balls to do it.

Well, Amtrak doesn't have that power, and I doubt the freight companies care what TSA does with Amtrak.

Amtrak doesn't actually own the rails (except in the northeast, I think). That's where we're talking about here, but in Seattle BNSF owns the track so TSA would have to deal with them.

Do they? Seeing as how tech companies aren't allowed to divulge they're the NSA's bitches and have to hand over all their data, I don't think that public services like trains (or electricity, etc) are allowed to shut down their services if they disagree with the government's imposed security measures. Pretty sure there's sections in the anti-terrorism laws that say companies need to comply when the government brings in counter-terrorism measures like searches and the like.

Besides, they'd probably comply willingly. The airline companies and airports do; hijackings just ain't good for business.

Wouldn't it be Amtrak Police in Penn Station? You don't normally see NYPD in there

NYPD are the ones carrying around machine guns, I think.

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