BiblioAddict

What’s this? A book on drugs and your rights as a citizen? Step this way, Sir…

Wired reports that the next time you decide to travel, you’d better be careful about choosing your reading material because Homeland Security is watching, and storing the information in its files for years. Remember that cheesy book you picked up in the airport a few years back? Well you’d better hope no one was watching (I sure hope they weren’t).

But as interesting as all that sounds, the Wired article doesn’t have a whole lot of leg to stand on. It mentions that in all of the cases they reviewed, only one case file included the name of the book the screened passenger was reading:

One report about Gilmore notes: “PAX (passenger) has many small flashlights with pot leaves on them. He had a book entitled ‘Drugs and Your Rights.’” Gilmore is an advocate for marijuana legalization.

Besides that, Russ Knock, a spokesman for the Homeland Security security screening program said the government couldn’t give a flying hoot about the types of books passengers are reading:

“I flatly reject the premise that we care at all about the latest Tom Clancy novel a traveler is reading,” Knock said.

Well, shoot. I probably keep closer track of what people are reading than the government does. I wonder if they’re hiring. I really do need a second job. Being nosy about what other people are reading seems like the kind of position that has my name written all over it.