Whilst taking journalism classes at 2 different universities in the 1980s, I heard professors repeat again and again that it was not ethical to receive information from a source who wished to remain unnamed, usually for fear of losing their job, and then to reveal the name of that source should you be questioned about it afterwards. The professors all spoke of the McCarthy era and Watergate and warned us that those days could return again if we were not vigilant about remembering our right to speak the truth.

A situation is unfolding in the USA right now that has brought all of those memories flooding back. Christopher Elliot is a journalist who writes for National Geographic Traveler magazine and he is a columnist for MSNBC.

After the recent bomber scare on a flight from Europe to the USA, the TSA in America has gone into overkill mode and instigated such sparkling bits of travel wisdom such as banning the ability to get out of your seat (even to use the toilet) during the last hour of a flight, disallowing the use of devices such as laptop computers or electronic games during long haul flights, disallowing books or magazines to be opened on your lap, forcing passengers to be quite literally patted down prior to boarding a plane by some airline employee who will touch you all over from head to toe, and forcing you to check on your hand luggage which may contain valuable items or personal documents which are NOT covered by travel insurance if they are checked on.

If you hover over the name Christopher Elliot in either place in this article, it will take you to his own website where you can read this sorry state of affairs. He is a well-known and well-respected journalist and people around the world are frankly furious that, having written an article which cites information from an unnamed source, he has now had a federal agent show up on his doorstep at home 2 days later and present him with a subpoena. The government in the USA just wants him to roll over, play dead, and give up the name of his source.

What is even more bizarre about this whole case is that the TSA actually had the same information very briefly posted on its own site prior to yanking it off — so this was hardly Top Secret information about how the airlines planned to deal with the increase in security. Also, there are several other writers and sites which have carried the information.

It is apparent that Christopher Elliot is being made a scapegoat. The government of the USA has singled him out to try and frighten other journalists into submission to their will. How truly nauseating!

One of the primary goals of any decent journalist is to maintain the integrity of your sources. And another essential factor in good journalism is the ability to act as a watchdog and expose inequities of all kinds, corruption from sources high and low, outright lies by politicians, and fraudulent activity that puts the everyday man and woman at risk.

Elliot simply reported the truth and now he is being hounded for doing so. I hope that this story travels far and wide and exposes the TSA in the USA for exactly what they deny being but actually are — a private army of ill-trained and rude civilian employees whose bullying tactics have made overseas travel a nightmare for tens of thousands of passengers to and from the USA in the post 9-11 years. Elliot has acted with journalistic integrity and this particular branch of the US government continues to act like Cold War thugs.

Let’s hope that the sheer amount of press and internet coverage that this is getting helps to protect this good man!