The Washington Post reports today that the Transportation Security Administration’s ban on websites where “controversial opinion” is expressed has been lifted. (See our post Parental guidance needed for security officers? July 6, 2010.)

Turns out we were right that They were out to protect their security officers from the mental corruption that comes, They think, from viewing violence and hearing opinions They consider wrong, like good parents protecting their little children.

TSA spokeswoman Lauren Gaches said the agency’s revised “acceptable use” policy for Internet access on the agency’s network was designed to block sites “that promote destructive behavior to one’s self or others.”

“After further review, TSA determined the ‘controversial opinion’ category may contain some sites that do not violate TSA’s policy and therefore has concluded that the category is no longer being considered for implementation,” she said in an e-mail to The Washington Times.

Before abandoning the guideline, agency officials said the policy changes were intended to address “evolving cyberthreats,” but did not explain exactly what was meant by “controversial opinions” and whether Internet sites with conservative or other politically oriented viewpoints would be targeted under the new guidelines.

Imagine:

The police want to receive no reports about crime.

The hospitals want to hear nothing about sickness and injury.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) wants to learn nothing about controversial opinion, see and hear nothing about extreme violence and its gruesome results, or ponder criminal activity.

Ha-ha! None of these similarly ridiculous statements could be true, could it?

Well, one is. The TSA, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security and is responsible for screening passengers boarding planes, “detecting, deterring, and defeating terrorist or other criminal hostile acts targeting U.S. air carriers, airports, passengers, crew, and when necessary, other transportation modes within the US’s general transportation systems” and conducting “comprehensive inspections, assessments and investigations” of passengers “to determine their security posture” wants to hear no “controversial opinion” on, say, argument for and against suicide bombing and jihad. So it has banned “certain websites from the federal agency’s computers, including halting access by staffers to any Internet pages that contain ‘controversial opinion’, according to an internal email obtained by CBS News.”

The email was sent to all TSA employees from the Office of Information Technology on Friday afternoon. It states that as of July 1, TSA employees will no longer be allowed to access five categories of websites that have been deemed “inappropriate for government access.”

These are:

• Chat/Messaging

• Controversial opinion

• Criminal activity

• Extreme violence (including cartoon violence) and gruesome content

• Gaming

The email does not specify how the TSA will determine if a website expresses a “controversial opinion.”

There is also no explanation as to why controversial opinions are being blocked, although the email stated that some of the restricted websites violate the Employee Responsibilities and Conduct policy.

The blowing up of aircraft in flight is criminal, extremely violent, and gruesome. Are TSA employees to keep their minds off these facts? If so, is it because they will be harmed by knowing them?

And on whose parental instructions? Janet Napolitano’s – the stunningly smart Secretary of Homeland Security?

We may never know.

This news strains belief. But we tell ourselves it shouldn’t really, because, for  all the glaring stupidity of the decisions, they’re perfectly consistent with the policies and sympathies of the Obama administration.

It comes from Creeping Sharia:

TSA tells terrorists where body scanners are, and exempts them.

Terrorists spread the information and discuss …

… ways to evade and beat airport scanners on jihadi forums:

“We have that system in place in Algiers…does anyone know if it’s capable of detecting [the flammable gas] butane?”

On another Jihadist site, a visitor questions security involving 3D scanners at British airports asking: “Can I refuse [to pass through] for religious reasons?”

Before long comes this answer: “… advise those who wish to avoid the Heathrow scanners to take the train to Paris… and then board a plane from there.”

The TSA website features a map and lists of locations to help terrorists determine which airports to avoid when planning to smuggle explosives aboard commercial airplanes. There’s also a video on CNN showing just how easy it is to beat TSA’s screenings.

Since terrorism isn’t limited to air travel, the TSA also lists other domestic U.S. locations where the scanning technology is used, primarily court houses and prisons…

[There will be] 1,000 machines in the nation’s highest-risk airports by next year. However, body scanner screening is “optional for all passengers,” and this is due to the stealth jihad of Muslim Brotherhood groups in the United States (funded from outside the United States) – and was enacted to exempt the specific religious demographic that prompted the need for such advanced security.

From a May 2009 posting – well before the Christmas plane bombing attempt and faux fatwas to protect Islamic terrorists were issued; from a host of Muslim Brotherhood-linked stealth jihadists including MPAC, the Islamic Shura Council, and the Fiqh Council of North America:

After a series of meetings with interfaith leaders and advocacy organizations, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) this week agreed to make traveler compliance with the highly controversial “full body scanners” optional. [Remember, the TSA is headed by the lady Mark Steyn aptly calls Janet Incompetano.]

The … announcement came after a number of groups expressed concern over privacy and modesty issues, for themselves and their children, related to the advanced image technology machines. [Never mind the safety issues for the rest of us!] The TSA reassured the community representatives (Dr. Muzammil Siddiqi, Chairman Fiqh Council of North America, Shakeel Syed, Executive Director Islamic Shura Council and Aziza Hassan, Director Government Relations of MPAC) in a meeting requested by the Islamic Shura Council to discuss the Islamic perspective on body scanners. …

It all seems too easy. Islamic terrorists have every advantage. They don’t even have to work for information. They are exempt from the security measures in place to thwart and catch them.