(Paul Joseph Watson) The Department of Homeland Security, a federal agency created in the aftermath of 9/11 to fight terrorism, has continued its war on potentially deadly grooming appliances by raiding a home in the affluent Orange County city of Laguna Niguel to seize allegedly counterfeit hair straighteners.
According to the feds, the American people need to be protected from the threat of counterfeit hair straighteners because they could pose a safety hazard to consumers.
The owners of the business that sold the product, Brisk Deals, labeled the incident a “misunderstanding,” adding that the feds conducted the raid as if they were targeting armed terrorists, not dodgy hair irons.
“They attacked the house like they thought we had guns, like we’re a gang or gun-running or something,” said UCI electrical engineering graduate student Mohsen Rafizaden, accusing the DHS of causing his mother to have a panic attack for which she was taken to hospital.
The affidavit against the business claims that the hair straighteners violate trademarks held by Chi Curling Irons and GHD. The fact that the house was the target of a terrorist-hunting style siege over hair appliances illustrates how far the Department of Homeland Security has overstepped its jurisdiction.
Let’s not forget last month’s proud announcement on behalf of the DHS that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had stopped 13,000 potentially unsafe hair dryers from entering the country.
It’s just a shame that the agency doesn’t seem to pursue illegal aliens with the same zeal it uses to go after salon tools. Last year, the DHS announced that illegals who broke the law by sneaking into the country would be allowed to stay in the country and seek employment.
Despite the raid, the company’s website, BriskDeals.com, is back online having initially disappeared following the incident. The DHS’s usual method is to arbitrarily order ISPs to shut down a company’s website merely on the accusation of activity involving counterfeit goods or intellectual copyright infringement. In the case of music blog www.dajaz1.com, the website was closed for a year on charges the DHS had to later admit were completely false.
Still, it’s good to know that the DHS’ war on faulty hair appliances isn’t taking away from its focus and the very reason it was created – to fight terrorism.
We recently reported on a document out of the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security & Preparedness that lists banal bodily activities such as yawning, staring and goose pumps as “suspicious activity” indicative of terrorism.
Perhaps sellers of dubious hair appliances should be treated as terrorists too, and then the DHS can really be empowered to go after this obviously fundamental threat to our way of life.