Vetting – It is certainly not a new word | Eastern North Carolina Now

   Vetting is certainly not a new word, but you would think it was only invented on November 8th or 9th, 2016. The word originally was used in horse-racing when it referred to checking all horses in a race by a veterinarian. The original term was to 'VET' because of the examination. (Origins of the word VET)

   The word has certainly gained momentum in today's political climate, but if you think about it for a minute. Everyone does it even if they do not call it "VETTING."

• Young men will VET a girl before they ask her to marry them.
• Fathers will VET a boy before they agree to let their daughter date a boy ( or at least that used to be the case.
• Employers will VET a potential hire to be sure they are capable of doing the job and evaluate their past employment history.>
• The Army use to VET draftees before inducting them into the Army. As an aside those that were questionable were sent to the Group W bench.
• The IRS use to VET the income tax returns of people that they suspected of evasion. Not they do not VET, they merely run an algorithm to select the 99% of the filers that they suspect of evasion. Then they fall back on the old system of VETTING but they call it auditing..

   This list could go on and one but I think you get the point.

    Now we have a new emphasis on the practice. It is just not good enough to use VETTING; we now have to use EXTREME VETTING. The media is practicing this now in it examination and reporting on the Trump Administration. To take it a bit further, they are not just looking at the horse's mouth, they are looking at the other end as well. Good taste (😉 😉 😉) prevents me from displaying that picture here. They seem to be against doing EXTREME VETTING when it is applied to the process of checking potential immigrants to our country.

   I propose that we expand the process to the following categories:

• We should VET all recipients of welfare, food stamps, or any form of government subsidies to individuals.
• We should VET recipients of Social Security to be sure they are alive and breathing. Let us call it a health check benefit.
• We should VET votors to be sure they are eligible to vote and are voting in the correct precinct based on their current VETTED residence.
• We should VET all news stories that have been accused of being "FAKE NEWS."

   Maybe we should install signs in every government building or agency that states:

   For the people who do not speak English, there should be another sign that everyone can understand.

   I doubt that this would pass the legal challenges that would immediately be filed. We could just change the term to something else that does not sound so ominous. I touched on the subject in a previous article but I did not call it VETTING:  Profiling Vs Stereotyping.   My point is that it is going to happen whether you agree or disagree, whether it is legal or illegal, whether it is a Democrat of Republican in office, or whether they have a warrant or not. There use to be a system that required an "IMPARTIAL" judge to make a "JUDGEMENT" on the threshold of privacy before a warrant was issued.

Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

   However, we now have a judicial branch which is just a partisan as the congress and executive branch.   I guess we are just stuck with the existing procedure which is straight from the horse's mouth:

VETTING EVERYONE WITHOUT NOTIFICATION OR JUSTIFICATION
LEST WE TAKE THE CHANCE TO OFFEND
SOMEONE WHO PROBABLY SHOULD BE VETTED