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Post 0

Tuesday, August 16 - 1:24am

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Tibor,

Yes, power corrupts - and I clicked on the checkmark for the full Acton quote.

But about the unpredictable inconsistencies:

If potential terrorists could predict what they'd be up against, they might be able to find a chink in that known suit of armor. The unpredictability and inconsistency makes any breach harder to plan. Middle-Easterners are more averse to humiliation - especially the humiliation of failure - than to mere death, so increasing the chances of failure due to an unknown change in the procedure they are up against is a very effective deterrent. I would be much more worried if the inspections became standardized and predictable.

Post 1

Tuesday, August 16 - 8:25am

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Adam is absolutely right about this. They have a random component built in by design. That's one reason they don't profile. If they profiled, it could be adjusted to. By having a general security criteria, and then working with the variables under it, they present a floating target.

Post 2

Tuesday, August 16 - 1:31pm

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Tibor Machan wrote: "I, too, had (and resisted) the temptation to lord my authority over some poor bloke who came on base at 3:00 A.M. I recall wanting to stop the car, look into it, check for IDs, and so on, not out of necessity but out of sheer boredom, and just a little sense of superiority.

1. So, let's be clear about this. I come to your gate at 3:00 AM and I get by without a search? Sounds good to me. This is why philosophers should not be security guards. Who are you to think? You are there to follow orders. I am 100% serious. Search the car. Search this car. Search the next car. Search the car after that. Have you never in your life seen a movie where people get past guards by having a pretty girl smile and giggle? How do you know that Granny is not Ma Barker or that the Baptist Minister is not a Syrian Spy? Save the dichotomies for the classroom and search the car. If you want to question procedures, then write a memo.

1.A. Meanwhile, being a philosopher and a security guard myself, I assure you that I always search the car. In fact, I have this little trigger in my head that goes off when I start to think. I arm the trigger by putting on a uniform. If I starting thinking, the trigger goes off and I restart the procedures from the point where my mind wandered. "Oh, I don't need to check that, I think it's ok." Bang!

1. B. From a different life activity, new student pilots will say, "I've had six lessons and I am still scared. Can I be a pilot?" The answer is: If you are in the cockpit and you are not scared, it is because you are ignoring something that ought to scare you. Stay alert. Stay alive.

2. I do not want anyone creating a diversion by arguing with a guard.

3. If you can argue your way past this, then the next person will want to argue about that, and pretty soon, no one will be following any procedures. There are a dozen ways to redesign the entire transportation matrix from the ground up to avoid these phony baloney insecurity checks. Short of that, though, you have no solution. Just shut up, take off your shoes, and move through the line, sir. Otherwise, Officer Bertha will do a cavity check.

TM: Even at the gate of some hospital or similar facility, the guards routinely exhibit this tendency to indulge their tiny power�never mind that there�s no reason for it at all

4. Hospitals are targets for drug addicts. Have you never seen The Godfather? How do you know who is in the hospital and what threats to them exist? Your job is to maintain the security of the people and the installation. You do not have to be a jerk. You should always be polite. But you never compromise the safety of other people by ignoring a problem or letting a non-problem become one.

Post 3

Tuesday, August 16 - 1:38pm

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Rich, I'm not so sure about this. If 100% of these terrorists are Arab men, exactly how can profiling be harmful and pulling over the random granny-in-a-wheelchair helpful? Please explain.

Also consider that, for one of the flights on 911, two of the terrorists had been stopped at check-in but the guards were forced to let them go, partly because there is (or was) a law against holding more than two passangers of the same race.

(Edited by Alec Mouhibian
on 8/16, 1:41pm)

Post 4

Tuesday, August 16 - 2:15pm

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Ay-rabs look like:
http://solohq.com/img/People/alec.jpg

But never like:
http://www.shakiraheaven.com/

Islam is a religion, not a race. Among the most recent terrorist suspects have been
Jose Padilla and John Walker Lindh.

Of course, in our efforts to bag towelheads, we should not overlook the guys who got pushed into second place, the American rightwing superpatriots who blew up the Murrah Federal Bldg. Would you stop Eric Rudolph from getting on a jet? And then there was Ted Kaczynski.

So, tell me, jeffe, what does a terrorist look like?

Post 5

Tuesday, August 16 - 2:23pm

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Alec,

Terrorists have used women as well, although (so far) not against American targets (but there is always a first time.) Many have been non-Arab - and most Arabs don't look much different from other Caucasians of the Mediterranean subtype, such as yourself. If East-Asian grandmothers were exempt by profiling, the next bomb would be carried by an East-Asian grandmother.

Post 6

Tuesday, August 16 - 5:18pm

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By no means am I suggesting that *only* Arab-lookers be checked. Any suspicious looking person should, also, by the same criteria they use now. But profiling will take care of 99.99% of possible suspects. There are only so many people in this world who are willing to blow themselves up for Islam, and only so many out of those who aren't conspicuously Arab-looking.

And for crying out loud, show me one suicide-bomber who was as attractive as Shakira. Or as I, for the matter. :P

And yes, I have been treated differently in airports out of caution at my exotic appeal. And yes, two minutes of my time and a little not-so-unpleasant body-contact is a small price to pay for better security.

Alec

(Edited by Alec Mouhibian
on 8/17, 4:58am)

Post 7

Tuesday, August 16 - 10:03pm

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Some interesting ideas here. I am learning. Yet these TSA folks are often still bullies.

Post 8

Wednesday, August 17 - 4:14am

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Tibor Machan wrote: "Some interesting ideas here. I am learning. Yet these TSA folks are often still bullies."

It goes with the territory.

First of all, they are hired by the government. As a private security guard, I take my cues from scenes in Alongside Night.

More basically, perhaps, our culture with its govern-mentality, its statist propaganda in public schools, etc., etc., makes it difficult to turn the tide and bring more rational people into public safety and private security.

Still more basically, the distribution of genetic traits means that there will always be a certain number of these people in any grou.

You are right. They are bullies. How does the rational man deal with that?

Post 9

Wednesday, August 17 - 8:41am

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I believe rational people need to be alert and deal with bullies as the circumstances, their talents, and situations make it possible to get around or, at times, through them. There is no formula for prudent conduct other than the principle itself, "Take Care."

Post 10

Wednesday, August 17 - 12:37pm

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You know how they randomly select individuals to be searched in detail? Well, in addition, they mark your ticket with whether you should be randomly searched. So... just have 2 or 3 people sign up for a flight, and toss the bomb to the guy who isn't going to be searched.

I mentioned this to a lead TSA officer at one of the airports on my way to my sister's wedding. At first, he just tried to blow me off. Then I spoke up a little more, and was like "Look, this detailed security check is useless when there are two terrorists." He finally agreed, but said that this is how they are told to do it... blowing me off again.

Useless security measures.

Post 11

Wednesday, August 17 - 3:49pm

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I received the following post from a TSA screener:

"In response to your article I would like to start out

by saying that ,yes, there are airports that are not

consistent in certain things such as shoes. I am a TSA

screener and have been since 3/04. I really do like my

job but not because I am "God's little helper". I work

in a small airport in Michigan and got the article you

wrote off a website frequented by screeners. We all

know of the inconsistencies across the nation. Some of

the things you may not know are as follows:

*Poor management across the board

*The only way to move up is to give a "good blow job"

*work hours suck (I work 4am-1230pm)

*the pay is NOT that great

*the benefits are really expensive, especially health

*incompetent workers who kiss ass enough to keep their

jobs even though they have no right being on a

checkpoint in the first place

*supervisors who stand over your shoulder then tell

you you are a piece of crap right there in front of

the passenger you are screening

*having shoes thrown at you

*being called all sorts of names you never thought you

would hear outside any military base

*being accused of profiling when all you are doing is

trying to clear an alarm on someone who can't take all

their jewelry off and then you discover drugs

*having airport police officers not even arrest people

when they break local laws (such as in Michigan a

knife with a blade longer than 3" is illegal)

*Having to take a break in a filthy room that has had

God knows what stored in it since the airport opened

and then being told you can't lay down on your breaks

*Being accused of laziness when you are working you

butt of at 5mos pregnant and you can't lift a 75lb bag

*And the list goes on

I understand what you are saying. I see it every day.

Maybe you should investigate some of the things that we

screeners deal with and then see why we are "crabby".

Check out the website www.tsa-screeners.com
to see what kind of things go on across the nation."

Post 12

Wednesday, August 17 - 7:07pm

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What do you expect, anonymous TSA screener? You are hired by the US Government. The US Government doesn't have competition. It hires people just to give people jobs and spend money.

How about this instead:
The government can make airline companies partially responsible for the destruction caused by terrorists taking over their planes. Is that reasonable? If done, then it would be in the airliner's best interest to make their airplanes a good deal secure, instead of not caring but just barely meeting the Governments minimum security requirements.

TSA screener, then you could be hired by the airliners, earn an income that isn't provided by slaves (tax money) and be respected for your work.

Any other ideas?

Post 13

Wednesday, August 17 - 8:32pm

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You know what the biggest kicker is about all this TSA red tape? It would only potentially stop a guy with a box cutter from getting on the plane. There are internal programs that the TSA has that allow for supposed "random" checked cargo to be shipped. It's called the "Known Shipper" program. I have been told that they "randomly" check your first few shipments, then the rest go through unchecked.

http://www.tsa.gov/public/display?theme=44&content=0900051980069c15 has some info on the changes they made in 2003. It is not widely advertised that they do this. This is a program for cargo shippers and freight forwarders.

It really bothers me that we little squishy pink (red, black, green) people master the skies in our flying metal tubes, and some assholes with an agenda have to clog up our progress.

Post 14

Friday, August 19 - 4:33pm

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Shoes or no shoes? What idiot rent-a-cop came up with the shoe thing? I couldn't believe it the first time I went out to Florida this year. Taking off your shoes for security is ridiculous and really a royal pain in the ass. All the x-rays, metal detectors, strip searches and foot odor ain't going to make this country any safer. It certainly won't stop any of the nutters out there.

I'm not a criminal and don't appreciate being treated like I'm a threat to society. I flew out to Orlando last week and seeing all these kids in the airport have to take off their little shoes and have their stuff checked in order to go to Disneyworld really was rather disturbing. It is just another monumental waste of tax dollars.