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Auditors Question TSA's Tech Spending, Security Solutions
Frosty P writes "Government auditors have faulted the TSA and its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, for failing to properly test and evaluate technology before spending money on it. The TSA spent about $36 million on devices that puffed air on travelers to 'sniff' them out for explosives residue. All 207 of those machines ended up in warehouses, abandoned as unable to perform as advertised, deployed in many airports before the TSA had fully tested them. Since it was founded in 2001, the TSA has spent roughly $14 billion in more than 20,900 transactions with dozens of contractors, including $8 billion for the famous new body scanners that have recently come under scrutiny for being unable to perform the task for which they are advertised. 'TSA has an obsession of finding a single box that will solve all its problems. They've spent and wasted money looking for that one box, and there is no such solution,' said John Huey, an airport security expert."
Gee, TSA wasting tax payer money? Who'da thunk Chertoff's big money maker would be a big money waster for the rest of us "little people"?
Similar to the upcoming US election results
Used to be cutting edge
Uh, when the fuck was this? Was it back when the Internet had no trolls and everyone on slashdot wrote thoughtful, well-reasoned commentary?
Similar to the upcoming US election results
36 million on devices to puff air?
The TSA can blow me for free.
THL phish sticks
Seeing what happens when you point out holes in the TSA system it may better to just to let it slide. And any ways a of the tech is from pork barrel.
When they had their contest to find the best system to detect *, I suggested they ditch technology and go with human power. No computer yet can yet process all that we can in that mode of operation. You need to pay people some good money to actually want to do the job && keep it. Minimum wage or close to it means they don't care if they get fired, it's no big loss. Next, you have to have trained people, not people you put through a class and expect them to catch terrorists.
But don't tell any of that to the people spending money because if they don't spend money, they won't get money... and that's bad for their business and unpatriotic!
My abilities are only limited by my imagination
The TSA is simply a job creation program that has gone amok. At first it was extra baggage screeners, but it's now grown to the point that the only jobs they could think of involve fondling people. I think the idea is that if they get sued often enough, it will create lots of jobs for paralegals, expert witnesses and attorneys. The TSA likes machines because machines need operators, and each operator is one more job. In short the TSA is the biggest farce I've ever seen the government create, and it can't be closed down completely quickly enough.
-- $G
And this is what happens when you let magical thinking get spending power. Buy the magic box, and scare the monsters from the moon cult away. Seen any moon monsters lately? Magic box is working! Wait, scientist said magic box doesn't work? What does he know! Newspaper man proved magic box doesn't work? Nothing to worry about. My shaman/advisor says magic box doesn't work? Time to buy new magic box!
I'm wondering why no one is asking about using dogs for bomb sniffing.
I'm guessing that the reason the TSA isn't trying that is because dogs can be supplied by many "vendors". It's more difficult to patent a dog than a scanner.
Woooooooosh!
The TSA has pulling this shit since at least 2008. Remember the CNN reporter who wound up on the no-fly list?
Oh yes, 14 billion, now lets look at ~ Can't bring up war, NO REFUSE! Agh no carrier?
I don't think it really matters that they have improperly spent all this money. So what?.. Is someone going to get in trouble for it over at TSA? Obviously not, they couldn't care less. The machines aren't about making you safer, it's about training you how to be a slave in this new globalized terrorist-filled society. If they cared about people's safety, they wouldn't let their workers walk right past security because they too, could be a terrorist.
Or they wouldn't be raiding the pilot's house that blew the whistle on this blatant hypocritical mission that the TSA is apparently on. http://www.news10.net/news/article.aspx?storyid=113529&provider=top&catid=188
These scanners are obviously making their way to shopping malls, schools, gov buildings, and just about anywhere else - so don't let them fool you and tell you it's for the brown men in turbans, feeling up your 14yr old daughter and your 75yr old grandmother has nothing to do with brown men in turbans plotting evil things in caves.
The magical number is: 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
They work better than any other system, period. They don't have to irradiate you and they don't have to grope you. Admittedly Muslims and some other people consider them unclean, but they don't even have to touch what they're sniffing. The training takes time and money, it's true, but I have to wonder how many sniffer dogs could be trained for $14 billion...
I piss off bigots.
Thank you, Tom Daschle, you ignorant bastard.
Fox News/talk radio philosophy: if it happened when Bush and the Republicans were in charge, keep looking for a Democrat to blame. Then hammer that home on the air 10,000 times a day until people start believing. Just like Barney Frank singlehandedly created the Bush housing bubble when he was ranking minority member of the Senate Finance Committee.
seriously, I've done counter-terrorism and I can tell you that all the tech solutions are literal wastes of money.
Even the tests of TSA screening show a trained terrorist can get all the items aboard 4 out of 5 times, with a more than 95 percent success rate on getting them into the cargo hold as well.
The only things that work - and have worked - are:
1. Dogs.
2. Pigs. Even better than dogs.
3. Throwing your coat or blanket on top of any hijacker and subduing them, yelling "Terrorist! We're all going to die - get them!"
Everything else is an utter and absolute waste of time and effort.
And a whole lot of cash.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
The last thing I want is airport security handed over to the lowest bidder whose only obligation is to maximize profits for his shareholders. Some things are WAY too important to be left to the free market, and looking out for public safety is at the top of the list. TSA employees may be one step above rent-a-cops, but at least they ARE one step above rent-a-cops.
I piss off bigots.
Used to be cutting edge
Uh, when the fuck was this? Was it back when the Internet had no trolls and everyone on slashdot wrote thoughtful, well-reasoned commentary?
Dude, even back when it was ARPA*NET we had trolls and unreasoned commentary.
UseNet flame wars were ... wait for it ... legendary.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
You should consider how much it costs the TSA for each terrorist they caught. Take that $14 billion, and divide it by the number of terrorists they've caught to date (0) since 9/11, and see how economical it has actually been. $14,000,000,000/0 = ?
Ummm, can someone do the math for me, my calculator doesn't have that enough digits.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
Why? You can get a private pilot's license for less than $10k worth of training.
Who needs the TSA?
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
The thought of all that money well spent makes me feel safe.
"It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes." Douglas Adams
If the pilot is behind a locked door (that the knife cannot cut through), are we really concerned about knives?
And dogs should be able to detect firearms.
TELEX networks had trolls and whackjobs decades before ARPANET had its first message.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
Thank you, Fleet Commander Obvious! That was my whole damn point.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
I'm very happy that Auditors are Questioning TSA's tech spending...
I mean, they're only a few months after slashdotters, the general public, and pretty much anyone except the idiots who made the devices.
I'll take your word for TELEX - I was only on BBS systems since 1978, so I don't know what went on before then.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
does that include lessons on *landing* as well?
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
Getting a pilot's license is not all that hard (almost every one of my co-workers has a VFR license and most of them own a single-engine ship.)
The hard part is getting and *keeping* an IFR ticket, where you have to put in so many flight hours that it's really tough to do if you're not a full-time commercial pilot. Let's not even talk about the costs of owning, leasing, or even just fueling and maintaining even a low-end private jet.
It's fantastically liberating to be able to fly your own plane, but it also tends to be quite limiting. Consider the range on your, let's say, Cessna 182, for the 7-8 hours max you'd want to be in the left seat. Also consider what happens when you're grounded or diverted by VFR.
Most private pilots still go via commercial carriers when they travel. Flying yourself from Los Angeles to Maine can be fun, but it's no less greuling (and often not much faster) than the equivalent road trip.
The "use it or lose it" factor of IFR currency (FAR 61.57) in reality pretty much requires you to fly continuously, and without IFR you're stuck with mainly recreational flying in a relatively limited geographical area, only in clear skies. It doesn't suck, but it is not in reality the substitute you hold it out to be, nor do the costs end at the price of school.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
My friend and I were on our way home from Iraq for mid-tour leave in ~2005. Being in our military uniforms we were granted some additional freedoms other passengers were not. While on board one of the flights my friend and I sat next to a very nice man in his mid 30's early 40's. During the flight we found out that he worked for the TSA. During our conversation we started talking about airport security and how I inadvertently carried a knife, straight razor and multi-tool through 4 security check points and multiple scanners (obviously not the ones like today, but still). At one point my friend jokingly said "So I guess the only thing you couldn't smuggle on-board is a chain saw!" to which the TSA worker replied "Only if it's running..."
Post Military duty I haven't gotten on a plane since. I know "airplanes are safer than traveling by car" but I can't stand that kind of gross incompetence. (Hence why I got out of the Military after 4 years).
The TSA will be audited again, but by another company. "We will audit until we pass, even if we have to go through all the auditing companies we can get our hands on", a spokesperson said.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I've got the stupid magic box they're searching for. It's called the ballot box and if any politician were to grow a spine and stand up to these goons I'd use it. The box that comes next in the series is far less peaceful.
does that include lessons on *landing* as well?
Thats extra.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Quite seriously, some of their contraptions seem to come right out of Dr. Evil's secret underground lab. I wonder when they're going for sharks and lasers.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Expect similar things for getting your pilot's license within 12 months.
A bloated bureaucratic behemoth that paid for iPods for cops and bullet proof vests for dogs? But didn't pay for extra employees for searches? Or keeping cops on the street?
The next thing you will be telling me is that there is a pattern of bribery and corruption between contractors and employees administering the contracts.
They need their budget slashed immediately.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Bollocks.
People have been hijacking and blowing up planes for decades and nobody's economies collapsed. It's only since it happened over American soil that The Terrorist Fear took over and America started fucking everyone (including themselves) in the ass and generally doing the terrorists' jobs for them.
The rest of the world has been dealing with this sort of bullshit for years and getting on with their lives. I was on the tube in London two days after a bunch of fucktards blew it up and we didn't have government agents groping passengers at every station (well, not officially, anyway). We got blown up by a higher class of arseholes in the 80s and we learned how to deal with that sort of shit. The correct response is the Glasgow response. You boot your local terrorist in the nuts as hard as you can, then go about your business.
The sooner America realises that they're amateurs at this and learns how to handle it properly the better.
Then you'll change your tune (to a higher pitch when it malfunctions).
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
I'm just thankful that our leftist benefactor, George Soros makes plenty of money off of the TSA body scanners. If he wasn't a leftist, I'd feel like these were bad people ...
MEL: "Just get us on the ground."
WASH: "Don't worry, that'll happen..."
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
According to the article:
"Since the introduction of metal detectors in the 1970s, technologies have been bought and cobbled together in a somewhat piecemeal approach," said Tom LaTourrette, a security expert at RAND Corp., a nonprofit research institute.
"No one has been able to provide a satisfactory answer to the question of how to best structure aviation security," he said.
According to most of us in the real world:
"But the TSA's done a darn fine job of showing us how NOT to."
My girlfriend and I sat down to figure out how we could fly to her dad's airport outside of Baltimore from the LA Basin in a Cessna 172SP. We were looking at 16-18 hours of flight time over two or three days, five or six stops, and a bill of about $2400 to $2700 for the rental -- each way. Even without the rental fees, it would be something in the neighborhood of $650-$730 in fuel each way. That assumes no diversions and reasonable weather the entire way. It would be an incredible trip and a lot of fun, but it would also be much more financially difficult.
Being a private pilot works when you can get a few friends to go in on a trip to someplace that can be pricey even commercially. Flying from the LA Basin into Sacramento, for example, the numbers and time just about even out. More popular places like San Francisco, Las Vegas, or even Phoenix are tougher to match, and most long-distance flights are just right out. Until one gets into higher-performance aircraft (175 knots or faster and 800NM range or more), long-distance travel just doesn't work economically, and often not even then. For example, the above trip in a Cessna 350 would be a two-hop flight requiring about 12 hours in flight, give or take, depending on the cruise speed. At the common rental rate of $350/hour, that would be $4200 each way.
I love to sit in the left seat, but for most serious trips, I turn it over to the professionals.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
I hope the truth results in action.
Once I can enter an airport without being molested and/or photographed nude, I might actually start flying once in a while again.
A lot of people think I am silly for valuing my sovereignty over my own body. I think they are silly for letting the government treat them like animals.
If the do-badders who have it in for the USA and the West have learned anything, it's how to force an empire to it's knees by making them blow all their money. The USA did it by brute force outspending the Soviet Union and now the do-badders will achieve the same to the USA by causing them to blow cash they don't have on totally non-constructive adventures like fighting in the middle east and pissing billions away on useless homeland security ventures.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September
It never has been.
The solution that works prevents terrorists from even getting to the airport - Intelligence.
Unfortunately, intelligence is hard work, and requires LOTS of highly trained people to make it work well. Not the minimum wage security people manning the boxes.
Can someone finally get fired? How god damned hard is it to xerox Israels security system and be done with it? If Muslim terrorist want to crash a plane, it's certainly going to be one filled with Israelis. There are clearly not any Jews falling from the skys of the middle east so can we just assume they must be doing something right?
Its only the last half inch that hurts.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
tsa needs to have its budget cut by at least half.
Yeah, the Jean Charles de Menezes incident was a royal cockup of monumental proportions. The Met got rumbled trying to lie their way out of it too.
When the IRA put bombs in bins in public areas, yes, we removed the bins (there usually are bins now - sensitive areas have heavy duty bins that direct explosions upwards) and put non-shatter windows into the bottom two floors of public buildings. That's a reasonable response to a sustained bombing campaign, much like reinforcing and locking cockpit doors.
You can't 'win' a 'war' against terrorists - you do what you can to limit damage and make large targets more difficult to bomb, and apart from that you have to accept that it's just not possible to eliminate risk. If you go massively overboard like the US has done, you really have Let The Terrorists Win.
The clue's in the name. They're terrorists. If you let them terrorise you, I'd say that's a pretty convincing victory for them. The IRA et al and 7/7 bombers were largely unsuccessful as terrorists - they scared the shit out of us for a few weeks, but that's about as far as it went. People kept going to the pub after the Guilford and Woolwich bombings, the tube was back up and running in a matter of hours after 7/7. The trick is not to give a fuck and make sure they know it.
I've perceived an improvement in overall commentary quality in the past 1/2 year or so. The quality is much, much better than other sites, IMO. Want to see what I mean - go visit reddit or digg.
The Powers That Be want you to be a bit scared when you're going through the airport, but they mainly want you to be scared of Terrorists, and mainly feel that the TSA are there to protect you and catch the terrorists, not feel directly threatened by the TSA. Big Brother Government is there to Protect You, and you're supposed to be obedient.
They do use some smaller dogs as sniffers, beagles and the like, that aren't scary dogs, but even then, you expect police sniffer dogs to be looking for drugs, and you expect that the police will lie about what the dog's telling them if they feel like singling you out.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I've got an IFR pilot rating and an RV-8 - which gets about 170 knots and a decent range, although it's pretty cramped (better than coach, though), and lacks de-icing capabilities, I regularly fly it around the central US, and for most flights it's faster than commercial (counting drive-to-airport, checking in, waiting, flying, retrieving baggage and leaving airport), and no 'freedom fondle' or worrying about breakage, theft or the TSA rule-of-the-week. As an example, from my home in west-central MN to a client site in Dallas is about a 20 hour drive (direct), about a 6 hour flight in my plane (with one pit stop), or about 7 hours commercially (3.5 hours to 'real' airport, 1 hour AT airport, about 3 hours in air). Fuel is a bit more than a typical coach fare, but less than two tickets if I bring a passenger (it's a 2-seater). I occasionally have to wait or divert for weather, but I get to do it on MY schedule, not the airlines. It isn't for everybody, but it's not as far fetched as many think. I've had the plane about 6 years and I've been (for business or recreation) all over - Fargo, Minneapolis, Chicago, Indianapolis, Cleveland, DC, Orlando, Key West, Dallas, Phoenix, St Louis, Atlanta, and hundreds of smaller towns around the country.
On top of that, the plane is fully aerobatic and fun as hell.
The long lines are what they are bombing now, terrorists targeting airports right now are thinking that rolling up with a suitcase filled with explosives in the middle of a large crowd waiting for security:
a) Shuts down the whole airport.
b) Inflicts more causalities than randomly crashing an airliner
c) Will make security spend massive amounts of money countering
Let''s review, TSA has made us less safe by offering us up as a larger and slower target. It is like putting security at the watering hole to make sure no one is a crocodile while lions eat everyone else who is waiting in line.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Bollocks.
People have been hijacking and blowing up planes for decades and nobody's economies collapsed. It's only since it happened over American soil that The Terrorist Fear took over
Nah... I am pretty sure they only grope you. Unless something has changed recently.
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
Bollocks.
People have been hijacking and blowing up planes for decades and nobody's economies collapsed. It's only since it happened over American soil that The Terrorist Fear took over and America started fucking everyone (including themselves) in the ass
Nah... I am pretty sure they only grope you. Unless something has changed recently.
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
1) Make sure that cockpit doors are reinforced (this should already have been done)
2) Arm any pilot / co-pilot who wants to be armed and has training
3) Metal detectors, x-ray luggage & carry-ons
4) Hand every boarding passenger a baseball bat
[Insert pithy quote here]
Two important points: How much did the training cost, and how much did the plane cost? A perfect 35 hours for each of the PPL and IFR under Part 141 at $50 per hour for the instructor is $3500, and essentially nobody makes those numbers (70 hours is the national average for PPL and it's something like 60 hours for IFR). Factor in plane rental (or acquisition/fuel) and run it over the hours, and it takes a long time to make that back. If you own your plane, you need to take into account all the maintenance that goes into the plane, which can be considerable, especially when you factor in subscription features like are available in modern sets like the G1000.
I don't at all regret getting my PPL, and I look forward to IFR training, but I also didn't do it to save money.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
Our local aero club had a IFR certified simulator. At least in NZ hours on that was good enough for keeping your instrument ratings, and it was much cheaper than plane. However its still time, and you need someone else with proper instrument ratings to sign the hours off.
But lets face it. Non of us at the club flew for travel, we flew for fun.
The Grey Goo disaster happened 3 billion years ago. This rock is covered in self replicating machines!
I just want to tell you both good luck, we're all counting on you.
I am officially gone from
And before that, Caveman Ugg was drawing dongs on other people's cave entrances.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Was it back when the Internet had no trolls and everyone on slashdot wrote thoughtful, well-reasoned commentary?
When did this exist?
1946.
More on topic, am I the only one who thinks the TSA should be disbanded and Michael Chertoff should be standing in an unemployment line with Michael brown?
How about we spend some of that transportation safety money on guard rails? 45,000 people die on American highways each year, but there were no airline fatalities for two years straight. Seems that the government's priorities are highly illogical; the transportation safety money should be spent on safer highways, where people die every day, not wasted on the already safe airports. The only terrorist I'm terrified of is the blond in the SUV texting on the cell phone while eating a hamburger.
Free Martian Whores!
Great idea, I'll just use this extra $10k I have lying around and sell a few of my yachts to buy a personal airliner. Thanks so much, I don't know why I didn't think of this simple solution!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Disband TSA for sure, that 14 Billion could have been used to save lives, make friends out of those freedom fighters we consider terrorists (if there really are any), lets put as much effort and money into making the world a better place for everyone.
I vote for Yorkshire terriers ^_^ It will be especially cute when they find something and go into a barking fit, bouncing back from the recoil of each cute little bark ^_^ naaaawww
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
I'm still dabbling at the other end of the spectrum: flying gliders. Cheap, "easy", and lots of fun. Homeland Security keeps proposing rules that could shut it down, but luckily the FAA has been open to rational discussions.
Keeping your glider rating is almost trivial. There are some guys in our club in their 80's and half paralyzed. And cheap too. As low at $20/hr, including tow and instructor. And there's nothing like flying 120 knots in a plane with no engine!
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
When did this exist?
Back when slashdot was largely populated by people who were subject matter experts and were willing to discuss and independently research at the behest of their peers. Back then moderation even had a propensity to reflect technical merit and accuracy. And meta moderation commonly combated trolls. Back then, "citation needed", would have been laughed at for the inappropriate stupidity it is. Largely because people back then actually understood the difference between research papers and casual discourse and debate.
These days its largely a popularity content. Ignorance and half truth is commonly moderated up. Troll moderation happens daily and without bounds. Moderators seem completely unable to read simple instructions and follow them. Meta moderation seems to be almost completely useless because of the scale of poor and troll moderations. And its extremely common for moderation to be used for censorship rather than to focus or expand dialog. Basically slashdot became popular and most of the people which made slashdot worthy have long since left. What you're left with today is largely American Idol where re-enforcement of the mass' ignorance is the objective of the day - every day.
Slashdot absolutely has changed - and for the worse, by far. Slashdot is a former shell of what it once was - largely because of the low quality of people it now attracts.
Lowest bidder only maximizing profit for shareholder.
Incumbent official only maximizing donations to reelection campaigns.
I do not see much difference.
The head of the TSA is not elected and not of much use to anyone else who wants to get elected, since everybody hates him. He is also -- in principle, at least -- responsible to the public as a whole, not just his shareholders.
I piss off bigots.
>>A 4 hour VFR flight is tiring. A 4 hour hand-flown IFR flight is more exhausting than an 8 hour shift of manual labor Word. I had to fly from Nassau (Bahamas) to BWI (Baltimore) in nasty IFR with no autopilot. I felt like I had done 10 rounds with Mike Tyson at the end of that flight.
cut spending and do away with this useless group that was created to give us a "perceived sense of security" when we fly. Terrorists that want to blow up or hijack a plane will, TSA or no TSA.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
You may think that's funny, but she almost hit me a few days ago.
It was nothing compared to the lady dialing her iPhone with her nose while putting on finger nail polish and drifting into the oncoming lane. Somehow she didn't hit anyone, but that was only by dumb luck and good reactions from the other drivers, who were more than happy to give her a 1-finger salute. She was oblivious to what happened. And yes, I'm serious. She passed me on the left when I saw what she was doing. She sped past me and into the oncoming lane, before drifting into my lane almost hitting me.
I remember the days when the drivers seat was used for driving, not used for everything else, and occasionally turning that big round wheel.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
The part of Israel's security we ought to copy -- there if you shoot a terrorist, you're a hero. Here, you're a homicidal manic in need of jail time (at least).
Why can't we just man up and take care of this ourselves? We'd do a better job than they do, that's been proven as well. See John Lott's "More guns, less crime" for many examples. We simply make it too dangerous to be a terrorist. Works great on crime, when a potential crook realizes he might not face our namby-pamby legal system, but instead face judge, jury, and executioner all at once, and be dead in one second. Kinda takes the fun out of crime. Too lousy a risk/reward ratio.
There is next to no crime where I live, out in the boonies -- and practically everyone is armed, it's just part of the culture of farming and hunting. Coincidence? We have crooks living around here, we know who they are, but they're smart enough to go to gun free zones to ply their trade....
Funny thing about that. Darwin takes care of any who don't pay attention to that one.
Why guess when you can know? Measure!
The problem is that there is a scale where the perception of the value of a single life is zero in Islamabad, 5 in London and 1000 in New York City.
Until that changes you have a health care system focused on putting off dying for two weeks at a cost of $500,000 and airport security focused on preventing any incident from happening at any cost.
If someone were to come out and openly say it isn't worth the trouble and cost to the American people to have the TSA and if a terrorist succeeds in crashing a plane ... well, that's too bad the result would be a riot. Certainly they would be thrown out of whatever office they held.
No, this is not a point of rationality in the US. And it goes way, way deeper than simply the TSA.
Just like spending more money on swine flu than regular flu.
and everyone on slashdot wrote thoughtful, well-reasoned commentary
You're confusing facts and fiction..
Insert
Quit taking planes.
Show the airlines you aren't happy with how things are, and refuse to use them until stuff changes.
Remember 911? Remember how shutting air travel down for a week caused airlines to claim they were losing mass money and needed bailouts to continue?
What do you think would happen if for a month, or 2, they got less business? They'd bitch at the government, and TSA would have to get the shaft.
You need to speak the language, which is money.
You are the consumer, quit fucking consuming air flights till they fix it.
Be seeing you...
I got mine for less than $5k. The airplane will cost you around $18k to $20k(USD) minimum.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
Ahh, but how much for the parking space...
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Depends on where you park it. If you can get into Cox Airpark (a 1400ft grass strip), $1200/yr. RDU is about $300/month (I think). Sanford-Lee is $200, unless they've gone up since the last time I checked.
The plane I'm building is highway towable. So, unless I get lazy, it will stay in my garage.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba