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Time To Close the Security Theater
An anonymous reader writes "An editorial at Forbes calls for the dismantling of the TSA, pointing to recent headlines as the latest examples of 'security theater' at its worst. From the article:
'The problem isn't that the TSA is harassing the wrong people. The problem is that the TSA is harassing anyone. The TSA is encroaching on fundamental liberties and providing no discernable benefit. ... Naturally, the TSA responds to incidents like these by saying that the agents are highly trained and that they have followed proper procedure. This indicates a signal failing for the agency: if "doing it by the book" involves touching people in ways that would be considered sexual assault in virtually any other context or telling a 90-year old breast cancer survivor to remove her bra lest it contain explosives (as happened to a friend's grandmother), then the book needs to be shredded and rewritten. Better yet, it needs to be replaced with a competitive market for air travel in which the airports, the airways, and the airliners are in private hands. Some might object that private firms will have incentives to cut corners on safety. It is a legitimate concern, but competitive mechanisms tend to weed this out.'"
Security theater. Education theater. Infrastructure theater.
And near impossible to get rid of once established.
I would bet you will see TSA checkpoints on street corners before we get rid of this cancer at airports and train stations.
Incorrect. True security *has* stopped another 9/11.
That 'security' includes exactly 2 things:
Reinforced and 'locked' cockpit doors.
Flight #93 passenger response.
Those 2 things will prevent another 9/11 from happening. The TSA is preventing bombs 'on' planes which is *not* what 9/11 was. It was using planes as flying missles. Very. Different. Threats.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
is that they aim to fly as close to the line as possible.
In a system where safety rating is part of the commercial offering, you'll end up with cheap, dangerous, low margin airlines because (and it's a shame it has to be said so often) enlightened self interest is a myth.
of course the rest of this stuff is spot on. The TSA should be disbanded.
All animals are created equal, yet some animals are more equal than others.
The problem is that those people that created the TSA should have to go through this type of security screening. Make these invasive procedures personal to those in power. They'll have a change of mind when Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama and Nancy Pelosi are getting groped instead of hearing stories about some random grandmother. Too bad those three women always fly privately. I guess we're all equal under the law unless you get elected to office.
This isn't an either-or situation. The TSA's perpetrated a number of civil liberties violations, yes. On the other hand, some kind of free market libertarian fantasy should not come at the expense of public safety either.
The TSA needs to be re-imagined, but we shouldn't revert to the system we had before. But c'mon. A free market system has no incentive to improve in this kind of situation (oh, you died in a terrorist attack? Fine, go to some other airport next time!)
Take off every sig. For great justice.
They're a one-tune-band.
Private enterprise. Rah Rah Rah. Solution to everything .... blah blah blah... Capitalism, the savior of us all... blah blah blah. privatise airports, roads, the police, fire brigade, army, air, water, everything.... right to property, profit, business efficiency.... Private enterprise. Rah Rah Rah.
"but competitive mechanisms tend to weed this out."
This is just a free market troll. Competitive mechanisms favor the group that cuts costs, reduces quality and undercuts the higher quality competitors. The end result is the dodgy group raising prices sky high once a monopoly has been achieved.
Incorrect. True security *has* stopped another 9/11.
That 'security' includes exactly 2 things:
Reinforced and 'locked' cockpit doors.
Flight #93 passenger response.
Those 2 things will prevent another 9/11 from happening. The TSA is preventing bombs 'on' planes which is *not* what 9/11 was. It was using planes as flying missles. Very. Different. Threats.
Reinforced and 'locked' cockpit doors are things that should have naturally been implemented into design by common sense. That would be passive security that works on its own without further human intervention after fabrication and production.
The Israel's airport security model is very effective. But it is very difficult to follow in the US. You can google for a number of sources such as this. Excerpt:
While American and European security procedures rely mainly on technological solutions for screening luggage and passengers, Israel’s security philosophy is based on a mix of advanced detection devices and personal interaction with the passengers.The multi-layer system begins outside Israel’s biggest port of entry — Ben Gurion airport. Cars approaching the terminal are stopped by guards and asked one or two questions, usually about where they are coming from or what is the purpose of their visit. A nervous response, or one revealing an Arab accent, could trigger further scrutiny even before entering the airport.
When walking into the terminal, visitors pass by another set of security agents searching for passengers behaving suspiciously. The next stop for human evaluation is before the check-in counter, where passengers are required to show their travel documents and answer a series of seemingly standard questions from trained security personnel. (Did you pack your bags by yourself? How long did you spend in Israel? What was the purpose of your visit?) Screeners are interested more in the tone and body language than in the content of passengers’ replies.
This is also the point where profiling takes place: While most Jewish Israeli citizens will be waved through after the brief conversation, others, mainly Israeli Arabs and non-Jewish visitors, will be taken aside for lengthy questioning and a thorough luggage and physical check.
This article one of the better I've read, and the author is right: the TSA is flawed to the core. The TSA also makes the case that law enforcement should never be above the law... sexually assaulting people, stealing people's stuff (taking away contraband) and creating a system of checkpoints with a do not pass list all are contrary to existing law and at least as bad as anything Eastern Europe had to offer in the 1960s and 1970s. If we are exempting law enforcement from sexual assault and theft laws, then we need to change that as there is not one good example where law enforcement should be able to rape, molest or steal from a citizen, EVER. The TSA also has little regard for citizen health as seen in it's apparent lack of safety testing for backscatter detectors and their treatment of people in wheelchairs.
TSA isn't impossible to get rid of. All it takes is one Senator or member of the House to stand up and hold public hearings where citizen after citizen get to tell stories of their wives, children, and grandparents being sexually assaulted, relieved of property or denied access to travel without any kind of right of redress, and the people will be more than happy to get rid of the beast the TSA has become. Personally, I have avoided commercial flights since the TSA became more Stalinist in its tactics because I fear that I would lose my temper and be arrested for questioning the TSA's right to sexually assault, irradiate people, steal stuff and impede other citizens right to freely move. I'll continue to fly privately or not at all (if the boarding+flight+bag claim time is under 5 hours, you usually can drive there in the same time) until this changes. In 2001, I flew over 340,000 miles. Last year, I flew 0 on a commercial airliner.
-- $G
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
Couldn't you just replace TSA with Federal Government in that story?
Couldn't you all vote to replace the Federal Government if you all really disliked it so much?
Yes, and we have the opportunity to do so with great regularity: 1/3 of the Senate every two years, the entire House of Representatives every two years, the the President every four years. We, as in the US voters, fail to re-elect a new government with equal regularity. Even with in-the-sewer approval ratings, Congressional incumbents tend to enjoy a remarkable re-election rate (I've seen figure in excess of 90%).
I worked with a guy who had the right idea: whomever the incumbent is, vote for the challenger. Don't worry about party affiliation, they're both essentially the same anyway. The effect on the Senate would be less dramatic then the House, since only 1/3 of the Senators are up for re-election at the same time. Can you imagine a House of Representatives where all 435 members were replaced at the same time?
Government's idea of a balanced budget: take money from the right pocket to balance...oh who am I kidding?
A first post AC who has something insightful to say? Color me shocked. The gist of the editorial isn't that the security theater is ineffective, it is that the government shouldn't be groping grandmas when the free market could provide security without having to grope grandmas. This is nothing but the standard trope of "government is evil" mixed with taking advantage of people not understanding security.
But that's a sham.
#1 Physical profiling doesn't work. Terrorists would just do dry-runs until they find a combination of people and materials that is outside the profile.
#2 Behavioral profiling is somewhat better, but requires much more expensive training. It is unlikely to be implemented in all airports.
#3 This leaves random sampling. In order for random sampling to work, grandmas and babies have to be groped. Otherwise, we're right back at #1.
Do people have to be groped? Honestly, I'm not up-to-date enough on the latest explosives to know what kind of damage a fake boob or a full diaper's worth of C4 can do to a plane. I'll leave that decision to the experts.
What I can guarantee you though is that the free market doesn't have a better solution for this? Why? Money.
There are two ways to pay for it: airports and airlines pay for it, or travelers pay for it.
If airlines and airports pay for it, the motivation is to keep bringing as many people in as possible - which, since everybody thinks they're innocent and shouldn't be hassled, means a reduction in safety. If individuals pay for it, they'll want to pay for it only when they travel, which is a huge individual expense. The only people able to afford proper security are the wealthy, and at that point, they might as well rent a private jet.
If the American people want airport security, the only way to do it right is through a government agency that takes a little bit from everybody to provide some expensive security to a small subgroup of people.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Also, 9/11 changed our mindset around hijacking. Previously, everyone on the plane would have thought "They'll get us to the ground safely, they just want us as hostages" so complacency had much lower risk than heroism... but 9/11 showed that some folks want to use the plane as a missile and don't care about the people on board. That means if someone attempts to hijack the plane, even with a bomb, the passengers have plenty of motivation to respond because the risk of complacence is now *higher* than the risk of heroism.
The First Amendment guarantees freedom of association -- that means the freedom to travel and meet whoever you like. We used to laugh at the Soviet Union for requiring "internal passports" to travel. America, we proudly said, was a free country and we do not have "identity papers," much less need to carry them. Now you cannot board an airplane or train without Identity Papers in what we used to call America. The terrorists have won, we have become Nazi Germany, and nobody seems to care.
Interviews conducted by experts, not groping and searching by minimum wage automatons, provide effective security. Bags do need to be searched, and passengers screened, but this searching does not need to be intrusive. Anything else is just theatre.
Whether the airport, the government, or the airline directly foots the bill, you still pay for it. You pay for directly in your airline ticket or via taxes which spreads out the cost more.
Some things are not done better by the private sector. Government is not universally incompetent, they actually do many things well. Changing to private security from government security will not magically improve security. If the airlines provide security it will just be done as cheap as possible without breaking any laws. Government regulations ARE required when it comes to health and safety issues. The free market simply does not give the average consumer the required information in a timely manner to prevent health and safety abuses.
Anarchists never rule
Thing is: NOBODY voted for the TSA.
No sig today...
So when a colleague of mine went to catch his plane home, and they asked him where was the latest place he visited, he said "I was in a meeting with the Defence Minister".
So they locked him in a cell with an armed guard outside. After several hours they were persuaded to, you know, actually try the Ministry. Most of whom had gone home. They eventually reached the Defence Minister, who confirmed that indeed Dr X. Y. had been in a meeting with him that morning and had left to catch a plane to the airport.
Now, you would think that in any civilised country an apology would be in order. Not in Israel. Instead, they refused to speak to him or make eye contact, and eventually almost pushed him onto the plane home without a word of apology.
This apologia is unwarranted. Israeli security goons are surely no better, no worse than security goons anywhere. There are just far more of them and they search far more people more thoroughly.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
If the American people want airport security
Who says we do? We did pretty well for a few decades without the TSA or a private firm equivalent. Why the hell do we need them now? Because some loonies pulled one over on us 10 yeas ago? Whoopty-doo. Even the toughest kids on the playground get a black eye from time to time.
I say bring in some bomb sniffing dogs at every airport. Dismantle the scanners and sell the materials on e-bay to pay off some of the debt. Lay-off every single TSA employee. Get on with our lives. I'm tired of living in a country where wanting to travel long distances quickly and conveniently is a reason to suspect someone is a terrorist.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
Terrorists don't have to get past airport security. They can wheel in a huge bomb on an airport-provided trolley and blow up the queue for the scanner.
If there's no terrorist attacks in the USA it's not because of the TSA, it's because there aren't any terrorists who can be bothered to do it.
If you don't believe me I've got a magic tiger-repelling stone I'd like to sell you.
No sig today...
Bags do need to be searched, and passengers screened
Says who? Did you read TFA, in particular the part about the number of deaths due to terrorist+airplanes vs. accidental deer strikes?
There is no statistical justification for searching any bags or for any kind of passenger screening.
Imagine this: suppose after the first WTC bombing (truck in the parking lot), some authority decided the only way to make cities safe is to stop every car, bus, and truck on the way into the city, search all occupants and their luggage, and do to the vehicle. Absolutely ridiculous? Now tell me how the airport+TSA crap is any different.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Should have. But common sense and hindsight are 20/20. Most terrorists just wanted a ride to Cuba before 9/11, so there was no need to escalate the situation. When 9/11 turned the planes themselves into weapons, the attitudes of the passengers and the pilots changed. That is all that it took. We don't need anything else.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
"You're really using the Flight 93 situation as a citation of functional security? It fucking crashed. Everyone died. Way to go, security."
The point is that it reduces the expected value for hijackers to something much less than their objective, i.e., no longer a good investment.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
The Israel's airport security model is very effective. But it is very difficult to follow in the US..
Yes. Because 1) Israel has only one major airport (Ben Gurion) and perhaps 50 smaller ones 2) It's the physical size of New Jersey and 3) They do obvious racial profiling.
The latter point alone is responsible for most of the TSA excesses. Undressing children and grandmas in wheelchairs (anybody could be a terrorist) is the price we pay for political correctness.
Like a lot of nice solutions, it just doesn't scale well.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Don't be an idiot. If the TSA were having measurable successes like those, the leaders would be on TV regularly extolling their successes.
With political incentives like they are, absence of evidence is evidence of absence.
We've only got two choices and they're both completely crap.
You're doing it wrong.
Candidates in the 2010 Ohio Senate election:
Rob Portman (R)
Lee Fisher (D)
Dan La Botz (Socialist Party)
Eric Deaton (Constitution Party)
Michael Pryce (Independent)
2008 Presidential Candidates On Enough State Ballots to Reach 270 Points:
Barrack Obama (D)
John McCain (R)
Ralph Nader (Independent)
Bob Barr (Libertarian)
Chuck Baldwin (Constitution)
Cynthia McKinney (Green)
Incidentally, in the 2008 presidential election 1,623,078 people voted for a 3rd party out of 131,014,789 votes (not counting "others"). 1,623,078 people voted for what they believe. Do you think that many people will revolt when they have food in their bellies and a roof over their heads? Two party system? That's the defeatist attitude that ensures a two party system. If it doesn't matter who wins, democrat or republican, focus on raising that number. 1,623,078 people voted 3rd party in 2008, in 2012 don't focus on which R or D wins (in presidential elections or congressional elections), focus on raising the number of 3rd party votes. That's the real victory. Every election with less votes for R and D is a triumph for freedom. Democracy sometimes takes a long time to change direction, don't give up now on the idea that men can govern men with ideas instead of violence.
If I can just reach out with my words and touch a butthole, just one, it will all be worth it.
Yeah, the point of Flight 93 is that terrorists are never going to gain control of the plane again. I was on some of the first post 9/11 flights and at that time the social contract among the guys on the plane was rather explicit. Those first few months everyone made eye contact and there was lots of implied "we've got each other's back" subtext to all of the conversations with strangers on the plane. Anyone trying to hijack a plane with boxcutters post 9/11 would have been torn to pieces before they got the first demand out of their mouth. Heck, even a bunch of AK-47s would have failed, unless they managed to kill every person on the plane.
If there's some doubt as to the intent of an assailant, it is in your interest to mitigate the conflict and get out alive. If you know for sure they intend to kill you and everyone else, your incentive to cooperate drops to zero.