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Poll Finds Americans Think the TSA Is 'Doing a Good Job'
OverTheGeicoE writes "Why is it that airport security never seems to change in the United States? Perhaps it's because most Americans think the TSA is doing a 'good job,' according to a surprise Gallup poll, allegedly commissioned by no one but the kind editors at Gallup. The poll found that 54% of Americans believe the TSA is doing a good or excellent job, and that 57% have a good or excellent opinion of the agency. So why all the criticism? According to the article, criticism of the TSA comes primarily from 'Internet sites, where reporting standards are generally not at the same level as newspapers, where reporters are taught to consider what is told to them with skepticism and to seek responses to charges.' Furthermore, 'the TSA is put into a difficult situation when such charges are posted with little or no fact checking by reporters.' Other sources, of course, have different interpretations of Gallup's results, including questions about whether the poll was biased. If Americans secretly do love the TSA, that could explain why the recent whitehouse.gov petition failed to gather enough signatures for a 'response.' In fact, you'll find so little information about the petition remains on whitehouse.gov that you'll wonder if my link is correct. And these are not the droids you're looking for. Move along."
Most of the people either don't travel by air, or travel very infrequently. Those of us who are road warriors are vastly more likely to hate the TSA with vehemence.
Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress
> Most Americans think the TSA is doing a 'good job,'
Of course they do. That's the whole point of security theatre:
Security theater: term that describes security countermeasures intended to provide the feeling of improved security while doing little or nothing to actually improve security. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater
Fifty four percent is incredibly bad performance - it's a failure at a high school test.
What if I were to tell you that 55% of Americans think the IRS is doing a good job? It's certainly something I could believe - as the IRS audits less than 1% of Americans each year. Give something to compare it to. Otherwise, this is a puff article designed to make the TSA look good without any evidence WHATSOEVER.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Most Americans think that evolution is controversial, that Algebra is too hard for them, that FOX is informative, and that the Earth revolves around Oprah. Indeed, nothing strange here. Move along.
The article has a significant bias that's expressed in the spin it puts on the result. Data showing 54% of Americans think the TSA does a "good or excellent job" is not "Americans secretly do love the TSA." It could just as accurately be summarized "Nearly half of Americans think TSA is not doing a good job."
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
In other words, people like it when bad things happen to other people but not themselves.
Or the shoe/underwear/toner cartridge bombers could be what they were before 9/11 - crackpots; and the TSA could be using them for the "See? We told you so, terrists - but we're keeping you safe!" publicity value.
"Slippery slope" is a pretty lame argument in the face of grannies in wheelchairs having their colostomy bags searched, and toddlers having their sippy cups taken away, and a thousand other stupid anecdotes we've all heard. The REAL problem with TSA isn't necessarily the screening itself, which could be done pretty inconspicuously, but the sheer ostentation of going through a glacially slow-moving "security" checkpoint run by thugs and bullies.
I think that in people's minds it was more like:
a. they're doing a good job
b. they're not doing a good job so when they see people vote for this option, they will step up their security to even more ridiculous levels
Seriously, I don't think it's outrageous to say that people realistically thought if they voted no, security would get more intrusive
Is it a good thing to do a good job at violating people's privacy? The cashier at walmart at least provides a public service. A TSA agent has no legitimate reason to exist.
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Why have would-be terrorists resorted to increasingly bizarre and ineffective weapons - the shoe bomb, underwear bomb, and chemical cocktail? If they thought they could, obviously they'd just bring some hand grenades, and you can be darn sure those would work every time.
A lot of TSA criticism comes from people who want stringent security for "those people" but not for "us" - meaning white people, grannies, etc. But if you think about it for a few seconds you know where that leads.
Personally I would scale back the TSA and the nekkid scans, but as a value tradeoff, knowing it would come at some cost to security.
And planes were routinely hijacked with "hand grenades" prior to 9/11??? The simple truth is that pre 9/11 security measures were more than adequate to prevent a hijacker from bringing guns or powerful, easy to use explosives on board a plane. What they could do (and did) was bring smallish cutting implements (e.g. box cutters).
The problem with 9/11 wasn't in what the hijackers brought on board, but that they changed the rules of airplane hijacking. Prior to 9/11, if your plane was hijacked, you cooperated. That was the best way to ensure that you would survive.
The 9/11 hijackers changed the rules, but the passengers couldn't know that. On one of the four flight the passengers did learn this, sadly too late to prevent the takeover of the plane, but they did prevent the hijackers from killing more people on the ground.
An attack like 9/11 could only ever work once. Now we have reinforced cockpit doors and passengers will not cooperate with hijackers. Any attempt to hijack a plane, without using firearms at a minimum, will be stopped by the passengers who will assume that the hijackers mean to crash the plane.
All this means that the myriad of additional security nonsense on the ground is almost entirely security theater. Initially, this was mostly a case of ass covering (something needs to be done, this is something, ergo this must be done) but lately (as with the 'porno' scanners) this seems driven by a desire to line the pockets of private enterprise with taxpayer money.
tl;dr It is possible to scale back the TSA without sacrificing actual security.
No, people are INDIFFERENT to bad things happening to strangers far away.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
It's not that they're not doing a "good job"--most interactions with them are fine. It's that they're doing the wrong job.
There are enough horror stories that they get a bad rap, sure. But the bigger point is that they are doing a job that it is stupid for us to be paying for. It inconveniences every traveller in the US and it does not make us significantly safer. Secure the cockpit doors and stop worrying about bombs--if you secure the cockpit doors, all they can do is blow up the plane, and they can blow up a bus so it's a ridiculous waste of money and time to be providing absurd security.
9/11 was (1) an attack that could only work once and (2) about flying the planes. Take away the ability to fly the planes, and the plane is no longer a particularly useful terror target, it's just a target.
Don't get me wrong--I'm happy that there are people working to make terrorist attacks on the US harder. I just don't believe that the TSA is a useful way to spend those resources.
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
With a popularity poll. A significant portion of that 54% of Americans, when read the Bill of Rights, believe you are describing an antithetical, Socialist manifesto.
How can you judge if the TSA is "doing a good job", if you are among the 44% of Americans who are unable to define the Bill of Rights?
I for one DO believe the TSA does a good job. That job is one of eroding fundamental protections of basic rights while enriching cronies.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
I deposited a check recently. The next day, I was surveyed on my banking experience. They wanted to know how helpful the teller was at selling financial products not related to check depositing; whether she smiled, and so on. Each grade less than a 10 was followed up on-- as if her job depended on my unwillingness to cakk her stellar.
It's like ebay--anything less than a five star rating results in financial penalties.
Using that standard, 54% is a flunking grade.
Take a boat.
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I think what you meant to say was:
Homer: Well, there's not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol is sure doing its job.
Lisa: That's specious reasoning, Dad.
Homer: Thank you, sweetie.
Lisa: Dad, what if I were to tell you that this rock keeps away tigers.
Homer: Uh-huh, and how does it work?
Lisa: It doesn't work. It's just a stupid rock.
Homer: I see.
Lisa: But you don't see any tigers around, do you?
Homer: Lisa, I'd like to buy your rock.
Interestingly, younger Americans âoehave significantly more positive opinions of the TSA than those who are older,â Gallup said, noting that 67% of people between 18 and 29 rate the agency as excellent or good.
"And that," put in the Director sententiously, "that is the secret of happiness and virtue - liking what you've got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their inescapable social destiny."
-- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World, Ch. 1
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
A days drive is almost worth it. Unfortunately...
Unless Joe Terrorist steals a business jet somehow, he's not going to kill many people flying a typical Cessna 172 into a sporting event. Sure, it'll be world news and all, but the death toll really won't be very high; terrorists don't want to go to all that trouble just to kill a dozen or two people at the most. Just think about all the effort they have to put into it: they have to go to flight school and learn how to fly the thing in the first place (which is even worse if they try to steal a business jet, as those are much more complicated to fly), then they have to figure out where to steal one from and how, and time it so it happens when a major event is underway, and then avoid being shot down by F16s when the plane is reported stolen and the nearest airbase scrambles their fighters.
It'd much easier for them to just get some assault rifles and go to a mall on black friday and shoot hundreds of people, much like they did in Mumbai, India several years ago. Americans would be terrified of just going to the mall. Honestly, after the enormous success they had in Mumbai, I'm surprised they haven't done this here yet.
Nope. I am not independently wealthy, and I live up to my ideals just fine. You can live a thoroughly fulfilled life without boarding a plane.
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I've got news for you, while you're busy pointing at the evil, evil right wing, the usual suspects you vote for are busy implementing the same or worse.
Time to get over this red-team/blue-team bullshit or you are part of the problem.