Slashdot Mirror
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
how do you prove to potential clients that you can skew every public opinion survey?
release one saying TSA is loved!
> 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
I don't think it requires assuming the poll was biased or that "internet sites" are posting un-vetted charges. A simpler explanation is that, even if the TSA does suck, most Americans either don't know or don't care. In particular, a significant percentage of Americans don't fly regularly, and they tend to support whatever air-security measures some official claims are necessary. To them, something that sounds like security is good, and who cares if someone's inconvenienced, because it's not them anyway. For example, a 2010 poll found that x-ray scanners and new pat-down procedures were more popular among non-fliers:
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
WTF.
It's 'better than average' - It's the Lake Woebegon way.....
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
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.
polls don't reflect, well, anything but the pollster's spin.
"If...you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning" - Catherine Aird
I wonder who paid for this survey? Because I'm sure it'll come out someday.... I started driving everywhere since 9-11 anyway. Saw the writing on the wall, etc. Gonna have to keep up the pressure re TSA, because frankly the TSA makes me feel very unsafe, simply because they even exist in the first place. And guess what, I happen to *live* in NY...
C|N>K
'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.'
I haven't laughed so hard in months. Thank you, PR lackey, for brightening my day.
I accidentally left my sunglasses and jacket in one of those tubs that you put through the scanner last Christmas while rushing to a last minute flight after some genius wearing more chains than Mr. T snarled up the security queue for 30 minutes at a regional airport.
Upon returning a week later and checking in with TSA agents, I found out they had itemized and bagged my stuff and got both back to me in less than 15 minutes.
Not everywhere is Dulles.
And in related news billions of flies around the world prefer shit to honey, but I don't take their preference as a nutritional suggestion.
Pre-911 security would detect hand grenades just fine. And 911 hijackers used freaking boxcutters, not guns or grenades.
And I have a boxcutter, scissors and a screwdriver in my backpack right now. They are never detected by airport's scanners because my backpack has a nice carbon plastic compartment that reduces the contrast of items within it. I've been flying with them for several years through tens of TSA theater checkpoints by now. So I'm "better armed" than a 9/11 hijacker all without trying to do it specifically.
That's good or excellent job. It'd be like 54% of a class getting an A or B. Of course, if the other 46% gets an F, then it's bad. However, if the other 46% is C's, then it's pretty decent.
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
If they didn't screen for people who actually have flown commercially since 9/11, then they got a lot of ignorant people without any experience to base their opinion
If they didn't screen for people who had flown commercially before 9/11 and then had flown after 9/11, they got a lot of people without the experience of what it used to be like vs what it is like now
>> Poll Finds Americans Think the TSA Is 'Doing a Good Job'
I suspect they mean pole.
Why is it, if a poll shows an approval of over 50%, the media takes that to be overwhelming support? Taking into account that many polls are biased to provide the answer they are looking for, a narrow margin is not really something that major decisions should hinge upon.
Brought to you by: "Al"toids - the curiously weird mint.
The petition failed to gain enough signatures because everyone knows that they won't get a real response from the administration. Case in point, there was a petition that got 75,000 signatures (3 times the threshold) where the President was asked to explain why Cannabis should not be regulated by alcohol. The response was written by the Drug Czar, and failed to mention alcohol once.
This was the great hope for change we elected in 2008. This was what was supposed to be the most transparent administration in history. And he can't even answer a simple question about his policies honestly.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Oh shit, Time Cube Guy's into computers now...
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Look at the comments below any newspaper article criticising the TSA. Filled with comments along the lines of "Stop whining about security, I don't care if I have to strip nekkid, as long as the evil ragheads don't blow up my airplane". No concept of relative cost vs risk, no realisation of the fact that this is all theatre, no understanding of the loss of liberties involved. Even the previous head of the TSA (Kip Hawley) by now says that most of the scanners etc are useless, but Joe Sixpack, he reckons the security will keep him alive.
I wonder who at the TSA asked Gallup to do the poll. It's completely biased. Adding the word "job" makes the question very personal. I would describe the person who checks me out of the grocery store as "doing a good job", but if I later found out that it added 50% to my food cost, I'd think that I'd be better off without them and that the self checkout lane was fine. The biggest argument isn't about how the indivduals do their job at the TSA, or if the agency is good or bad. It's whether or not the TSA is effective or worth the cost.
Let's see the result of this poll.
Do you think that the TSA has been worth the $60,000,000,000 we have spent on it?
Or how about:
Do you think that it is fair that in this economy, 4000 people at the TSA headquarters make an average salary of $103,000?
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 actually hadn't been to the US in the last couple of years, and reading about the whole new set of scanners, privacy violations, draconian attitude by the TSA, and some scandals, I actually was concerned about what the experience would be for myself and my family.
I have to admit, it was not a big deal. Flying from Toronto was painless and we went through the usual metal detectors there. The staff (usually grumpy Canadians working on behalf of the US) was okay. I found the Americans at Pearson airport tend to be quite friendly and professional. They represent the US well.
Flying out of the US (a SW Florida airport) was a breeze and fairly pleasant. I had to submit to one of the scanners, and my family went through the metal detector only as we have young children. The TSA staff was very friendly and quite accomodating. We even had one incident where my wife had left a water bottle full of liquid in her purse. They were nice about it, chatted with us and then ran it through the X-Ray again.
So it sounds that many of the complaints and scandals have forced the TSA to make changes. There's still a lot of security theatre in place and I think 9/11 will leave us with that forever unfortunately.
All in all, I'd say that the American airport security and customs staff were friendlier and more competent than their Canadian counterparts.
Of course I'm generalizing and being Caucasian, I'm sure my experience may differ from other folks.
I would like to see some evidence that the TSA is doing a horrible job and that the people who think otherwise are obviously deluded fools as the summary suggests.
Not saying that it's not, but I'm just a little bit suspicious that such hostility towards the TSA comes from the anecdotal evidence of few unnecessary searches of grannies and such and personal experiences of relatively minor inconvenience and not from a thorough and impartial analysis of the security procedures based on deep knowledge of what it takes to secure airports.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
How do you figure that?
I think that what a lot of the slashdot crowd forgets is that the reason all these things we hate go on is because the public in general is ok with them. We care about these issues and are baffled by the fact that others don't.. but they care about stuff we don't. If everyone _really_ hated the TSA, or was upset about the ongoing errosion of privacy, or patent insanity, or IP nonsense.. it would be stopped immediately. Truth is there is only a small group that care about these things.. we just perceive it as a huge thing because we hear about it constantly in our chosen circles.
A lot of what the TSA does is not designed for security, but to provide the illusion of it. We get this. The illusion however is effective to those who either don't get it or don't care.
This isn't just specific to us either. It happens in most areas. I'm sure there are groups who feel passionately about other things that we really should be paying attention to but could give a shit about. That's just the way this stuff works.
At the very minimum, we have to accept that we represent a minority opinion on issues such as privacy and security.. and move from there. Assuming the public would be outraged and fall in behind us if we could only explain it to them correctly is not gonna get us anywhere.
I always love how its the "internet's" fault when there is criticism. The complaints aren't valid or worth consideration because the internet is just a wild uncontrolled forum where anything can be said. Unless it comes from the god of a journalist it doesn't count. Right.
I've always said English was my second language. Had Romeo and Juliet been written in C, I might have understood it.
I don't know a single person out of my entire family, friends or co-workers who think the TSA does a good job. There is something seriously wrong with this poll.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
Yesterday's article showed how it's done: Poll printed in Baskerville font!
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.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Can you contact us at TSA?
We would like to discuss the possible acquisition of your rock.
We'd also like to know about possibility of mass production of aforementioned terrorist-repellent devices to secure all transport terminals once and for all.
Roast beef sandwiches: the NEW national security threat!
...how clueless most americans are.
Some of us would like to see friends on other continents from time to time.
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
It's ironic that almost the exact same percentage of Americans sponge off, uh, work for the government or are paid as a contractor or supplier to the government.
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.
If they are doing such a good job, then how did a man named Adam Savage manage to board the plane with a 12in blade...Accidentally - not even trying to hide it!
The inconsistency of their agents has to be the most annoying thing. In Dallas a few weeks ago they were uniformly polite and efficient. In Oklahoma City they tend to be pretty good as well. In Charlotte they like to pretend they are Gestapo agents and in In Fort Lauderdale they are crass and unobservant (had a new bottle of gel toothpaste in my carry-on that went unnoticed because they were too busy bitching about the phone charger and camera clumped together) in smaller airports they tend to fumble around a lot. I flew out of Washington National a few years ago with my 8 inch dive knife in my carry-on (by accident.)
I think TSA satisfaction would increase if the airlines hadn't turned the security checkpoint into a baggage checkpoint. The volume of luggage going through the system slows everything down and creates more hassle, which is communicated to the passengers. Flying is no longer a luxury in most cases, it's a necessity. As such the airlines really don't care about providing customer service, they only try to avoid liability. This touches everyone who participates in the system.
Former Inmate, VA Linux Sanitarium
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120405/04390118385/tsa-security-theater-described-one-simple-infographic.shtml
You are assuming that democracy is functioning for us. If we have no real choice on th e matter, then an option can be unpopular but still remain. Even them, there it's skewing for demographics with higher turnout.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
You think that they are doing a good job? Many people beg to differ:
Adam Savage from Mythbusters: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqoiifBZD4E
Chidren in Wheelchairs: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNO-AzPxS4U
Molested Women: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwvcpS5iLjI
Lactating Mothers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwvcpS5iLjI
Drug Dealers: http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/26/news/la-trb-tsa-drugs-20120426
TSA Agents: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgZZeBpZAnM
The TSA Itself: http://articles.cnn.com/2008-01-28/us/tsa.bombtest_1_airport-screeners-airport-security-fake-bombs?_s=PM:US
Exactly how many "Shoe Bombers", "Underwear Bombers","Chemical Terrorists", and "TSA Screeners" have they caught?
half of americans do NOT think the TSA is doing a good job
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.
I'd be very interested to see a breakdown in these poll results by age. I would not be at all surprised to see younger, more Internet-connected respondents have a more negative view of the TSA, while the Fox News generation (average viewer age 65, average age for Bill O'Reilly viewers 71) tends toward a more positive view. We see the same thing with numerous other issues where pretty much everyone on sites like Slashdot agrees, but the actual politics seem to be lagging behind. For instance, 50% of Americans now favor legalizing marijuana according to recent Gallup Polls, but while 62% of people in the 18-29 age bracket are in favor, only 31% of senior citizens do. And those seniors vote at a MUCH higher rate than young people. This is why issues relevant to old people are discussed endlessly, while issues important to the young are simply ignored. It's why college funding keeps getting cut every year while Medicare and Social Security remain untouchable.
Get out there and vote this November! Even if it's just for the lesser of two evils, vote anyway. The only way this imbalance will be fixed is if young people start voting at the same rate as older Americans.
generally not at the same level as newspapers, where reporters are taught to consider what is told to them with skepticism
Bah ha ha ha ha ha! Good one!
The TSA is doing such a good job that they've also prevented hijackings and bombings in South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and Antarctica.
Any service agency that gets a ~50% approval should be looking to improve or disband. That level of satisfaction is poor! If you are a seller on eBay with a 97% rating, that is considered pretty bad. I think the IRS would not be pleased if I paid my taxes 54% of the time.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
there are many competing models of evolution, there is much controversy about it among real scientists about mechanisms, species relationships, rate, etc.
In science, evolution is a controversial topic. so is the Standard Model, in physics. Even the real composition of water, in Chemistry (very interesting ion configurations of the hydrogen and oxygen are still be discovered and evidence for some debated.)
> I've been flying with them for several years through tens of TSA theater checkpoints by now.
What the flying fuck. I'm gonna need one of those for my bottled water then.
In a recent Schneier article titled Court Orders TSA to Answer EPIC a menacing comment was left by what claimed to be 'Blogger Bob' from the TSA's blog. It may be and likely enough is a dupe, but seemed terribly appropriate for the TSA. I have pasted it below for your reading pleasure:
"I've been asked to respond to this post in order to clarify misunderstandings that some people may have.
The TSA properly exempted itself from the requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act and the Sunshine Act. The TSA granted itself the exemption for valid reasons that must remain classified for National Security reasons, so you'll have to trust us on that.
The TSA also had a valid grounds for respectfully refusing to comply with both court orders. The reasons are also classified for National Security reasons, so again you'll have to trust us the refusal was appropriate and necessary. But I can tell you that the decision was based on thorough analysis of the latest robust intelligence pertaining to the current threat environment.
In both cases, TSA Counsel determined that any form of notice and comment rulemaking regarding the deployment of AIT would be detrimental to National Security, based on the classified determinations I referenced above. TSA Counsel prepared a classified memorandum exempting the agency from notice and comment requirements. TSA Counsel believes that the National Security determinations set forth in the classified memorandum give the TSA full authority to disregard any court orders requiring notice and comment rulemaking.
You are, of course, free to sign the petition. But it will have no more effect than the lawsuit or the court order. And do be aware that pursuant to classified TSA procedures, any names on the petition will be forwarded to the Terrorist Screening Center for possible inclusion on appropriate watch lists.
Thank you for allowing me to address your concerns about this matter."
Posted by: Blogger Bob at August 2, 2012 6:39 PM
Perhaps the poll was conducted with a stick. But then again, we are a libidinous culture.
Forward! -- Emperor Norton, 2012
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.
You seem to be more focused on the individuals who work for the TSA, as opposed to most of Slashdot who are concerned with the rule makers who run it. The who pretends to thoughfully compare your face to your ID prior to granting you access to the scanners, didn't invent that job for himself. Nor did the guy who stares at the backscatter monitor. The people who invented those jobs catch most of the grief because neither actually makes your flight safer.
But if you want to focus on the ground level employees, every single one of them performs his job on an at will basis. If he found the work too ridiculous or too objected to its intrusiveness he could quit it at any time. So I have little concern for them as they choose to do pointless work that doesn't add any value to anything. While they may not be as guilty as those who organized the whole thing, they still share culpability. If a TSA memo instructed them to knock passengers in their heads with a hammer and stack them on the planes like cord wood, for safety's sake, I have no reason to believe they wouldn't all do it.
The Editors at Gallup are pretty obvious in their authoritarian leanings when you listen to interviews. Their polls are likely good science, but their interpretations should almost always be ignored (unless you're authoritarian yourself). You can easily read the bias out of the comments here:
I admit that I can't tell who said that from the writeup, but I'm assuming it was gallup. Does anyone think that reporters actually do any fact checking anymore? Like at all? On the other hand, if you hit Bruce Schneier's site (or many others), you'll find actual experts telling you that the TSA is pretty much worthless and a giant waste of money.
It's ok, I figured it out though: The TSA is actually a jobs program. In a world where socialism is a curse word, the TSA is a surprisingly effective jobs program for a segment of society with no critical thinking skills or meaningful education. Neeners.
Imagine if you weren't allowed to use roads because a bus company complained about your driving 3 times. --skunkpussy
I don't think that too many are complaining about how well the TSA agents are performing what they've been told to do, I think everyone is complaining about what they're being told to do. If the purpose of the TSA is to make air travel safer, do you feel it is accomplishing that? Do you think it is accomplishing that efficiently or effectively? Do you think it is being done at an irrevocable cost of our freedoms and human dignity?
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..."
Why have would-be terrorists resorted to increasingly bizarre and ineffective weapons - the shoe bomb, underwear bomb, and chemical cocktail?>
And none of those were caught by the TSA. They were caught by civilians.
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
Too much ambiguity introduced by the target audience and types of questions asked.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Have gnu, will travel.
You are so right. The 9/11 hijackers did change the rules, and now the flying public knows: don't co-operate. Of course meanwhile, the cop-types started using "Hey, it's a different world" as their excuse for whatever curtailment of rights or legal corner-cutting they had in mind. And while it is technically possible to scale back the TSA without sacrificing actual security, the fact is anybody who even suggests it will be crucified by the Right as being "Soft on Communism^WTerrorism".
welcome to the no-fly-list
I do not belive "54% of Americans" have any significant experience with airline travel and are thus in no position to evaluate the TSA. Also, most people are stupid, but that doesn't make them correct.
In addition, once on board an aircraft, a reasonably creative terrorist could fairly easily improvise deadly weapons from materials readily available on the plane - any flat and thin piece of metal, even some varieties of plastic, any large blunt object such as a hard-shell suitcase, or of course well-trained hands and feet. There are 2 things that actually have made a difference: First is that they can't get into the cockpit through the reinforced door, and the second is that the doctrine for hijackings has changed to recommend that passengers and crew fight hijackers.
I am officially gone from
Do you think the TSA is:
a) Doing an excellent job
b) I wish to be put on a "no fly" list
c) I request to be strip "searched" by Manny.
d) I invite the FBI visit my house.
e) b, c, and d.
The job of the TSA is to acclimate you to your future in a police state.
What's so fascinating about this, is that it not only attempts to inculcate into people's minds that TSA = good job (with a D- mark of 54%), but also any critique of TSA come only from internet websites with questionable reputation, mostly driven by conspiracy nuts is the logical conclusion.
The TSA does a good job AT WHAT?
Pollseter: "Do you think the TSA does a good job raping people's rights?"
Gomer Pyle: "Why yes ah do!"
Pollseter: "TSA does a good job...."
Seriously, does anyone believe these polls? I haven't talked to a SINGLE person who thinks the TSA is anything but bloated and useless.
I think they made this poll up, personally, and it's also statistics. I suspect either the poll is rigged or they're lying/twisting the truth....
-
with thunderous applause. Wait, did I just quote one of the three prequels? I am ashamed...but slightly less ashamed than the people who think the TSA is doing an excellent job should be.
I only JUST started flying in August of last year. Flying was never an option growing up, but I'm a career where I'm sent to various places of the country a few times a year.
I've been through SNA, LAX, DFW, SAV, ORD, SFO, OAK, and DCA. I've had a pocket patted once and had the full search because I forgot a flash drive in a leg pocket in my cargo shorts. In both circumstances, I made light of the situation joked profusely with the investigating TSA agent, and went on my way with a smile.
Does that mean I like it? No. Would I prefer not being approached by two men with the assumption that I'm a criminal or terrorist? Yes. (But I do have experience growing up brown in Southern California.)
However, I understand that those "TSA Agents" are literally just local people with no particularly strong commitment to the TSA beyond doing their job sufficiently well so that they keep their jobs. The vast majority of them are just normal people doing the same tedious task over and over, not the jack-booted thugs many make them out to be.
Summary: The workers are just fine. The process seems unnecessary.
apparently 54% of Americans are below average intelligence.
fascinating...
OK, so if we parse this correctly, it more likely means 54% of Americans are dumber than a box of rocks.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
And in related news, a Gallop poll found 54% of people have never been in an airport before.
WTF did I just read?
...that you and your close friends and family are far more enlightened about reality than the average sheep (oh, sorry... I mean citizen).
I'm making that assumption partially based on your tagline. After all, Ron Paul is *so* darn popular, his own political party won't give him any speaking time at their convention in Tampa, FL! (Oh, they're letting his son, Rand, talk a little bit as a concession, mind you. But as most of us know who follow politics in any serious way, Rand's politics does NOT line up too neatly with Ron's.)
Last time I checked a 54 grade is a failed one and means almost half of the users dont like the job they are doing. Most americans don't travel, the ones who do use cars or buses mostly so when they do use an airplane they dont have a comparision point.
Can I have some of what you're on?
Who are famous for framing their questions so as to get the answers that please the faux news crowd. Well, the day just got more depressing.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
is doing a good job of keeping tigers away. you don't see any tigers around do you?
54% of Americans don't fly.
That's how I read it.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Is there a problem? I mean, hey, if nobody's gonna resist, fuck it. Off to the tropics for me.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Welcome, Comrades!, Welcome to the Glorious Union of Soviet Corporatist Republics!
No way, I refuse to fly because of the crap they pull. If they go to train stations, bus stations and even ships then I guess I wont be traveling anywhere except once. And that is away from america.
Yeah, that's pretty much it. The poll is polluted by non-traveling mouth-breathers.
Consider that only 1/3 of Americans hold valid passports. I'd guess that the percentage that flies more at least once a year is around the same, perhaps less.
Which means that the non-travelers are just fine with whatever tactics that the TSA uses.
That's great, I guess we should re-purpose them as LFA (Lost and Found Administration) agents. They could reduce passenger losses by billions and actually serve a purpose to the taxpayer!
A better indicator would be weighted for the frequency a respondent has been subjected to TSA procedures:
...and so on. Mind you, I am no statistician and I'm sure someone could devise a better spread with a better understanding of the demands of this kind of survey.
I have traveled by airline X times since 2009:
0 times = score 1.00
1 time = score 1.25
2 times = score 1.50
3 times = score 2.00
4 times = score 2.50
5 times = score 3.25
As someone who travels via airline +/- 10 times per year I can say that I have had the unpleasant experience of having to be patted down because I refuse to be subjected to as-of-yet questionable and unnecessary amounts of radiation. If the jury's still out on the scanner, I'll be opting out.
I do fully understand that this wasn't the intention of the study and wouldn't you know, it's an outcome that reinforces the status quo and besmirches dissent. I can see this being a headline in USA Today or some other brain-dead rag.
If someone has no frame of reference on a particular matter, why should their opinion be validated? For instance, would my opinion about legislation involved in animal husbandry regulations be considered worth anything? As someone who's never been involved in the insemination of livestock I can say, without hesitation, the answer is a resounding "No."
The enemy of my enemy is quite possibly also my enemy. I've made a lot of enemies.
Propaganda, supporting the unsupportable, an editor orders one of his copywriters to create news that casts the government is a "good" light!
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
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.
Bullocks. Newspapers by and large are either liberal moonbat (Boston Globe, NYT, etc) or Neocon (Boston Herald) propaganda, with little regard shown to the truth of the matter. There are a few exceptions here and there which remain mostly objective (Wall Street Journal) without turning every story into op-eds or taking quotes out of context but the objective newspapers are few and far between.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Interesting though though. Perhaps the survey was phrased with the focus on individual performance to place the TSA as a whole in a better light. Certainly when I have flown, I have been groped/assaulted in a professional and friendly manner.
If a corporate-controlled 'news' group is telling us that being sexually groped by our own government is both effective *and* welcome, who are we to question?
My guess most of the people they asked are people too fat to get out of their trailer let alone fly so why ask them?
Terrorist!
I am John Hurt.
The airport is being used as a detention center, gives more time to check up on everybody.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Perhaps they don't want to GPL security
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
If shoe bombs are ineffective, why do I have to specifically take my shoes off and put them through the scanners at the airport before I'm allowed in the terminal? Sounds like somebody thinks a shoe bomb would be effective enough to cause a problem...
The TSA is *exactly* like the FBI was characterised in the first Die Hard movie: brain-dead, by the book reactionaries that do exactly what the bad guys need done. In the case of the TSA, they have been crucial in conducting bin Laden's long-term goal of turning the US into a police state. Based on his early life exposure and his Soviet-era collusions with the CIA, he understood that the most likely US reaction to a terrorist threat would be justification of dictatorial powers for the gain of personal power and profits by those in both public and private sectors (if there is still a difference).
Mission Accomplished, indeed.
A marriage is always made up of two people who are prepared to swear that only the other one snores.
The article poster laments that the petition he referred to had vanished off the petition site.
So... do something about that, why don't you?
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/improve-transparency-online-petition-system/VmVB9XC2
Yes, I realize the irony in even hoping a petition to change the petition system would receive any attention at all. But as I don't have the ear of the website developer, this is what I can do from my armchair.
Sure, it is almost certain to fail. But it has a measurably - if still small - better chance of success than whinging at the screen where nobody can hear me.
They weren't caught by anybody; they actually tried to trigger their devices, which were not effective. But if the defense is good enough to prevent an effective attack, that is the goal.
approve of torturing those that do. Only about 1/3 of Americans fly each year. Many of the people who "approve" of the TSA don't deal with them.
Fugue for Aaron Swartz
Do I think the TSA is doing a good job of performing the duties it has been mandated to ? Yes. Overall, agents have been polite and professional, when refusing to enter the irradiator, I have been treated with courtesy, and groped according to established procedures.
Do I think the TSA mandate and procedure make any sense ? Hell no. The security circus serve little to no purpose, and being groped to be able to travel should not happen in a democratic country. This is not the fault of TSA employees, this is the fault of the political body that invented that bloated, expensive and useless administrative behemoth.
...criticism of the TSA comes primarily from 'Internet sites, where reporting standards are generally not at the same level as newspapers, where reporters are bought to publish what is told to them...
People may think they're doing a good job.
But anyone with actual counter-terrorism and combat demolitions experience knows that TSA screening is a farce and not just a waste of time but an anti-competitive non-productive nuisance.
People also thought the world was flat. Some still do, sadly. Some people think Jesus rode dinosaurs.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
You friend Ivan Jackenoff needs a word with you. He says that's his money and he wants it. Come up with something different, paleeese
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.
Correction, the best way that you individually survived, and also guaranteed that further hijackings would continue. The list is impressive, notably that Israel seems to get attention about once per decade. The last successful attempt was in 1958, but the 'terrorists' keep trying. I parenthesized terrorists because the one in 2000, for instance, was a rather disturbed individual that needed psychiatric help, and not someone working towards an agenda or terror. As has been said before, Israel has a model that is worth emulating, and is very different from the US's.
Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
The TSA is doing a good job of keeping me from flying. Why would I want to subject myself to such searches? Amazingly, people still get things on aircraft. Enough with the TSA already... trust me, the passengers will take care of business if there is a problem. Just like they did with the underwear bomber and the shoe bomber.
Funny how the Slashdot hivemind is on the wrong side of the discussion yet again, although as usual they were so entirely convinced of their correctness.
On a totally unrelated note, although related to the mass population: Poll finds that 54% of Americans believe that Iraq had WMDs Poll finds that 54% of Americans believe we are defending our country by being thousands of miles away in Afghanistan Poll finds that 54% of Americans believe the hijackers were from Iraq / Afghanistan Poll finds that 54% of Americans believe they actually vote for the president of the US Of course these numbers are made up, but you get the point...
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Well, I also hardly ever get porno groped anymore. But that's probably because I lack confidence and look too needy when I go through Security, it's just like the bars in college...
If terrorists wanted to do some real damage, they'd park on Hawthorn Street and use a shoulder fired missile to dump a 767 into downtown San Diego. The reason the don't is that there is some very real and very good security that works to prevent that. TSA on the other hand, is neither very real nor very good.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
The second part of the poll indicates that at least 50% of my fellow countrymen surveyed in the first poll are brain dead morons (with a margin of error of +4%).
Shut up brain or I'll stab you with a Q-Tip. - Homer Simpson
It doesn't matter if people feel good about the TSA; what matters is whether the agency if effective. Even the statistic about the TSA's perceived effectiveness doesn't help either way. The only reason to present the result of the survey is to imply that the TSA is doing a good job, which is a false conclusion. It's like implying that my magic pencil prevents tiger attacks because I haven't been attacked by a tiger lately.
Always someone has power over you. The thing to consider is this: Is the power good, or bad?
The definition of a Conservative used to be "a Liberal who's been mugged". Now is it "a Liberal who's been groped"?
Since when was a 54% approval rating in an industry considered "good"?
...and you're a communist taking their FREEDOM! And try regulating pollutants in the air they breath....
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
To have an opinion of the TSA one must actually travel. As Walmart pays 7.75 an hour and the average American wage is 35k, MANY people seldom travel and may never travel. People with 0 TSA experience have no reason to not like the TSA.
Not liking the TSA is more of an "elite" issue.
There is no way Chocolate rations are That up. Call me a skeptic or optimist, or Ishmal, but americans are not that stu.... nevermind.
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 [...]
I've identified your problem: You're using a profit-driven bank instead of a member-driven credit union.
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
In other news, only 46% of Americans ever fly.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The TSA requires little or no background check on new hires. It is an idea job for gropers, pedophiles, thugs & thieves. Several FBI drug busts have jailed TSA agents that were bought-off. Many of the FBI tests on TSA security have failed! The TSA has no record of ever detecting a terrorist. ABOLISH THE TSA NOW BEFORE THEY UNIONIZE...!
Don't you think...? Or don't you?
Actually, no. If you read the article (I know, this is /. but this is something that will almost certainly be in the poll data...), there isn't much of a difference in perception between frequent fliers and non-fliers. Of course, this is all just perception, nothing to do with the actual effectiveness of the TSA...
"I was just doing my job." -- Some guy who bagged onions in the same bag as bananas to the customer's dismay.
That's right... that's an un-Godwin. Your move, Captain hyperbole.