I appreciate your response. I don’t know how to parse your post to insert quotes so I’ll do my best to respond. You say that “I do agree that the TSA is a terrible form of security. They’ve hired tens of thousands of people who would most likely never get hired as a peace officer” and then assume that they dealt with my family in the proper manner. That’s a bad assumption. Even worse, it’s an indictment of the TSA.
As I said. What this means is they have to have very rigid rules in place and not allow any free thinking. Everyone operates the same from the same playbook. If they allow this person to be an exception, then they would have to allow that person an exception. Soon everyone is an exception. Sadly some A-hole people in the world use kids as their means to and end. So kids can’t be an exception to the rules.
Again, as I’ve stated above…the argument of “standard operating procedure” doesn’t work for me. SOP has changed multiple times for the TSA. Just because it’s SOP doesn’t make it right. If the TSA isn’t constantly evaluating it’s SOPs then that’s a massive problem in itself. If people don’t stand up for what’s right, then nothing will change. Andy, just curious…are your police department’s procedures routinely evaluated? Are they changed if it’s found there is a better way to do things? I suspect they are…if not, you should be concerned.
I don’t work there, but from speaking with two that have in the past the TSA was constantly re-evaluation things as they periodically changed their procedures. Despite what most people think, Gov’t agencies like this are constantly changing and evaluation what they do.
Again, they’re not a perfect organization, no organization is. But for 99.9% of those who deal with them there are no issues. In 2014 that was 1.8 million people per day!
We seem to have settled for bad security rather than effective security. And while Andy may think I hate anything governmental (interesting given my actual politics), no one including me ever said no TSA or no security procedures. The discovery of a large number of guns is not really any great sign of effectiveness but does say a lot about the number of Americans who think they must travel armed at all times. For example, the TSA itself said - in a press release:
In total, 2,653 firearms were > discovered in carry-on bags > at checkpoints across the country, averaging more than seven firearms per day, approximately a 20 percent increase in firearm discoveries from the total of 2,212 in 2014.
An old buddy of mine, maritime attorney out of NOLA, was the first American post 9/11 to get arrested for a having a loaded gun in his carry-on. He made it with the weapon out of Louis Armstrong no problem October, 2011; landing in Salt Lake City to check on security arrangements of a home he had rented for the upcoming 2002 Winter Olympics. Always a balla he rented some palace and stayed for a few days of Hunter and Ralph-type partying, until he was assured he could bring his family and kids safely to always dangerous SLC! Getting back on the plane he was tackled by Utah TSA folks for the loaded weapon. They seemed incredulous when my buddy told the TSA he couldn’t possible remember which of his hundred or so weapons were in which pieces of luggage! He was asked about the weapon being loaded and in truly New Orleans fashion told TSA personnel a gun is no real use unless it is loaded!
Took him 2 years to get the weapon returned but he got it back. Never paid any fine and just had to deal with another plane ticket after being released to return to LA.
That would scare the hell out of me. TSA may have some problems but the security in some airports was horrible before it. I never felt safe with security in San Jose until TSA. They could have done better hiring the guys standing out by Home Depot.
I believe that over time, TSA will improve and will be provided with better tools. I flew to Myrtle Beach this year, “TSA PRE” and breezed through, while my travel partner spent 30 minutes getting through the long line. On the way back, my ticket wasn’t TSA Pre and guess what, I set off something and got a pat down. The pat down was not as thorough as I would have expected, but was done professionally and they only can be done with a certain amount of professionalism and still be thorough.
I was always extra thorough searching people I arrested. It’s real embarrassing when the jailer’s search comes up with dope, knives or guns. I expect TSA to be as thorough.
If the US was experiencing the problems Europe and the Middle East are, we would probably be more tolerant. Israel has taken their security to higher levels for years and refined it so it’s not so noticeable to the casual or regular traveler, something that will probably occur in the US if terrorist acts rise to the levels of Europe and the Middle East. Complacency is the door of opportunity for those who wish to do you harm.
Randy, the quoted part of your post above struck me. The TSA was created in November of 2001…so basically they’ve had 15 years to become competent at what most think is a critical function. Yet airports around the country are firing the TSA. Sounds like it’s heading in the wrong direction to me. If more of the flying public spoke up this would change much quicker. A quick google search of the term “is the TSA effective” generated an incredible amount of hits…I liked these two.
Almost 15 years in existence. I can’t think of any job that would allow an employee 15 years to become competent at their job. Is this acceptable? An argument could be made that the TSA is one of the country’s biggest failures especially at the cost of $7+ billion per year.
I suspect that’s because it was the airport running security. And of course I assume this was before 2001.
Another way to look at it: would you prefer that a government agency managed the maintenance of an airline’s aircraft? Supplied the airport food and other services? Why is it that we think the government can do a better job in this one instance (TSA) but not all the other functions and services? Frankly, I think the airlines would have a huge incentive to a) get security right, and b) make it efficient. They are in the business of attracting passengers, getting them on/off planes, and selling themselves to customers. TSA is not interested in any of those things. And the airlines have an even greater incentive than does TSA in keeping their planes safe.
Airlines do a very good job with maintenance and safety but the rest of what they do we mostly complain about.
Anyway, how would you implement per-airline security? Airports (in the US, anyway) are built as shared spaces and depend on the concourses being secure. If you have the airports manage security, then go back to my original point - yes, I trust the government far more than the airport.
my pat down in dubai was probably the freshest anyone’s gotten with me in awhile This was after going past initial security check & passport check. Then an additional security check at the gate. Then finally I was “randomly” selected to go into a room and get checked.
That’s a good point, but it’s also a case of “you get what you pay for”. People want cheap tickets, so they will settle for tiny bags of peanuts.
Anyway, how would you implement per-airline security? Airports (in the US, anyway) are built as shared spaces and depend on the concourses being secure. If you have the airports manage security, then go back to my original point - yes, I trust the government far more than the airport.
Also a good question, I didn’t say I have all the answers, just that a contracted government service is the least likely to be efficient and responsive to the market - they literally don’t have a market, they are completely insulated from their “customers”, and there is zero recourse for a customer when something is unsatisfactory. That’s a recipe for terrible service, in any industry.
I’d look at a public/private partnership, where airlines have a stake, input, and personnel involved in the process, but there is final oversight by TSA. Most larger airports where this is a real issue have multiple terminals and/or security checkpoints that are more or less dedicated to particular airlines, or 2-3 at most. All of the terminals I commonly fly out of or through are like that. You’d probably end up with airlines going to specialty contractors that would handle their security anyway. It would end up much like it is now, except instead of being paid by the Federal government, the airlines would pay - and have an interest in making things work well, because it would become a component of the airline’s overall service.
Can’t remember if I mentioned here an observation from a recent trip: I was in a security line, medium long, with a single Xray unit in service out of about 4 they had available. I was in the priority line, so it didn’t affect me that much, but the line was pretty long overall. As I was close to the front, there were at least 5 agents standing around in a huddle, literally doing nothing. I don’t know why, but I overheard them wondering why more Xray lines weren’t open. Something is wrong when an operation is so rigid that it can’t respond to the situation in real time.
Mike … yesterday flying out of DFW, I had the same experience as your daughter - went through the rapescan, had my bag run through twice, bag physically searched, initial pat down of my leg (recently I always get this on my right side - no clue what they think they see there!) then full on intimate pat down. I had hours until my flight and I’ve dealt with it before so it wasn’t too annoying except for the absolute stupidity of the whole process - but I was lucky in that the TSA woman was very concerned and tried to be as polite and pleasant as possible - made all the difference. She was courteous, explained carefully what she was going to do and apologized for having to do it. I suspect she would have put your daughter much more at ease than the experience she had.
Did you not read either of the links I posted a couple of posts up thread? Said that TSA failed to detect fake explosives and guns in 95% of tests run recently. Security experts basically say that TSA would have done better just using dumb luck. Read the links and tell me how well TSA is doing their jobs.
Yes, I read them. My point is that by the most obvious and important measure, we had attacks before and we haven’t since. So the authors lose me when they conclude that “all we need is pre-9/11 security.” I remember pre-9/11 security as a bunch of people who didn’t require any testing to be recognized as incompetent.
If the 95% statistic means that they were able to pass 95% of the illegal things through, it’s indeed alarmingly bad, but none of the stories I’ve found explain it. My reading was “we had some set of procedures and criteria for each place/time we tested, and 67 of 70 times the criteria were not met.” In that case it’s still bad, but you have to know what the tests and criteria were to know what it actually means.
A bit of follow up. My local assemblyman got back to me and told me that the TSA had conducted an investigation and found no wrongdoing. Of course the TSA investigator never contacted me…
My senator’s office got back to me a day later and said they haven’t heard anything back from the TSA.
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This was after going past initial security check & passport check. Then an additional security check at the gate. Then finally I was “randomly” selected to go into a room and get checked.