There are two things we know about enhanced X-ray screening and full-body pat-downs at TSA check points. The first is that if we abolish them and a terrorist blows up a plane as a result of concealed explosives, Congressional hearings will castigate the TSA for failing to protect the public. The second is that if we keep them, Congressional hearings will castigate the TSA for excessive invasion of privacy in protecting the public.
We learned this "damned if you do-damned if you don't" lesson about government years ago, when media reports of tax cheaters led Congress to demand that the IRS beef up its enforcement through hiring more agents to go after those not paying their fair share. Within a year or so, Congress began getting reports about how the IRS was going after the homes of people who were old or ill or old and ill, and hearings demanded that the IRS improve its customer service.
The same schizophrenic frenzy has turned up in just about every area the government is asked to manage for the protection of the public: food safety (ensure safe food but keep food cheap), oil drilling (protect the environment but keep oil flowing), energy conservation (improve gas mileage but don't put auto companies out of business), mine safety (keep coal cheap but don't let miners die), and public health (stop that pandemic but don't quarantine anyone) -- to cite a few examples.
Government is inherently a matter of trade-offs, in values and policies. Privacy vs. security, protection vs. cost, justice vs. mercy, short-term gains vs. long-term losses (or short-term losses vs. long-term gains), guns vs. butter, taxes vs. debt. Where to draw the line is, in fact, one of the chief functions of government and one of the chief sources of contention in a free society.
Politicians on both sides will use these trade-offs -- and the extremes of government action that usually result until we get the balance right -- for their own benefit, as will the media, interest groups on the right and the left, bloggers, and those who seek their fifteen minutes of fame by recording their encounters with government for our viewing pleasure on YouTube.
This is all as it should be. Were government so constrained as never to push our buttons, and were the public so constrained as to never howl in protest, we would not find the common, sensible ground that is essential for a well-functioning society. What we are watching in the current furor over airport security screenings is democracy at work in the healthy debate of how we manage the trade-offs between two valued ends.
It's worth remembering this as we watch the passionate, sometimes infuriating, often exaggerated, seldom calm, typically one-sided arguments over the coming weeks. If you love America, love this too. It's our vibrant, free society at work. It's a sign of success, not failure. It demonstrates the enduring truth that a society where trade-offs are subject to constant criticism and negotiation is a good society.
Yes, the obvious point that people are pissed about is the whole thing is the overt insensitivity of the TSA.
The underlying point is how this is another thing how our government is invading us
Benjamin Franklin, Printer, Author, Diplomat, Patriot
Besides, this is the Radical Right trying to save some money and privatize this. Don't think for a minute it is anything else, folks.
Actually, no, not unless the pilot opens the cabin door.
But do you truly believe that a tank truck full of propane CAN'T be turned into a dangerous weapon? Or that you can't commit mass murder on BART or Amtrak?
Look at the Madrid railway bombings.
Look at the Dubai massacre. That was on the street.
Airlines - except for Southwest - don't make much money, and even Southwest doesn't make huge amounts. If they turn off one-third of their traffic, what the other two-thirds want won't long matter - because the airlines can't sustain operations on two-thirds of their current customers, they'll go bankrupt (not exactly uncommon in the business anyway. Remember Braniff? TWA? Pan Am?
Current policies have convinced an adequate number of people to 'opt out,' - not just from the x-ray, but from flying altogether. That dooms the policy. The other two-thirds of people now have to decide whether they will fly WITHOUT the (false) assurance that they and their fellow passengers have been groped, or if they won't.
If enough of them say no, then the airlines themselves fold, and we can start groping people on AMTRAK.
I want to see videos of ever member of Congress being groped, X-rayed and generally humiliated by TSA because they are,IMO, more suspect than is Granny from Sioux City.
I can except reasonable security - I'm not offended by stepping through a metal detector before entering a court room or other venues of that nature - but groping my junk ain't on my list of reasonable actions.
Oh yeah, THEY tell you either a toxic scan, or sexual assault wrapped in a thin cloth of *love taps*, oh, I'm a gentle pat down.....
Anyone who believes that his/her constitutional rights have been violated by a TSA grope search can bring an action in federal court against not only the US (under the Federal Tort Claims Act), but also against the TSA groper individually. If enough such actions are brought, that might cause either a change in TSA policy or a change in the agents' conduct. In addition, the District Attorney's offices in at least two California counties where there are large airports have announced that they are willing to prosecute as a sexual battery any clearly inappropriate search conducted by a TSA agent. Only a few such prosecutions should be sufficient to cause the TSA agents themselves to change what they do, regardless of whether the TSA changes its official policy.
I'm about to fly in the near future, and I'm not looking forward to it.
www.sprocketsinside.blogspot.com
Anytime you are off your own private property you are similarly 'in public.' Do you seriously thin you forfeit all right to avoid sexual assault - or even simple search by that status?
You can't truly believe that...?