Politics
Has anyone seen a good article or discussion about how much more secure the new machines and screening procedures will make us, compared to those which have been in force since 9/11, and which compares them to the procedures in place before that?
No one that I've seen is saying that we should go back to the days of no screening of passengers on airplanes. The question is how intrusive the rules should be for all passengers, and how to decide who deserves more scruitny.
We could reduce car crashes if we banned left turns and made the speed limit 5 miles an hour. The question of what is a reasonable regulation in such cases is, in part, a calculus of convenience v safety.
In some instances, our bureaucrats seem to forget that. The new security screening looks like it might be such a case.
Ultiamately, I suspect part of the problem is the delegation of legislative powers. Congress has, in effect, delegated law-making to unelected bureaucrats. In a democratic republic, more decisions should be in the legislative arena than is currently the case. The American people want more say, through our duly elected representatives, in making the rules by which we live.
far more people will die from the heavy dose of radiation the so called body scanners give off than will ever die from so called terrorists attacks. the american people would be far safer with no screening at all. that is, if there is not some sort of difference between being soft killed over time by heavy doses of radiation and sexually assulted by minimum wage goons, or being killed in some sort of terrorist action. there is, of course, the simple matter of profiling people and having common sense about all this....but that won't train the sheeple to be slaves in the land of the free home of the brave. what is the point of this myth of safety when we have to live in an Orwellian police state.
In reality, they are inconveniencing the throng to find and capture perhaps 1 in 10 million fliers. Oh, they are out there, but this is the stupid approach. Israel has the right idea, but I think air marshals are also a good idea. I've also heard that they have a "sniffer" that detects micro particles of explosives, and this is 1) more efficient, 2) cheaper, and 3) far less invasive. Why didn't we adopt that technology rather than the whole-body irradiation nonsense?
Yes--see my long comment in the thread below--balancing is what needs to occur, after the firing of Napolitano and some TSA chiefs, who should have foreseen this debacle.
An air-marshall mid-way in the plane cannot stop an underwear bomber in the front or back.
Robert Gibbs was right when he said that whereas the Israelis have a few airports, we have 450. We cannot afford to do what they do.
So we can't go kill the Arab terrorists in the Middle East and we can't keep Gitmo open and we can't use interrogation methods that work (waterboarding) to find out when there's going to be an attack but that's OK because we're going to have TSA employees groping little old ladies, 7 year old boys and cancer patents with colostomy bags.
Jim Quinn is right. The American people in 2008 elected the enemy.
Okay, Hal (who's possibly an even greater troll here than the legendary Mack Sandpaper), I'm fairly sure this'll be a pointless exercise, but here you go:
- Gitmo remains open, with prisoners and everything.
- The "enemy" that you believe America elected in '08 has expanded the conflict in Afghanistan, Pakistan (and even Yemen). Is the enemy hateful of his own team?
Why don't you go back to your cave Osama? Weve all heard enough of your pro-Arab propaganda.
Hal, thank you ever so much for that enlightening and edifying response!