Originally Posted by
nachtnebel
True, most have been, although celebrated Red Team exceptions (pistols waltzing past hidden in brassieres) have occurred, and Jon Corbett's test indicated that these can be hidden on the sides as well.
The deterrence argument loses a lot of force if you look at the level of expertise required for true threats--explosives. It's not going to be the isolated crazy that comes up with these. The folks who are capable of producing these will go under the wings using ground crew. Or through WTMD with children serving as props. Or probe til they find a bribable TSA clerk, which apparently isn't all that hard. Pick the hole in the sieve, there's many to choose from. Yet we subject the 99.99999999999999% of innocent passenger to wholesale sex organ groping despite the uselessness of it.
If the terrorist were smart, they wouldn't be too afraid of getting someone caught. A near miss would cause as much disruption as a hit.
A "near miss" or even a mythical "hit" or "plot" involving airports and/or on planes served by US airlines causes far more disruption than any actual hit, since September 2001.
The TSA's knee-jerk overreactions and conditioning to respond to everything and nothing at all has resulted in the current idiocy and the kind of apathy that is the handmaiden to inhumanity against others being performed by those in the employ of government.
The TSA doesn't deter much of anything that is a serious treat. The TSA's methods may even be better characterized as the opposite of a deterrent.