cparekh

Keeps us safer how? Can somebody please explain the causal mechanism for ID checks making us safer?

I think the phrase you are looking for is post hoc ergo propter hoc.

InkUnderNails

I think that the airlines should issue a single shot drop action gun to every passenger as they enter the plane, at least those that wanted them. All of them would be loaded, but only 10% would have firing pins. None of them would have the ability to be opened to check for a firing pin.

If anyone, or even a group of 6, tried to take over the plane there would be 130 guns pointed back. 13 would be functional and ready to fire. As for those taking over, if it were 5, only a 50% chance one of their guns would be functional.

That is not sarcasm.

That is nonsensism.

Pesky Monkey

Even at TLV checking for ID has never saved a life.

javabytes

You lose me when you try to make the link between fingerprinting everybody and 100% guaranteed safety. I think you lost yourself there too... the part where you say "I'm not sure what good it does" and then somehow this contributes to a "100% guarantee of safety" in the next sentence. Because people who were fingerprinted before and who have a clean record can't become terrorists?

FlyingHoustonian

Let me help everyone who didn't fully grasp the nature of his proposal:
Step 1: Go to computer and open web-browser
Step 2: Type in google.com in address bar
Step 3: type in "sarcasm"
Step 4: read definition

I think that will help all to understand his post better.

jackonferry

This happened last week on two different AA flights. Only ID checks, no patdowns or luggage searches. ORD-LAX and LAX-DFW both had 5(!) TSOs working the boarding area.

exerda

LAX seems particularly bad about this.

SeriouslyLost

I'm quite confident they've never looked for that phrase in their life.

MKE-MR

Well, since last time this gate idiocy appeared in my path (at IAD, if I remember correctly), there were two queues to the gate agents accepting boarding passes, but only one queue which was being checked by TSA, I'm pretty sure the average smarter-than-a-slime-mold passenger could figure out which queue to use...

...then again, there was a line stretching down the concourse for one boarding lane, and no queue for the other, so I might be wrong. And no, it wasn't a priority boarding setup.

Mats

I've had good luck with using a mobile boarding pass. I shut down my phone the second I scan it to board the plane. If asked to see my boarding pass I get my phone out, slowly start to turn it on, fumble over my password... and then they give up and let me get on the plane.

I also spend a LOT of time fumbling around looking for my ID when asked. They can't stand that, so they'll just let me get on the plane.

"Sheep" passengers are all too likely to have multiple forms of identification and just hand it over to the TSA before being asked. They probably offer them a few bucks as a tip for helping "keep us safe."

I learned the mobile boarding pass trick in Atlanta when I had a connecting flight coming back from overseas. Since there was no travel document inspection at the international transfer security checkpoint, my boarding card had no scribbles on it. The TSA woman went crazy, as if I must have snuck in. I had to explain that they don't write on boarding cards at all airports. She was too befuddled and let me on the plane. After all, nobody ever changes planes in Atlanta.

The whole thing is theatrics, but I'm baffled by the need to show a boarding pass or identification without matching the two. Since they have no logic, the answer is "We have reasons we can't tell you." Anyone with an IQ above 20 knows that this translates to, "We have no legitimate reason to do this." It's condescending to our intelligence to argue "special secrets classified far above your level."

I dream of the "Great Airline Revolt." I've had flights in Newark, Raleigh, Honolulu Chicago, Cincinnati, Atlanta, and San Francisco all delayed due to gate inspections. It costs the airlines thousands of dollars per minute when a flight pushes back late. The airlines don't stick up for themselves, but I think they should send the TSA the bill. "You imposed a surprise inspection, it delayed our flight, here's how much it cost. Did you find anything? We didn't think so."

Where is Kip Hawley to restate his famous line? He said, "I think we should get it right at the checkpoint."

How do you think the people feel who have landed, are sitting on the taxiway desperate to get home or make a connection, but they can't get to a gate because the TSA is trying to figure out why someone from Alaska or Hawaii isn't carrying a passport, or if "520P" on a boarding pass means "flight number 520" or "5:20 pm" or "52-OP, which could be a code word for terrorists?

As we know from the "leaked" TSA manual from some time back, the list of gates with surprise inspections is published by the airport's TSA staff every morning. I think they have a responsibility to notify the airline. The flight can have its boarding time changed. It still screws people on short connections, but a delay is still less likely. If the TSA insists on these pointless exercises, they could at least do so without economic damage.

The only power we have is to make a DOT complaint so that the pie chart in the monthly statistics shows the number of flights delayed by the TSA.

pmocek

United States. See also: FlyerTalk: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/pract...-policies.html

Providing information, possibly verbally, that assists someone in determining one's identity is not the same as presentation of documentation of one's identity (i.e., as "showing ID"). In this country, we're not even required to have such documentation, much less to carry it with us and present it upon demand.

No way. Please see the the Identity Project's "What's wrong with showing ID?" for a nice summary of the problem.

cubbie00

I recently had this done to me at RDU. I queried the TSA agent how this makes us safer and it got heated. It became a delta issue when the gate agent stepped between me and the TSA agent and started yelling that checking ID's was not silly and I had a bad attitude. Because of that bad attitude, she was going to deny me boarding. We went around some more about the merits of checking ID and while not saying that I was a security risk, she was saying she did not want me onboard. Eventually, I said I wanted my bag back and she then said that she was not denying me boarding. I said, "it sounded like it" as I gave my boarding pass to another gate agent who beeped me thru. It was weird to have a gate agent jump in my face in defense of TSA and try to deny me boarding.

goalie

One word: paranoia

Followed by "The sky is falling, the sky is falling"

Epod

I suggest that not only does ID not make us safer, it makes us less safe.

As an example, a teacher of mine had escaped Cuba in a small boat in the 1960s. This made him a criminal fugitive in the eyes of the Cuban government. A few years later, he was on a Miami to Tampa flight that was hijacked to Havana. (in Flyertalk parlance, MIA to TPA; irrops; HAV) He hid/destroyed his ID when he realized that the flight was crossing the Florida Straights. He avoided recapture partly because it was plausible for an American to be traveling without ID back in those days.

To leave the realm of anecdote and cite something verifiable, Petty Officer Robert Stetham was killed by the TWA 847 hijackers because they found his U.S. military ID. Leon Klinghoffer was singled out for death by the Achille Lauro highjackers because his U.S. passport listed his birthplace as Israel.

Do you think that ID made those folks safer? Once the scanning check point has confirmed that I don’t have a weapon or an explosive, why does it matter whether I’m John Smith or Joe Bloggs?

FlyingHoustonian

Well obviously 9-11, safety, the children, if you have nothing to hide, anything that makes us safer, and identity matters...