Originally Posted by Bart

I don't know if Southers will be a good boss. From what I read in the article, I agree with some of what he says. For example, I agree that terrorism ought to be a study included in today's education. The fact is that terrorism is used to influence social, political and economic issues on the world stage to the point where we have to address it one way or the other. To summarily dismiss it as a criminal act ignores the social, political, economical, cultural and religious issues that prompt people to resort to such desperate acts of aggression. I disagree with him that it is not something that requires a military solution; however, I don't think a military response is the ONLY way to respond. Point here is that he appears to have a level-headed approach towards things; so it appears he might be the right person for the job.

I think it's naive to expect Southers to overhaul TSA. And I don't think Southers needs to overhaul TSA. I do think, however, that he needs to tackle a couple things put in place by Kip Hawley that may have had good intentions but have had questionable results.

1. Eliminate gate screening and put the focus on checkpoint screening. Once screened, there's no need to re-screen.

2. Eliminate BDOs; however, train TSOs some of BDO techniques to improve screening effectiveness. I think a TSO can screen more effectively if a passenger displays certain behavior; however, the basic prompt for screening still needs to be driven by a primary screening (x-ray, WTMD alarms, etc) and NOT JUST behavior. I don't think we need "specialized" TSOs in this arena.

3. Eliminate PASS and evaluate TSOs using the exact same methodology used in the rest of government.

Nice-to-do but not showstopper issues for me:

Get rid of the goddamned uniform with badge and go with a more practical "uniform:" polos with a TSA logo.

Let TSOs unionize. If other federal employees can unionize, so should TSOs.