Well, to be fair to the denizens of FT ... most who post here would claim that TSA's current level of screening is universally too invasive. Modifying the screening procedures for children is probably a good thing, but it doesn't change the desire to reduce the screening level for everyone else, too.

We do, unfortunately, seem to be setting up some rather odd tiers of screening. TSA started by performing a fairly high (invasive?) screening of everyone. Fairly quickly, airport employees were exempted. And, of course, TSOs are exempted (except perhaps at beginning of shift). And then diplomats are exempted (if they have the right credentials). And then air crews complained mightily and got their screening requirements reduced substantially.

Now, we're talking about exempting "children" from invasive screening (though it'll be interesting to see how Pistole et. al. define "child"). And, there's long-term discussion of exempting others from invasive screening in exchange for providing detailed background information.

Seems, to this uninformed observer, like TSA is putting so many exceptions to screening in place that it's hard to see what the overall philosophy is.

Maybe, just maybe, if those low-levels of screening granted to folks in those categories is really good enough for them, it might be good enough for the rest of us.

But I'll be the first to admit that I'm not trained in risk management.