The fault is with his employers. He's inheriting over a decade of frustration. Perhaps if Blogger Bob had tried to do the job from day one, we wouldn't be here now. Bob's lies, cherry-picking of facts, distortions and insults, supported by others in his organization, have brought us to this stage.

Most of the questions have been asked over and over again to no avail. Any ombudsman of any institution with a similar track record would be facing a similar response. Indeed, IMHO, the response he's getting here is far kinder than the response of TSA towards those who try to get answers on the blog. Far kinder than the responses most of us get when we try to understand craziness, rudeness and unpredictability at the checkpoint.

One would think that there should be a resource available to provide a definitive answer on any situation at any time to anyone in the organization. Those answers should generally be made available to the American public. It's not reasonable to ask people to follow the rules while denying them access to the rules. I can think of three possible answers to any given question here: a clear, no double-talk answer that any first time traveler can understand, an "I'm not at liberty to discuss that", or "it depends, because...". (An inexcusable example of the latter: a DEN TSO said there are specific length/weight SSI rules governing walking sticks/canes that were invoked only at DEN to try to confiscate an elderly actor's 'light saber' walking stick. There's no reason this very specific information should be kept from the public).

I wish him well; I'm sure his intentions are good, but I also have to agree with Halls and Flies: Blogger Bob's approach isn't going to cut it.

If Ross's equivalent any where else in the world besides the US signed up here, do you think the reaction would be the same?

If not, perhaps TSA should spend more time in its boondoggle jaunts to Europe learning from others instead of trying to force TSA standards on them.