These hoops have nothing at all to do with security. They are a way for authorities to convince you they are actually doing something. The more they make you do, or do to you, that is the more directly and intimately you are involved, the more you will feel like they are doing something.

But as noted in the example above, asking for ID at places like the post-USINS check adds absolutely nothing to security. What is going to get past a relatively highly paid, highly trained, and highly suspicious INS agent that someone who couldn't get work at MacDonald's going to find?