I'd say that knowledgeable travelers, such as most FT participants, understand that the appropriate response--in a utilitarian sense--to the foiled U.K. plot is to do nothing, or very little, or at most, devise some kind of behind-the-scenes process or equipment to improve detection. Even if the U.K. plot succeeded, overall air travel would still be relatively safer than automobile driving, for example. However, knowledgeable travelers make up only a small number of voters.

Most voters are occasional users of the air transport system and from their point of view (and reinforced by media coverage), safety is compromised to some degree. Something visible to them needs to be done. Suppose the authorities did nothing and some incident did occur in the near future. There would be calls for the heads of everyone in charge for being idle in the face of a known threat.

Thus, I conclude that the realistic path forward is to try to make new restrictions to be as efficient and pain-free as possible--yes, try to get rid of them, but recognize that a situation without ANY publicly-visible action is probably not politically feasible. And certainly resist any further initiatives, especially those that are personally intrusive.