I am an infrequent flyer,3 or 4x a year. Always out of ROC. ROC,as you may know was one of the flew US airports not to get TSA after 9-11. We still had private sceeners. Well,they did away with them last year,and now we have THE most useless power-tripping TSA'rs out there.
I flew out in May,this was my first experience with 'our' new TSA. It started with the *miserable* person checking ID's. Then , after putting my carryons on the belt,i went through the metal detector-did not set it off. I was then directed to the nude-o-scope,with my hands in the air like I was surrendering for doing something illegal. Then the TSO wanted to see my paper $.He was going throught it,looking for god knows what. Then I had to take my wallet out of my back pocket and have it put through the belt. Then I was 'free to go' .
This past week I had the indignity of going through this again. Another gruff TSO chcking id's. No hello for my hello. Put my bag ,no laptop, on the belt,off with the shoes. Go through the metal detector,no setting it off. This is where the fun starts. I am waiting for my bag to come out,the belt is stopped. This cant be good . One TSO calls another to look at something on the radar. The bag comes out ,TSO grabs it ,and announces,'whos is this'? Like I just got caught with my hand in the cookie jar. I say its mine. 'We need to open it' Fine. He produces my little can of Axe deodorant. Apparnetly this is not allowed and it 'must be surrendered' . Ok ,fine. The bag has to be put through again. The bag goes in ,belt stops,again,TSO 1 calls TSO 2. Here we go again. The TSO dumps everything out of the bag. Sees my digital scanner. This peaks his interest. 'Why do you have this with you'. I say I like to listen to ATC during a layover. I get this look like I'm on drugs.
I was half expecting the TSO to tell me they were confiscating that,too. That's when I would have said screw it and gone home ,there is no way I'm surrendering a $600 digital scanner. So,I get to keep it,has to be swabbed. The bag goes back for a third scan (empty now).The TSO now says that I can 'put everything back in in it' . Gee thanks.

Then to really make me laugh,the gate agent announces that," TSA will be swabbing everyones coffee cups that were bought after security" . To which just about everyone laughed out loud. What a joke these people are. I especially thought the 400+ lb. 'agent' squeezed into his outfit looked especially professional.
I dont know what TSA's problem is here in ROC. On all my return flights this year from MIA,BWI and ATL I have had ZERO issues with TSA. But for some reason they are out of their minds here.
I sent off an email to TSA abouth this ,but got the usual BS form email back.

Sounds like management elsewhere took the opportunity to dump their worst malcontents at ROC.

OP's complaint is that he failed to do the following which have been required for years and were required of the private contractor before TSA took over:

1. Did not put his gel/spray deoderant in his 1-quart bag and separate that from his carry-pm/

2. Take his digital scanner out of the carry-on and put it in a separate bin (think laptop).

3. Empty his pockets as required (whether you like the technology or not, it's not useful if it's blocked by anything. Hence the use of the word, "empty).

4. He doesn't like that TSA swabbed his scanner when it wasn't run through the X-Ray separately.

Now, one can be critical of the process in general and suggest that some or all ought to be changed. But, what OP doesn't start with is the acknowledgement that he made some personal choices here and is upset that those choices delayed him.

It's certainly OP's individual decision as it always has been, remains and will always be, whether he chooses to fly comercially or not.

Naaaw, sounds to me like a typical TSA experience!

Well,I have never had to take out the scanner in all my years flying before then,let alone get questioned why I had one.

I never had to take paper money out of my pocket,it was only 3 20's .

I have never had to take my wallet out of my pocket and run it through.

Now OP knows. He's been flying largely out of an airport which hasn't used commonly enforced principles for years (w. the exception of completely emptying pockets) and next time, if he chooses, he'll be ready.

For what it's worth, at IAD & DCA, the laptop (+ large electronics) + wallets came out of pockets well before 9/11 and establishment of TSA.

I am not griping about the deodorant. I forgot about the baggie. Point taken.

perhaps more than a bit of truth in this, but what about
Stuff like that is what shows that the TSA is a collection of clowns.

United727, on most of my travels, I carry a programmable 2-way radio that I use as a scanner. X-ray operators are apparently trained to call for a hands-on search whenever they spot an antennas plugged into an electronic device.... so what you might trying doing is to unscrew the antenna from the scanner and put the antenna with the other wires (laptop power cable, ethernet cord, etc) you may be carrying. (Separating the antenna has worked for me during most of my passes through TSA checkpoints.)

Another thing to consider is how densely you've packed; if your stuff is packed too densely, the X-ray operators cannot distinguish between the different items and they'll do a hand search if they're not too busy. (If it is a peak time, they'll probably let you through.)

Finally, make sure that your wires and electronics are *not* in close proximity to the stuff (liquids, gels, etc) that belongs in the plastic baggie. Apparently, TSA thinks it is a really bad thing if the electronics and 3oz sized items are near one another, but it is perfectly acceptable if those same items are in opposite ends of the same bag. (My theory is that TSA thinks that suicide bombers aren't capable of assembling bombs after they're onboard, so TSA only checks carry-ons for already assembled explosive devices.)

I hope this helps.

Pretty random. Most gate secondaries are ID checks and random carry-on. My buddies in the security business tell me that the random gate checks are probably the most effective device out there, but only if there's a way of assuring that everbody who sees the secondary TSO's arrive on-scene and wants to not board, has to go through the secondary.

Okay, I am a dumb redneck so write slowly.

If their ID and boarding pass got them past the checkpoint, why will it suddenly not be good enough to get them on the plane? The bag checks I have seen are simple glance and go with no possibility of detecting anything that someone really wants to hide.

Silly rabbit-it's because the TSA says so

Pretty difficult to determine "most effective device" when both the checkpoint and gate searches have each yielded (in the USA) ZERO terrorist catches.

If you have stats and references from other jurisdictions, please share.

Hey, terrorists, remember to remove the antenna from your remote control detonator before X-Ray inspection!

My point is that I only seem to have issues in ROC carrying the same (except for the deodorant) stuff out of MIA,BWI and ATL this year and none of them ever said anything. ROC is always the worst. They were a lot friendlier,too. I was chatting the guy in MIA up about my MGM Grand shirt I was wearing,very friendly.