Spiff

Yes, you are. Check out asteroid insurance policies and how few are sold.

Bottom line: non-passengers are not stakeholders and should have no say in airline/airport security. Neither should the government.

Boggie Dog

Who are non-customers?

halls120

Rights that are available in principle but not available in fact are useless. Sort of like TSA as a whole.

jkhuggins

The people working in the building that gets destroyed by the plane that crashes into it after being taken over by terrorists who subvert the airline's security procedures?

Spiff's point (if I'm reading him correctly) is that the decision regarding what security procedures will be deployed in an airport is a matter for the airlines and their fare-paying customers to decide, and that nobody else should have a say in it. My point is that this decision does have the potential to affect others who aren't direct parties to that commercial transaction.

Spiff will tell me in return to go buy asteroid insurance . In a very limited sense, I agree; we're talking about events that are extremely unlikely to occur in either case ... and splitting that hair may not be worth it.

But, hey, this is the Internet, and we have to argue about everything, so ...

GRALISTAIR

Indeed! ^

chollie

Well, as you pointed out, there's always the ballot box (for non-paying and paying customers alike).

That's the same ballot box that currently offers 'protections' from things like railroad engineers nodding off at the switch or police directly or indirectly causing harm or death to innocent civilians when in hot pursuit.

The real losers would likely be folks like Chertoff and company that have come to depend on an endless stream of taxpayer-funded short-lived, constantly replaced costly security apparatus of dubious effectiveness. If airlines were in charge of security, I suspect they'd want a better ROI.

jkhuggins

Spiff would claim there should be no government role in airline security at all; I respectfully disagree.

The problem is that it's incredibly hard to measure ROI, when (a) the event you're defending against is extraordinarily rare, and (b) people are notoriously bad at judging risk when it involves air travel and/or safety concerns. I agree that a ROI analysis for security is desperately needed; I'm honestly uncertain whether the private sector would do it better (or, perhaps, less badly) than the public sector.

Boggie Dog

Less badly would still be better than what TSA is doing now.

TSA refuses to acknowledge studies demonstrating zero ROI, i.e., the GAO report on the useless TSA BDO program.

TSA refuses to demonstrate effectiveness of security protocals such as restrictions on LGA's. I see no reason to just accept claims of an agency that uses deceit as a standard SOP tool.

In my opinion TSA is worse than useless. TSA and its employees are not trustworthy, provides inferior security screenings on its best day, and gives little ROI for our tax dollars.

Caradoc

Negative.

Maxwell Smart

I wish just one of these "abolish TSA", etc. editorials would come out and FIRST state that airport security had no role in allowing 9/11 to happen, and THEN talk about all of TSA's shortcomings.

Otherwise all you get are an endless stream of clueless individuals defending TSA because they don't want "another 9/11", or propagating the falsehood that private security allowed knives to be sneaked or smuggled through because of their incompetence. End result is that rational debate gets drowned out by these clueless rantings.

N830MH

I think I agree with you. They won't be last longer. TSA will be gone soon. I can't bear watch it anymore! Those passengers are complaining about bodyscanners. They don't want go through the scanner. Those passengers had it right to kept the privacy. They don't want to see a naked. BKSX is unsafe. BKSX is a cancer machine. That's why they removed all BKSX out of airport completely. MMW is a right choice, but there is no cancer machine.

GUWonder

Congress won't shut down the TSA; rather they will assist it in its funding demands.

The airlines and airports aren't eager to pick up where they left off in handling security before the "federalize to professionalize" mantra and TSA came to the scene (after 9/11).

Rather unfortunate that we're stuck with this gargantuan TSA also for years to come.

AArlington

TSA is here to stay.

But TSA is desperately trying to improve its image -- look at Pre-Check. They just need to get the "elites" and influencers through the lines with no pain and the chorus (of relevants) calling for the demise of TSA declines.

Spiff

Don't give up hope. We will rid our airports of this disgusting, un-American disease of an agency!

Fredd

I feel a little guilty going through Pre-check for that very reason. I think of family and friends who don't have the same privileges bestowed on them by a generous government body.