Of course, the proffered reason is that a flight crew member could have been compromised into taking a WEI through the checkpoint and then handing it off to a "terrorist" to take on a flight different from that crew member.

If more of these secondaries happen to crew members, then the TSA won't have as much time to do it to passengers and perhaps the unions and airlines will complain more and raise the level of discourse about ineffective screening. But then again, when their voices are heard, the TSA will probably go back to its old ways of just doing secondaries on passengers.

Sadly, he is not as he has drunk of the TSA Kool-Aid.

If you believe that then I've got some oceanfront property in sunny AZ for sale. PM me for info.

Think of all the ways TSA is making air travel "random and unpredictable":
Who gets to fly today?
Who misses a flight due to random screening that did NOT find any threat?
Which flights depart late?
Which passengers miss connections due to TSA induced delays?
Which flights get diverted?

and the TSA beat goes on

Do you have a reference for that? Where has that reason been "proffered"?

hey, i've got an idea......

let's have the tsa give the full monty to all badged and in uniform (i.e. working) flight crews and not screen the passengers.....

That is part of a layered security protocol and the processes are random. They will even set up and do all of TSA at one airport.

Based on the history of TSA workers having sticky fingers it would seem reasonable to screen TSA workers constantly.

I'm sure I will be verbally attacked for this, but, seriously, what??? Not you specifically, but do you want me to start posting links to various threads on this site where many of the people here hae said EVERYONE should be screened before they enter the sterile area? In fact, in one of MY OWN arguments as to why it was sort of pointless to screen flight crew, I pointed out they could fly the plane into a building - no weapon needed. Yet I was verbally attacked for suggesting that.

So why did all of you change your mind???? Please point out to me at what point all of your dropped the argument that everyone entering the sterile area needs to be screened, and started to argue that flight crew should exempt?

Or is the truth of the matter that no matter what TSA does, many of you will argue the opposite, even if it counters what you have said before?

Well, I won't speak for anyone else ... but I haven't changed my mind on the issue. I don't see a problem with screening the flight crew.

After all ... you don't really know that they're flight crew when they come to the checkpoint, do you? I mean, they're in snappy uniforms, and they're carrying badges and all ... but anyone could buy a uniform and forge a badge.

I should clarify that I don't think "everyone" changed their mind, but I think also you know what I meant. and I respect your personal position.

I have brought up before that flight crew coukd use their plane as a weapon, and I was "flammed" (is that the word) for suggesting so. It was made clear by many on this site that regardless of that particular fact, everyone should be screened, that the government should treat everyone the same.

But, now, for many here, that position seems to have changed. Sorry, guys, being hypocritical does not win arguments, and gives ample reason for TSA, DHS, and members of Congress to ignore you. Wh would thy listen to you when your not honest in your argumet?

As opposed to TSA's hypocrisy?

• You can't bring ice through the checkpoint ... unless Britney Spears does it, in which case TSA will suddenly discover that it changed the policy awhile ago and just forgot to tell everyone and update the website. (Which still, by the way, doesn't make it clear that passengers without medical needs can bring ice through the checkpoint.)
• BDOs are supposed to detect "suspicious" passengers ... but, somehow, TSA seems unable to find suspicious employees within their own ranks until someone else figures it out and tapes them / arrests them / files suit against them, in which case TSA complains that "we couldn't possibly have known that they were suspicious".
• TSA claims that WBIs can't preserve pictures of scanned passengers ... until someone finds the original specification for the WBI machines, which shows that the machines can in fact preserve pictures, at which point TSA backpedals and says "oh, yeah, it can, but only in Diagnostic Mode(TM), which we promise will never accidentally be turned on."
• TSA crows on the front page of its website about the .0001% of passengers that it finds carrying firearms. Yet when FTers talk about the .0001% of TSA employees that violate the law, we're told that "nobody's perfect".

I could go on. But I trust you see the point. TSA doesn't exactly have the moral high ground when it comes to hypocrisy.

working flight crews are exempt from the liquid and shoe nonsense but aren't they also exempt from secondary "issues" as well? if not, then i'll gladly take my saunter over to the box

what flavor koolaid have you been drinking?

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^