Twilight of TSA
May 23, 2010 | 1:36 pm
#16
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Cincinnati CVG
Posts: 284
the only effective security measures in place are the sealed cockpit doors and the passengers willingness to survive, that is it. all other measures are pointless because it has already been proved that a person can carry explosives past security.
May 23, 2010 | 1:46 pm
#17
Join Date: May 2010
Posts: 1
...is give Convenant Aviation Security, Inc. (or Wackenhut or whatever) a chaaaaaance!
http://www.securitymanagement.com/ne...-breach-006648
Although our friend Spiff here also expresses ideological reasons for dumping TSA, I'll stick with the practical one: TSA is not very good at providing security.
http://www.securitymanagement.com/ne...-breach-006648
Although our friend Spiff here also expresses ideological reasons for dumping TSA, I'll stick with the practical one: TSA is not very good at providing security.
May 23, 2010 | 1:57 pm
#18
Join Date: Dec 2008
Posts: 201
If checkpoints went private, wouldn't the end result be the same? The same people working there now would just switch uniforms, no?
TSA hiring standards don't require a GED/diploma so long as you have a year of security experience. IIRC, the reason why standards are this low is so that pre-TSA employees could make the uniform swap.
TSA hiring standards don't require a GED/diploma so long as you have a year of security experience. IIRC, the reason why standards are this low is so that pre-TSA employees could make the uniform swap.
Last edited by Batmanuel; May 23, 2010 at 2:03 pm
May 23, 2010 | 2:15 pm
#19
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May 23, 2010 | 3:55 pm
#20
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May 23, 2010 | 8:51 pm
#21
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Colorado
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I have a better idea: get the federal government 100% the hell out of airport security and then tell the airlines that aircraft and airport safety is their responsibility. Let passengers choose who they wish to use, let cowards stay home, and let the chips fall where they may. In the meantime, start prosecuting the scumbags "in charge" of TSA.
May 23, 2010 | 9:14 pm
#22
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Just another thoughtless anti-TSA tirade. I guess Spiff is grandstanding for the crowd. No point in really trying to move the spotlight off him. Between Spiff and the spotlight is a dangerous place to be. Let's wait to see if anyone with a less-known MO cares to ponder directions things could go without a TSA.
Your above statement is correct if all we are worried about is another 9/11 takeover. I do agree that we need effective gate security, but we aren't getting it with TSA, and I agree with those who call for TSA to be disbanded.
May 23, 2010 | 9:21 pm
#23
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May 24, 2010 | 12:26 am
#24
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Why and how would airlines be responsible for security at airports that they don't own, operate or regulate?
May 24, 2010 | 5:24 am
#25
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Your government could try to keep you locked in your house for your safety, Comrade.... Or not allow you to operate motor vehicle. Or not eat hamburger and french fries. All for safety of People!
They use said airport. If I rent a building, part of building security is my responsibility. Part of building security is the owner's responsibility. Other than normal law enforcement in the community and intervention if necessary, the government should take no part in the security of said building.
Last edited by Kiwi Flyer; May 25, 2010 at 12:14 pm Reason: merge consecutive posts
May 24, 2010 | 5:34 am
#26
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I may not understand the OP's first paragraph correctly, and maybe my memory is faulty, but to blame Bush for the TSA seems misguided. I seem to remember Tom Daschle and the rest of the democrats screaming "you have to federalize to professionalize" and they got their way with federal employees and the TSA, etc. Bush and republicans preferred a private, results-oriented approach but didn't get their way, so now you got the TSA.
May 24, 2010 | 5:43 am
#27
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Yeh, that's right, when something doesn't happen (like your house doesn't have a breakin), what do you know about the value of that? So every homeowner should be for disbanding the police if his NEIGHBOR has had a breakin but he hasn't. Makes complete sense, right? But to go to the opposite extreme and say the police have "failed" when your house is still safe is, excuse me, a scream. People who say that with a straight face are the comedians.
May 24, 2010 | 5:54 am
#28
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Yeh, that's right, when something doesn't happen (like your house doesn't have a breakin), what do you know about the value of that? So every homeowner should be for disbanding the police if his NEIGHBOR has had a breakin but he hasn't. Makes complete sense, right? But to go to the opposite extreme and say the police have "failed" when your house is still safe is, excuse me, a scream. People who say that with a straight face are the comedians.
May 24, 2010 | 6:55 am
#29
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I am not an economist, so excuse any inaccuracies.
The cost of the TSA extends beyond the direct financial costs of the agency. It is just that the financial cost is the easiest to measure. There are at least three more "costs" that could be evaluated. Each of these will have corresponding costs or saving from the elimination of the TSA.
The OP mentioned the value of TSA and that they prevent the loss of lives. Let's say, by no means proven, that they have prevented loss of life from airline terrorism. There is a possibility, maybe even a probability, that the problems of dealing with the TSA forces some travelers to seek other, less safe methods of travel, just to avoid the airport. This increase in loss of life is the result of the presence of the TSA. How much is it?
Related to this is the loss of productivity. If every traveler gets to the airport earlier to deal with the security process, that is time taken away from the opportunity to be productive. It is a cost that is small in many individual cases but multiplied over many many millions of incidences it becomes a huge loss of productivity. This loss of productivity is directly the result of the presence and methods of the TSA.
In addition, is the cost of loss of liberty. This may be the most difficult and the most controversial. That does not mean we should not look at it. Our system is unique, or was, in that it provided for individual liberty at the expense of government power.
The TSA reduces individual liberty and it increases government power. (By the way, if you do not agree with this statement, then we will have a difficult time discussing any thing else in this post.)
What is the cost of loss of liberty? Liberty was bought with the loss of life and treasure to gain it and preserve it. If we are to surrender this paid-for liberty on a piecemeal basis, the we devalue the cost that was paid to buy this liberty.
We may decide that our security has a higher value than our liberty. If we do, then the OP is correct, the TSA performs a function of value, perceived or actual security, paid for in the loss of liberty.
As for me, it is a sad time. We have reached a point where our liberty has little value. We have lost the awe and admiration for the possibility that individuals acting in their own self-interest can put together a superior system of economics and governance. We elect elites to determine what is best for us and at what cost.
And that is why many of us do not like the TSA. It is not an opposition to what they are trying to do as airline safety is an admirable goal. It is an opposition to the incremental surrender of liberty to achieve that goal.
The cost of the TSA extends beyond the direct financial costs of the agency. It is just that the financial cost is the easiest to measure. There are at least three more "costs" that could be evaluated. Each of these will have corresponding costs or saving from the elimination of the TSA.
The OP mentioned the value of TSA and that they prevent the loss of lives. Let's say, by no means proven, that they have prevented loss of life from airline terrorism. There is a possibility, maybe even a probability, that the problems of dealing with the TSA forces some travelers to seek other, less safe methods of travel, just to avoid the airport. This increase in loss of life is the result of the presence of the TSA. How much is it?
Related to this is the loss of productivity. If every traveler gets to the airport earlier to deal with the security process, that is time taken away from the opportunity to be productive. It is a cost that is small in many individual cases but multiplied over many many millions of incidences it becomes a huge loss of productivity. This loss of productivity is directly the result of the presence and methods of the TSA.
In addition, is the cost of loss of liberty. This may be the most difficult and the most controversial. That does not mean we should not look at it. Our system is unique, or was, in that it provided for individual liberty at the expense of government power.
The TSA reduces individual liberty and it increases government power. (By the way, if you do not agree with this statement, then we will have a difficult time discussing any thing else in this post.)
What is the cost of loss of liberty? Liberty was bought with the loss of life and treasure to gain it and preserve it. If we are to surrender this paid-for liberty on a piecemeal basis, the we devalue the cost that was paid to buy this liberty.
We may decide that our security has a higher value than our liberty. If we do, then the OP is correct, the TSA performs a function of value, perceived or actual security, paid for in the loss of liberty.
As for me, it is a sad time. We have reached a point where our liberty has little value. We have lost the awe and admiration for the possibility that individuals acting in their own self-interest can put together a superior system of economics and governance. We elect elites to determine what is best for us and at what cost.
And that is why many of us do not like the TSA. It is not an opposition to what they are trying to do as airline safety is an admirable goal. It is an opposition to the incremental surrender of liberty to achieve that goal.
Mike
May 24, 2010 | 1:27 pm
#30
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Bad example; ABC Security got its noncompetitive contract at OAK through a corrupt relationship between Alameda County officials and the cousin who owned ABC. ABC's lapses went unpunished due to responsibility shared between Port of Oakland and the various airlines assigned to different gate areasno single entity had sufficient control of ABC to enforce contractual obligations.
PoO made other questionable decisions as well, such as a hiring program for drivers of off-airport rental car company vans with an offender-rehab organization (!). But if the offender van drivers as a group had consistently perpetrated as many thefts or other abuses as TSA has since its inception, the provider could have lost its contract and been replaced.
Both of these issues would have been correctable by better contract vetting. OAK competes with other Bay Area airports for revenue, so market forces eventually would weigh in on repetitive problems. Security (theater) under TSA, centrally controlled with no stake in efficient function of the facilities it "serves," cannot reach even this defective level of accountability.