Why has TSA alienated the public?
 

It would seem that with nearly 100% of the people who fly not being any real threat TSA would strive to build cooperation instead of an us versus them situation as it now exist. The public is looking for ways to not cooperate with TSA and in my opinion for good reason.

TSA has done exactly opposite and seems hell bent on making the public distrust TSA completely. To what end?

I have never managed an organization as large as TSA but it seems to me that John Pistole has only made the TSA job much harder if not impossible.

Is that the sign of superior leadership?

Comments?

Agency ego.

It is the nature of unlimited government operating without legal limits. The only limitation to the expansion of power is the people that resist that expansion.

People are subjected to humiliating and degrading overreaching powers and eventually surrender as they learn through trail and error that if they surrender, things will go better for them.

As frequent fliers, we primarily see the the TSA as the embodiment of that.

But it is true throughout leviathan government.

It is reflected in the tax code and its indecipherable rules.

It is true at OSHA.

It is true the multiplicity of often conflicting regulatory bodies throughout government.

It is reflected in environmental rules that deprive property owners of the lawful use (taking) of their property without compensation.

It is reflected in the almost unlimited availability of eminent domain to acquire property of the citizens by government just to turn over to a private business.

The Constitution has been turned on its head. A document that was originally intended to limit the power of the new government is used to advance its power in an unlimited fashion.

So, people are harassed. People are abused. They are threatened. They are taught to fear the government as the government has broad powers to imprison or coerce its citizens at the threat of violence or death. The people have to be brought under control as they are the only force that can stop it. The states were emasculated years ago. The people are the last hope.

It has become an authoritarian tyranny, albeit we are not yet to a hard tyranny of massive oppression. The TSA is just our little corner of it.

They don't see it that way at all. They have been entrusted with protecting the flying public and they take that responsibility very very seriously. You can tell that by how they look down their nose at you, the glee in their eyes behind the stern face telling you to throw out your snacks & water. They are the original bullies. And God forbid you question them! Who are you to question them?!!?!

Here are just a few things TSA is counting on:

• Most pax will just walk away because it's not worth the time.
• Because the sheer nature of the business, ie the people who would lodge a complaint are presumably going through security because they are flying away from the city the checkpoint is located in, most people won't remember enough about the experience to lodge a complaint with names, dates, employee ID numbers, supervisor's names. And those are the only kind of complaints the TSA will take seriously, ones with enough information to move forward.
• The rest of the pax will have the sheep mentality, so TSA can make an example out of you. TSA gets their way by intimidation, the same way the 3 year old gets their way by screaming, crying & throwing themselves on the floor. It's easier to give in & give the 3 year old a sucker than it is to tell them, "I said no. Deal with it." And the TSA is counting on you wanting to make the problem (TSA) go away, at any cost.
• You don't want them to call your airline, do you?
• You don't want to miss your flight, do you? aka "DO YOU WANT TO FLY TODAY???!?!?!" screamed in the faces of countless pax, myself included.
• You won't want to make a scene. After all, just bend over, hand them the lube & do everything the not-so-nice TSA person asks you to do. And if you don't, well then you must not love America! You must not want the plane to be safe!

It's enough to make you want to drive across an ocean to get to Europe.

Superior leadership means asking the people who do the actual job what they think of new procedures and have their best & brightest try them out before they are actually implemented. It means having a trial period where ANY needed changes can be made. It means admitting when you're wrong, and using your best assets: YOUR PEOPLE to tell you how the business should really be run.

I think it's the only way TSA can cover for a massively undertrained, uncontrollable workforce going rogue on the front lines.

The agency has shown no interest in preventing theft, harassment, intimidation, abuse, etc. at the checkpoints. We have all seen crazy TSOs making up rules, screaming at passengers, etc. with no fear of reprisal. We have all observed nonsensical, bizarre procedures imposed by half-bright or possibly sociopathic personalities. You never know what you're walking into at a checkpoint.

Saddled with so many undesirables, TSA has a basic choice: defend the public against its own people, or defend its own people against the public. The former would be the equivalent of hacking big holes in the agency's own boat, so management has opted for the latter.

This creates solidarity among the rank-and-file but also pits the agency against its own patrons, e.g. taxpayers. And it forces TSA into lame coverups for ongoing abuse and incompetence, e.g. calling erratic employee behavior "consistent inconsistencies," which is sort of the equivalent of Pee Wee Herman taking a header and then claiming, "I meant to do that."

If TSA had hired more carefully and did not execute its mission is so reprehensible a way, it wouldn't be necessary to go to war against the public. But they're trapped now. They can't call out their own incompetent or corrupt or maniacal employees, because there are so many of them and TSA is dependent on them. They are stuck defending a nationally deployed corps of freelance maniacs, peeping Toms, thieves and bullies. The only managerial solution is to double down and treat the public as a bigger threat than their own malignant workforce.

Exalt a thousand times!!! ^

That only works to a point, and they've crossed that point. We are now pushing back, and the War on Americans is going to start getting ugly. Unfortunately we have too many lame ducks in Washington to deal it effectively.

Perfectly stated! ^

Bruce

I'm beginning to think there's a larger goal behind this whole fiasco - the shift from NoS as secondary to primary, the correspondingly larger number of people getting patted down, the new and invasive nature of the patdowns, Pistole's aggressive and uncompromising attitude - I think the desired goal is to re-privatize TSA.

It won't result in the experience being any better for the pax. It also won't result in the 'experience' (pay and benefits) being any better for the line TSOs. But someone, possibly related to Chertoff, will be making a LOT of money.

Oh, it wouldn't surprise me for a second if that was the plan all along. However, unless there is about a 2:1 ratio of those things versus the amount of magnetometers out there, there is NO WAY the lines can keep moving at the pace they do now. And I'm thinking it would probably need to be 3:1 in reality. I don't think most airports can handle that.

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPad; U; CPU OS 3_2_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/531.21.10 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.4 Mobile/7B500 Safari/531.21.10)

Someone who had worked for the government most of their life told me that if you see a behavior by a government entity that can be explained by either a complex conspiracy or incredible stupidity you will never go broke betting on stupidity.

Sounds like a corollary of Hanlon's Law: never ascribe to malice that which can be more adequately explained by stupidity.

Pistole is demonstrating the exact traits I expresed concern about before his confirmation. He is a 26 year FBI COP. His "usual daily customers" are crooks, criminals, and Bad Guys. He cannot transition to screening 2 million innocent civilians per day. To a career cop, a "civilian" is only a witness who can be forced to appear in court to testify under threat of jail penalty by contempt of court. We have no rights to Big Brother.

Sadly, the US has not learned a single thing since the days of Hoover and Nixon. Career FBI dudes have a built in facsist mentality. Pistole is of the mindset to rig Zyclon B canisters On Nude O' Scope portals if he thought it would have a chance of zapping OBL Bet on it. ^

As long a Pistole is "In charge, Here, Now" things will only get worse, not better. Prepare for it. Get used to it. Or resist.

Apologies to Mr. Godwin but John Pistole "Himmler Jr." has been appointed Director of TSA and the Constitution is but a paper to be shredded further as he consolidates his power base. :(

You know, everytime I look at this man's eyes the hair on the back of my neck stands straight on end. Has anyone checked his basement for any hidden torture chambers? It's not because he is who he is. He just looks off somehow.

Bolding Mine

It isn't just the rank and file that is filled with incompetent employees - the management is filled with the dregs of the federal civil service. When TSA began hiring, people who couldn't advance in the the departments and agencies where they were assigned jumped at the chance for a fresh start. Naturally, they were far from the best and brightest.