Besides that, they don't have to assemble to protest or exercise freedom of speech, no one is forcing them.

:rolleyes: perpetually

Head on out to DTW, LGA, EWR or SFO. You'll see (and hear) some there.


False. At DTW and SMF, they make you hand the BP across the WTMD. In EUG, the BP gets confiscated before you even get a chance to dump your carry-ons into the x-ray, you get the BP back after passing through the WTMD.


Just go to any High School or frat party and see how many sources are out there for fake ID.


It's pretty simple to figure out. If the TSA can do their thing with flight manifests, they can use a calculator and figure out the averages.


What does that have to do with an accurate count? You're counting people who actually go through, right? What does timeliness have to do with it?


That's because those disabled fliers are likely to be the much less frequent fliers than the 20% that make up 80% of an individual airline's revenue.

They are the ones who eat up the dog-and-pony show at the checkpoints, of course they're going to complain less.


Assuming "they" being the frequent flier community, we prefer to earn a paycheck. Some of us must fly to make a living.



Can't say anything about hat pins, but I have seen tweezers be confiscated. About three months ago, in SEA.


Again, I encourage you to fly to some other airports to see what we experience.

Remember: This is Washington DC. Perception is reality. We can nitpick about nailclippers and drill sergeants endlessly. Bear in mind that this article competed with a whole bunch of others on different topics for space in the newspaper. By virtue of its having passed some sort of editorial muster, one can assume that these views reflect those of the Washington Times editorial and publishers staffs.

A very conservative inside-the-Beltway newspaper published this article when it did for a reason. The author, according to his byline, is an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, which is a very conservative Washington DC thinktank -- a holding tank for Neocons who are waiting their turns for political appointments or key Administration jobs.

The TSA OUGHT to take note of the fact that at least some of their core constituency appears to be eroding.

Wonderful Irony
 

After hitting the link to the article on the Washington Times website, I noticed that the ad banner at the top reads: Now Hiring - Transportation Security Administration.

:D :D

IMO "search" doesn't have to equal "harass."

I don't consider the WTMD, x-ray of baggage, or any sort of swab or puff ETD to be harassment. (I do consider the current ETD-alarm clearance procedures to be harassment, but that's another issue.)

I consider SSSS to be harassment, and I don't think anyone, granny or otherwise, should be subjected to it without cause. I think patting down an 80-year-old American woman's breasts is harassment, but that seems to have mostly stopped.

I think the shoe carnival and retaliatory secondaries that occur at some airports are harassment. If TSA was truly interested in screening shoes instead of harassing passengers, non-alarming pax sent to secondary for supposedly profile shoes would have only their shoes screened, not a full-body screening. The harassment is aggravated by TSA management being blind to the inconsistencies that exist.

Taking away granny's sewing scissors is harassment. Aggressively searching her bag looking for a concealed prohibited item and then loudly saying "ah hah," as if the screener has found Bin Laden himself, after finding the scissors is harassment.

Referring an innocent special-ed teacher for arrest for carrying a leather bookmark is harassment. Threatening to charge her with civil and criminal violations is harassment too. Fining a guy flying out of SMF for carrying a cheese slicer, not a weapon and not on the prohibited list, is harassment.

I think that the current implementation of policy toward people with some medical devices constitutes harassment. There should be a way for someone with a device/implant/prosthesis to avoid humiliating and slow searches every time they travel. I'm not sure what the solution is, maybe some sort of limited registration program which I oppose for widespread use but might help in this limited situation. But what happens now at many airports to many disabled people or people with medical devices is humiliating to the point of harassment.

It irks me when person A says "kids and grannys shouldn't be harassed," and person B accuses person A of saying "kids and grannys shouldn't be screened." That seems to happen often here.

On April 14, you may only bring up to four books of safety matches in your carry on. ALL lighters are prohibited in both checked baggage and on April 14, will be prohibited as carry-on items; and ALL matches are prohibited in checked baggage.

That's what I thought. So your previous statement:
isn't the whole truth, is it? Congress mandated butane lighters to be banned; TSA went one step further and banned all lighters, maybe because of convenience, maybe because of other reasons, but the upcoming change is not just because of a congressional mandate.

Studentff, I think we are getting hung up on semantics. I'm basically against anything the TSA does that has no true effect on safety. But I am for the TSA doing whatever it takes to truly make the flight safe. Whether you call that searching or harrassment, it is the resulting effect that counts.

The TSA does a lot of things that have zero effect on the safety of the flight. We can and should stand up as often as possible to complain about that. But we must at the same time acknowledge the correct things they do (and also complain about the correct things that they don't yet do).

if you want to be picky, go right ahead. I think the whole ban is ridiculous. A Congressional law initiated the ban. I think where you're somewhat confused is on the butane, absorbed and non-absorbed lighter fuel issue, and I won't pick hairs here. The whole lighter ban is one huge step in the wrong direction. If Congress had left well enough alone, then TSA wouldn't be implementing this ridiculous ban.

Answers
 

But, you dont know if they aspire to be D.I.'s




THat is hardly ALL the TSA checking all the boarding passes.




I am not disputing that fact. But should ID not be checked because of this? I dont believe so. There have been people caught at DEN with fake ID.



However the numbers that we get are for the week. So on Sunday when the figures come out, there is a lot of latitude for late bookings later in the week. Add to that the fact that our numbers are only exact for 2 carriers out in DEN and the rest are all a percentage and you have a lot of room for error.




The numbers that we get at the start of the week are subject to change by the end of the week.




Opinion





The author of the article inferred that TSA as a whole takes these things. SEA screwed up but as a rule they are not taking tweezers.




Not on my salary!

Eyecue,


You can't speak for every airport as if it's yours. Yes, TSA at many airports checks your boarding pass three times even after the ticket person had already checked it.

What purpose does checking the ID do, you still can fly without one, just get that stupid SSSS BS. Comparing a name on a boarding pass doesn't do much for security unless TSA has now started giving you names of people that are known criminals in the area. Sorry terrorists aren't proably going to fly with there real name. So what does ID checking do for security Eyecue? It's already checked at the airline ticket counter.

Thats the biggest bunch of BS I've heard. My airport knew about the number of people flying through each day before we even opened the checkpoint, hell we knew about the number per shift. Sure it was +/- a few hundred or so. All the airline and TSA have to do is work together and look at their flights for a given hour and look at how are already booked on that flight and how many people are overbooked and such.


Have to agree, thats total opinion. A lot of the disabled people that fly are usually FF. It's that time in their life to travel and so they do it.


I had that salary as a screener before joining the military as a E1 and Im still able to make flights home to see family on it. You can make the same flight home if you plan ahead.

Caught by whom ? The airlines' check-in staff (where ID is initially required) or at the TSA checkpoint ?
Were these people real, nasty terrorists :eek: or did the TSA once more exceed its mandate by 'catching' miscreants unrelated to any aviation threat ?

Threat profiling would eliminate this hassle. Give us Korematsu.

I guess that with everyone being critical nowadays, its hard to decifer what is commonsense and what is not.

Perhaps, its only reasonable to say that the columnists was only trying to point out the faults of the TSA and a lot of it is largely true. Those who are pro-TSA will obviously get agitated and get defensive.

It is however only reasonable to ask that TSA and airport staff practise a bit of tact in carrying out secuirty measures. A lot of us, if we are really honest, are not really mad at the measures per se but rather the way it is being done. What is rude to someone may be ok with another person. That however doesnt excuse rude and inconsiderate behaviour on the part of the customers or of TSA.

To ask however that a passanger be polite and allow the TSA be rude towards you when you are made to wait in line for 20 minutes and asked to do things with no logic is a bit too much sometimes.

Those who are in TSA should realise that customers judge by how they do things and how people react depends on how they first put on the first impression. If you are a TSA agent and may be mad for some reason or another, then maybe you should ask your boss to relook at the schedule, are you being given too long hours? Do you have support? TSA agents work level of easiness depend upon the reaction of customers. If customers are continually treated badly by TSA, why should they treat TSA any nicer?

cheers

well
 

I cant? Well the guy that wrote the article sure did!


Jim Smith walks up to the ticket counter and gets a ticket that he had paid for one month ago. He then meets up with Andy White in the lobby and gives him the ticket. Andy White doesnt have Jim Smiths ID. When he gets to the CP, there will be a problem. There is currently a lawsuit over this exact issue. It will be interesting to see how it is decided.


I seriously doubt that. We have had estimates that were off by more than 1000. I have seen the load forecasts. I know that they are for the week, not by the day!

Yeah but how big is your family?