Why the TSA sucks and the Irish don't
 

I had an eye-opening experience dealing with the Irish version of the TSA at DUB. It was revelatory because I did not feel the usual sense of intrusion or annoyance that I get with the TSA, even though our security-related delay was longer than is usual. I started to break down the reasons why the Irish succeed where the TSA totally fails in its client relations:

1) The Irish security folks did not yell, or even raise their voices. Ever. The inspector's voices were quiet and private.

2) You had no sense of the personality or ego of the inspector at all.

3) Because of these first two items, you didn't have the usual sense of bad-mannered people bringing Napoleon complexes to the job.

4) The inspectors invited you to open the compartments of your bags, rather than grabbing at your things without asking.

5) They said "Please" and "Thank you."

6) They sounded reasonably educated, as representatives charged with interacting with people's private realms SHOULD be.

7) They did not stand around yakking with each other and laughing, as the TSA's crack representatives so often do while I'm waiting in an AA EXP security line and about to miss a connection (ORD EXP line, anyone?)

8) Their was a tacit acknowledgement in all of their behaviors and procedures that their work was a necessary evil. So different from the sanctimony that many members of the TSA bring to work.

The Republicans got slaughtered at the polls this week, and that is appropriate given the time and treasure they've wasted through their galactic incompetance these past years. I would like to think that a contributory factor was that many conservatively-inclined folks, myself included, have no interest in watching America become an incompetent police state.

The TSA might be wise to look to the Irish if it values its turf.

-KF

very well said!
 

I agree with your view of the situation. The security experience doesn't have to be miserable.

I've been through many TSA stations where they did not yell, didn't yak to each other and were polite. As a result the passenger were well behaved also. What goes around comes around.

Will we see change due to the election? I can only hope so!

I had the same feeling when leaving SVO2 this summer. They hand inspected *EVERY* item in *EVERY* compartment of *EVERY* checked bag. The inspector was very quiet, pleasant, and respectful. There was no yelling whatsoever. Instead of a feeling of being violated, we were left with the feeling that this was a necessary evil being handled as appropriately as possible.

I could tell you where a few dozen ORD TSA's or so go to hang out at a time (oh, say, peak Sunday afternoon times), but I'm sure that's SSI.

Besides, I'm sure other ORD pax have accidentally stumbled across the TSA's open air "hidy hole", er "break room" at ORD's sterile area since it's hardly private much less restricted from pax access.

Of course, other businesses have the (unwritten) rule that employees should do their horsing around where customers can't see it. Apparently TSA has no such rule.

I'm going on almost no sleep in the middle of a 20,000+ mile BIS run, here, but...

It seems like governmental power structures that are motivated and perpetuated on fear almost invariably end up being abused by the human sorts that are charged with running them. Small tyrants enjoy their sense of control a little too much; "recoveries" from confiscated goods turn into outright thefts small and large, favors are distributed unequally. Often the populace that is on the losing end of this grow to hate the machine.

In some places (Nazi Germany) the hate of the commoners doesn't matter: the security apparatus charged with rooting out Reichstag terrorists and whatnot destroyed dissenters as well. You kept your mouth shut or you got killed.

In other places incompetence and corruption becomes the norm; the masses are demotivated by what they perceive to be a permanently unlevel and arbitrary playing field. I'm thinking eastern europe here.

Neither of these paths lead to an America I want to live in.

I am not a historian at all but my impression is that for much of the 20th century the United States has done a uniquely excellent job in balancing out the potential for abuse in govermental structures with other powerful governmental structures. Rank-and-file police will forever be in a position to get away with abuses small and large, but Hoover's FBI and its descendants aggressively pursued police corruption. Armies can be dangerous to democracies, but we've traditionally checked their potential for abuse with very tight civilian control and (until recently) a superbly professional officer corps. The tyrants and sadists that are a part of any army are supervised and limited. Watch the watchers.

The world did not change after 9/11, nor did human nature and its negative tendancies. What did change is people temporarily accepted the dangerous idea that we would be safer without the checks and balances, and incompetents like our current President espoused this. We got comfortable with the idea of torture to keep us safe and the moral invincibility of our martial efforts abroad. We discarded bodies of law that were inconvenient. We stood for the national anthem a little too quickly, admired non-journalistic "Portraits of Grief" in the New York Times a little too much, supported the troops unreservedly, and checked our criticisms.

In this context it isn't hard to see how the TSA with its bad manners and smug presumptions devolved to where it is now. Assuming I'm not just spouting crap here, the premise of this thread has a silver lining. That silver lining is that what we're looking at is a managable problem that can be managed by, um, better management. The Irish example I cited at the beginning of this thread is one model: someone at the top is telling the rank-and-file to knock off the horseplay, and requiring certain standards of professionalism. Not such a difficult thing.

I think we can do the same, but it may require that people of conscience do the opposite of what our leadership would like: improvement will come through criticism and creative destruction of the many things that suck in the current regime.

-KF

BTW, caucases for "The Flyertalk Party" will begin at once such that we can field a competitive and well-traveled candidate for the 2008 election. He or she will hold top-tier elite status in all major American airlines, naturally.

I can see it now: Iowa, the debates.

H. Clinton: "Mr. Peterson, I respect your position on immigration policy. But you're just not qualified in all the areas that count to real Americans."

R. Peterson: [Arched eyebrow] "And so you're telling me that you earned EXP in the last week? Nobody's butt is big enough to manage all of those BIS miles, so quickly. Even yours, Senator."

[Flyertalk delegates go crazy with this swipe, waving around placards: "LOL" "My BIS for Peterson" "1P + EXP = President" ]

-KF

I just got through with two weeks of the TSA insecurity show and can honestly say that I found more tolerance in the last two weeks than I have seen in a long time. EWR was still barking and acting like gestapo wannabees, but CLT was a lot nicer (I heard a "please" and "sorry for the inconvience"). PHL was nice (Delta gates) as was CMH, but ORD and DTW were particularly obnoxious. The folks at CHA go out of their way to be nice (even apologizing when taking a pocket knife from a young boy), but ATL has gone downhill in a hurry.

Maybe all of the above is the inconsistency that is supposed to keep them dang terrorists off balance :rolleyes:

Nice but sad experience at CAE
 

I came home from CAE last tuesday..........jeez , it's been a long 2 weeks.......tuesday before last, and had my backpack hand examined at the TSA stop.
The screener was courteous and let me know what he would be doing before he did it.
He very much acted with the same underlying message that you all have mentioned , this is a necessary evil.
I'd been reading so many horror stories on FT lately that before I walked away , it occurred to me to thank him for making it a pleasant enough experience.

:-D And here's the sad part. After I landed in IAD, I went to the RCC and was going to stock up on a soda and a couple of snakes in my backpack and what did I find.......... a can of soda from last week that I had forgotten I had put in there from the last RCC visit on the way to CAE. I had had unknowingly brought 9 extra ounces with me! And it had not been found!! :rolleyes:
Luckily , it wasn't a danger to anybody , it was diet. ;)

Well, as usual, I wonder what times you are flying through the same airports I travel through. Except for the bit about the inspectors goofing around when not behind the x-ray machine, I just don't recognize your description of the airport security lines I fly through.

I wonder, do you have experiences at Jiffy Lube, Wal-Mart, and Starbucks that are similar to what you experience at the TSA checkpoint?

1) We can choose not to patronize Jiffy Lube, Wal-Mart, and Starbucks when their employees goof around. These businesses all have competitors.

2) Our tax dollars do not pay for the employees of Jiffy Lube, Wal-Mart, and Starbucks to goof around. I resent my tax dollars paying for people who violate my rights when they stop goofing around and actually work.

The short answer is no, I don't generally have these experiences at any of the companies you describe, in part because all of them have a habit of firing underperformers. Starbucks makes my triple short Americano faster than I could, without yelling at me, with or without collegial horseplay. Competence to the core mission is all I ask.

I don't go through life looking for things to complain about, and I'll laugh off a lot. But Patrick Henry hits the nail on the head: TSA's position is "special," just as a prosecutor's or a policeman's position is "special." We grant these people an exceptional degree of latitude to detain people, to invade privacy, and to impede our freedoms under the presumption that this power is necessary for public safety and welfare.

The quid pro quo is that these state-sanctioned authority figures must be a) managed carefully and b) professional. If they are not, then you're cooking up a mess. Incompetants and small tyrants will have their way, and the public's confidence in the system -- and by extension their democracy -- will be undermined.

I can go somewhere else for my coffee if need be. There's only one way thorough the TSA checkpoint. These officers need to do their jobs well.

-KF

TSA at RDU this Friday, Terminal C: A fairly respectful operation, no yelling. All pax seemed to be treated respectfully. Wait time about 4-6 minutes

TSA at TUS Sunday: No yelling, there was a question from one agent to his supervisor about my bottle of contact lens fluid, but she reassured him it was fine. All agents seemed to be polite. Wait time was a little longer here, about 10 minutes.

BTW, was EVERY AA flight packed to the gills this weekend, or just the flights I was on?

This reminds me of an experience I had there (Moscow) circa '96. The x-ray caught my Leatherman and they gestured at me to take it out and show them what it was. This I did; I showed them that it was a pair of folding pliers ;) . No problemo.

I lost that same Leatherman this year at IAH. I got "Bag check!" after accidentally leaving it in my bag. The TSO politely went through the bag, asking me questions about its contents. Just before he got to the well hidden Leatherman he asked if I had one, at which point I realized my mistake. :eek:

The TSO actually seemed to do a good job of trying to figure out if I knew that I had the Leatherman in my bag. I didn't know, but he did from the get-go. He offered to let me mail it, but the door to my flight was about to close... so I told him to throw it out.

In this case I can give a ^ to that TSO for his professionalism. This means a lot coming from me, as I really don't like the paranoia that the TSA represents.

I know this will sound "racist" although it most defintely is not - how come I have so much trouble understanding the "accents" of TSA at US airports and not in other countries. I really am getting annoyed with TSA staff joking and talking to each other in languages other than English (and not limited to Spanish). I am not a supporter of you live in the USA, speak English, but I am tired of hearing so many languages other than English being spoken by TSA staff while on duty, even amongst themselves.

I should be able to understand on duty federral employees while in my own country.

If it doesn't pertain to their official duties, they can speak whatever language they choose to. As long as they address the customers in English.

Multi-lingual TSA staff are certainly a benefit to have.