Letters to the Editor
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Anyway, shooting down a plane with a shoulder fired missile is a lot more efficient
At under 2000 ft elevation and 250kts an airliner is one big goddamn target. It's only a matter of time before someone gets their hands on a Russian MPR and takes one down. We're not talking about lone nuts who want to blow up their wife. We're talking about people with $100,000 to spend on a black market weapon one time use.
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I do not feel safer knowing the pilot has a gun...
...but then again, I don't feel less safe either. A person responsible enough to fly an airliner is responsible enough to carry a gun. I just have trouble picturing whole scenario: Armed terrorists have taken over the plane and are threatening the passengers - a terrified flight attendant phones the flight deck and seconds later the cockpit door flies open and the pilot and copilot rush into first-class with guns blazing. I just can't see it. If this ever happens, I hope the pilots remain locked in the cockpit flying the plane.
As for the Crew Pass issue, that bothers me a bit. I kind of like the idea that the crew has to pass through some kind of security before going to the plane. As someone mentioned here, company ids and uniforms can be stolen. Also, as I recall, a couple of the pilots that were discovered to be under the influence were noticed by screeners at the security checkpoint, a very rare incident I am sure, but nonetheless, the consequences could have been disasterous.
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Bureaucracy
I wrote this in response to one of your columns several years ago but I believe it is worth restating.
What your're discussing is BUREAUOCRACY, necessary to the administration of a civil society, but also the topic of jokes and derision for centuries. It is, as we all know, subject to all kinds of failings. A list of these failings common to all bureaucracies, not just the TSA, poorly recognized chains of command and decision-making, incompetence, corruption, nepotism, lack of accountability, rigidity of procedures, and interpretation of laws, to cite just a few.
I don't know how you could carry this any further except to say perhaps an Alice in Wonderland Bureauocracy!?
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The root of the problem...
Nice column. I don't have strong feelings about pilots carrying guns; it's pretty much irrelevant now that the cockpit door's locked (no, they're not going to charge out of the cockpit Rambo-style to take down hijackers in the passenger cabin). There's the added danger of the occasional accidental discharge versus the (minor) added deterrent to the terrorist that the pilots may have a gun and be prepared to use it. As Patrick says, the 1970s model for hijackings is obsolete post-9/11, so arming crew members is really not that big an issue.
Condemning the TSA doesn't get to the root of the problem with utterly pointless 'security' measures. If you ran the TSA, you'd have to take two factors (at least) into account when considering changing the security procedures: the gain in convenience for the passengers; and the (presumed) culpability of the TSA if any terrorist incident were to occur. The way the incentives are set up right now, there is no chance in hell that the TSA will act to improve passsenger convenience - because if any terrorist event ever took place, TSA would be excoriated by press and politicians for their 'lax' security. ('Lax' meaning 'less than it had been at some point in the past'). It wouldn't matter if the terrorist event wasn't dependent on exploiting the reduction in passenger security checks - any change would be used by media and politicians as a way to assign blame.
So the TSA's not going to change unless voters make politicians make it. Of course, the TSA is now part of (or at least entangled with) the military-industrial complex (or perhaps a rather newer 'anti-terrorism-industrial complex'?), so many businesses - as well as TSA emloyees who would be put out of jobs if security measures were reduced - have a vested interest in perpetuating the current state of affairs. This means that there are lobbyists in Washington whose job it is to feed the current terrorism/security paranoia.
Security measures in the current climate are a ratchet: they will only increase and never decrease. You can expect them to ratchet up periodically, as a new 'threat' is identified. You can expect the new 'threats' to be defined in such a way that the measures to counteract them profit some interest group (politicians, TSA employees or businesses). Sometimes that 'profit' will be that the politicians are seen to be 'tough' on terrorism.
How do you fix this? The only way is for the public to put pressure on politicians. The only people who will do this are the actual travelling public. That means organizing a single-issue passenger group whose declared goal is to modify airport security into a reasoned response to real, identifiable threats, rather than being a governmental CYA exercise. Everyone who travelled and felt strongly about the issue would have to voice that, in some agreed way, every time they went through security.
Happily for me, I don't travel very much right now, but good luck to the rest of you in trying to get the Great American Public to bring about this change.
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Ludicrous and Ineffective, the screening is
My own personal experience: I flew to RDU over Christmas. In my carry-on I inadvertently had both a micro-Leatherman and, most astonishingly, my "urban-buddy", a 2-inch push-knife!
Went right through.
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Ann H. has it exactly right.
The purpose of the TSA security measures is to make the American people feel LESS secure. By making us feel that the threat of terrorism is so serious that we must take off our shoes and have our tiny shampoo bottles in quart ziplock bags, the people really running the country trick us into trading our rights for protection from The Muslim Menace.
I’m convinced it is a conscious program designed to get folks used to standing in line and doing as they are told. The randomness, illogic and ever-changing nature of the “rules” is likewise intentional. “Take of your shoes.” “Show me your boarding pass.” “Take of your belt.” “Put away that boarding pass, I only need your ID.” “Too many books might be a bomb.” “Where is your boarding pass and ID?” “Take out your computer.” “Turn on your computer.” “Don’t touch that computer.”
What Patrick ignores is the way the airlines have been complicit in all this. You are no longer a customer who has spent hundreds of dollars for a valuable service – you are unruly livestock that won’t stay in place. Any show of passenger displeasure or dissatisfaction is deemed “air rage” or interference with the flight crew (who knew stew – er, flight attendants – got a badge when they graduated training?)
Without going to the kitchen a folding up a nice foil hat, I’ll sum it up this way – the goal is to change our basic understanding from being citizens who are governed to subjects who are ruled. The goal is to increase the complementary levels dependence and subservience. Mark my words, it’s going to get worse.
(As for guns in the cockpit – perfectly fine. The pilot is NOT going to be coming back to take down a hijacker. He’s going to be shooting anyone who comes through the cockpit door, intent on turning the aircraft into a missile. I’m all for that; it’s about security of those on the ground, really. As for those in the air, in this post-9/11 world, my fellow passengers and I will be pounding the hijacker to pulp back in the cabin, whatever the costs or risks – assuming the flight attendants let us out of our seats, of course.)